Sears emailed me multiple Shop Your Way points offers this week to shop with: $8 off an $8 purchase of Sears clothing, $20 off a $20 purchase of lawn and garden items, and $15 off a $20 purchase of Sears clothing! As I’ve confessed to in the past, I really don’t go to Sears unless I receive some kind of crazy offer. I felt that the potential of these three offers just might warrant a trip, so I headed to Spring Hill Mall this morning.
My “quick trip” turned into something of an unanticipated plethora of discounts! Guess what I paid for all of these items? You’re about to find out.
Transaction #1: $15 0ff $20 clothing purchase
I really liked this pair of cargo shorts for my son — they have cool scout and camp trail markers printed on them and were on clearance for $13.99. I also picked up a button-up shirt for him with sharks on it that was marked down to $3.99! Together, they totaled $17.98 — a little shy of my $20 goal to use the $15-off-$20.
As I shared earlier this month, our local Sears store has a very inexpensive item that makes a great filler for coupon clothing deals like this: $1 thong underwear! (Conveniently located at the register too, I should add!) Adding three put my total to $20.98. After the coupon and tax, I paid $6.14.
Transaction #2: $8 off $8 clothing purchase
This time, I browsed around the women’s department and found a long-sleeve shirt that looked like me. It was $7.99 – darn close to $8. I also saw a display of candy puzzle tins at the register. Each tin featured brightly-colored sea life or animals and contained a bag of gummy animals and a kids’ puzzle. Originally $12, these tins were marked down to $1.20 each! My coupon did not cover them, but I have some animal-loving nieces who would love these, so I bought those too.
Of course, $7.99 is not $8, and Sears won’t let you redeem an $8 points offer on anything less than that. Another $1 thong undie to the rescue! After this coupon, I paid $3.64 for the shirt, thong, and the candy puzzle tins. (Really, I just paid for everything but the shirt.)
Transaction #3: $20 off $20 lawn and garden purchase
This was actually the offer I was most excited about using! Our garden hose is old, and earlier this summer it sprung several leaks. I cut off the leaking portion and added a new coupling, but now it’s too short to reach the back of the yard. I have been looking for a deal on a long 100′ hose, but most of them are close to $30. This one was $27.99 at Sears. After the coupon and tax, I paid $8.63!
Now, I thought I was done shopping (and quite happy with my $61.82 worth of purchases for $18.41!) However, a bunch of coupons had printed with my receipts. I took a moment to go through them. Usually these coupons have start dates a few days after the day they print, to get you to return to the store the following week, but all of my new coupons had start dates of 8/30! So, I thought, let’s see what other deals I can put together…
Transaction #4: $10 off a $15 home purchase
One of my new offers was for $10 off a $15 purchase in the home department. I spotted these 8-packs of washcloths on sale for $4.99! We never seem to have enough washcloths around here, and so these were on my mental list of “things to look for a deal on” too. I picked up three eight-packs, which put me at $14.97, just shy of $15.
I thought I had found just the right filler item for this deal too, as Sears has a big display of Good Housekeeping-brand liquid hand soap pumps on sale for .60! However, I was informed that hand soap pumps are not considered part of the “home department.”
Silently, I disagreed, and I began searching for another small item to get over $15. I thought, “I’ll just grab another single washcloth.” However, these identical washcloths, when sold individually, are $4.39 each. Eight of them are $4.99.
I spotted a display with mini jar candles for $1.99 each. That put me up to $16.96, and I was able to use my $10-off-$15. After tax, I paid $7.48 for 24 (!) washcloths… and a candle. Now I’d spent a total of $25.89 for $79.37 worth of items!
Transaction #5: 20% off a shoe purchase
I really thought I was about done shopping at Sears now, but one of my other coupons that printed was for 20% off a shoe purchase. I figured it was worth a quick run through the shoe department, as we had found some great deals on sneakers for our boys a few weeks ago.
My coupon excluded clearance shoes and a few specific brands. I ended up finding two more pairs of shoes for my sons, each a size up from what they currently wear. While both were on sale, I wasn’t sure if they were clearance sales or regular sales, so I took both to the register.
The Athletech pair of shoes on the left was on sale for $8.99, and the pair of Everlast shoes on the right was on sale for $9.99. My cashier (who was rather familiar with me at this point!) confirmed that neither one of these were clearance prices! The 20% coupon too $3.80 off both pairs, and I paid $16.39 for both — about $8.20 per pair!
If you’re a Shop Your Way rewards member, even if you’re not a regular Sears shopper, it’s worth paying attention to the coupon offers they send out. For what it’s worth, all of these offers came to my personal email address too, which isn’t affiliated with my blog. I don’t have a blogger relationship with Sears where I’m getting anything special. I do question how they can continue to send out such deep discounts considering the state of the company these days, but I’m very happy with today’s trip!
wolverine70 says
Well, Sears can tank you for getting at least one other person back in there. After your post last week, I started paying better attention to my SYW offers. In consecutive weeks, I received $13 and $14 in surprise points. My wife and I let our youngest granddaughter splurge a bit last week, finding a LOT of great clearance deals. This week, we returned so my wife could shop for herself. In the Sears weekly ad there is 20% off a $50 clothing purchase. Using the surprise points in a separate transaction and again finding some great clearance deals, we came away with a good haul, $200 in retail for less than $45.
I’m not sure how much profit Sears in netting on these, but to have a chance they need to get people in the doors and the SYW points are doing that. Thanks again for these posts.
Coupon Maven says
That’s wonderful — you got more than 75% off!
I don’t know how often I’ll go back, but it’s hard to resist those kinds of high-value points offers. Like you said, these have to be directed at getting people back IN the store, even if they are giving things away for half-off or better. Glad these kinds of posts have helped you save money too :)