File this one under “What is Dominick’s thinking now?”
Over the past few weeks, Cellfire subscribers received emails notifying them that Dominick’s has decided not to participate in Cellfire ecoupons anymore. From the wording in the email, it seemed that this was a temporary situation, as Cellfire hoped that they’d be available to Dominick’s shoppers again soon. A press release I received from Cellfire echoed the same sentiment — this was a temporary decision on Dominick’s part.
Apparently, though, it’s not temporary. And not only is Cellfire not coming back, PGEsaver and Shortcuts ecoupons may now be off the table too. Dominick’s is apparently putting all of their eggs in the “Just For U” basket.
Julia Wessels, author of The Frugal Find (a great Bay-area deals blog for any northern California readers, by the way) recently attended a bloggers’ event hosted by Safeway regarding the rollout of Just For U in Northern California. And at the bloggers’ event, Julia learned that Safeway stores utilizing Just For U (currently Hawaii, Illinois, and Northern California) will no longer support ecoupons from Cellfire, PGEsaver, ShortCuts or Upromise.
There you go.
It would have been nice if Dominick’s would have released this information in our area too, or held a Chicagoland bloggers’ event (Dominick’s, Jewel is light-years ahead of you in this area on maintaining relationships with their bloggers) or… heck, posted a notice that these would no longer be supported on their own website so that their shoppers would have an official statement about it.
Instead, shoppers can still load PGEsaver, ShortCuts and Upromise ecoupons to their Dominick’s Fresh Values card right now (yes, I just tried it, from both PGE and ShortCuts – screenshots below. In fact, ShortCuts is still allowing you to register a new Dominick’s card for their ecoupons.)
Screenshots taken at 9:00pm, 10/28/10:
garpgarp says
I haven’t shopped there in over a year. The closest one to me is the notorious Randall / Huntley Rd store and I just can’t get myself to walk in the door again. There’s never anything, now that I have a nicely stocked pantry, basement and closet (thanks Jill!), I need to buy at Dominicks, even if it’s free. I do just fine at Jewel and have never left there feeling mad or red in the face, ever.
armymom says
to make their “Ghost Town” stores into Graveyards”…
denisec says
that a company would really do their best to remodel the stores, start this new program and then make attempts to get rid of many of their valued customers. I really do love my local Dom’s. My closest Jewel is very small and is missing many of my regular items which is why I have turned to Dom’s. I hope that some excessive complaints to corporate can return some of our favorite perks, otherwise I will have to make Jewel my place to shop. Now would be a GREAT TIME for Jewel to take on ecoupons! Hmmm I think some calls to Jewel headquarters might be due…
tammidunc says
The Dominicks closest to me is already empty most of the time so if (and probably I should actually say ‘when’) they stop taking expireds then I really won’t go over there at all.
pamk says
think that Doms would be doing everything that they could to keep their existing customers and to get new ones in this economy. Taking away the e-coupons does the exact opposite, and in essence, they are the ones that are going to loose out in the end as us savy shoppers will look elsewhere to get our deals.
Too bad for you Dominicks, with Jill teaching us to be savy shoppers and more all the time at many of her seminars, you will be losing a bunch of potential shoppers.
dancingwolves says
putting all your eggs in one basket….I knew something was up when I was updating the e-coupons at the various sites yesterday so this note was very timely.
Did review the Just For U items over the past two weeks. It did appear reflective of purchases I had actually made this past year (unlike Avenu though I did benefit from it several times). However, the pricing will not match stacking a store/mfg coupon with the e-coupon by any stretch of the imagination. Which is a shame as I am one Jewel shopper who took the time to venture in the Dominick’s stores over the past year and started to visit them regularly.
Charlie Q says
is focussing more on the casual coupon shoppers. There are people out there that have never used an e-coupon or even known that they existed. There are people that don’t even have FV card and still shop at Dominick’s with paper coupons. Now with the big push on just for u there are a lot more people aware of the program and what it has to offer.
As far as losing out on the P&G, shortcuts and Cellfire, they were all one time use coupons. Granted you may have had 4 $.50 off fruit snacks come off the one box that you bought, but the next box you buy you get nothing. So if you buy 8 boxes you’re still only getting the $.50 off 4 times.
Be honest, look at the big picture, how much (what pecentage) of your savings was actually atributed to shortcuts and Cellfire? (I excluded P&G because of their recent hard stand on stacking paper coupons along with e-coupons and for the most part you can get as good or better paper).
frugalsheila says
I skip right over the Dom’s deals every week and haven’t shopped there except maybe twice in the last year. I don’t miss them at all.
They seem to be doing everything they can to push couponers… and shoppers, really…. away. Jill- Did you ever think about giving them what they want and dropping them from your deals?!?
I would be much more interested in reading Ultra deals (even though I never warmed up to them after they took over from Cub, my favorite).
pwill69 says
I personally do not like the new Just 4U program. It just seems way too complex now to figure out what’s a deal and what is not a deal. Personal pricing, ecoupons, super coupons, etc are great but it’s not really organized well. And bottom line, I still don’t have the confidence that the discounts will come off correctly.
I don’t see that big of a deal with loosing the cellfire, shortcuts and P&G. Many of those same coupons are on Dom’s site anyways so it’s one less place to check for coupons IMHO.
What I dislike about these programs (like Meijer’s ecoupon area) is that it’s good for 1 discount. Big whip. Even a casual couponer usually will buy more than one item if it’s a good deal or they only go to the store say every other week. Sure we could do the multiple card thing but that’s a PITA for no good reason. I can take my paper coupons and just get it done in one transaction. I also have more confidence that my paper coupons are going to come off – I hand the cashier a piece of paper with x.xx off and then I can watch it come off. No watching the computer screen to see what came off while it scrolls on by like it does with the ecoupons. Easier at self checkout but then I would still check my paper copy of my notes to see if what I expected to come off actually did so how virtual is that? And then there’s the issue of when it doesn’t come off right to have to go to customer service… At least with paper coupons you see what you get much easier.
And unless they want to lose another segment of their shoppers, Just 4U is not going to be for everyone. There are those that do not have access to the Internet or know how to use the Internet. Sure, they have laptops in stores but how many people who didn’t get the stuff loaded up are going to sit down and use this site before they grab what they want?
Jewel was light years ahead of them with their Avenue program. Does anyone remember scanning your card by the door and having a paper printout of the Avenue deals? Sure, you only got between 5-10 deals and did not always seem to track what we might be buying but at least it was a start. Not sure why it didn’t really take off – Jewel seems to have walked away from this.
I still do go to Doms for the occasional deal as I have one pretty close by. If there are get deals to be had, I’m probably missing them since it’s buried within their Just 4U website with my personal pricing for products.
mrsgriffler says
I knew there was something fishy going on…the last time I was there (and I only went because I had a giftcard) I did not get the deals I was supposed to with the coupons that I had loaded onto my card and my catalinas didn’t print. I knew it…I looked at that receipt a dozen times trying to figure it out and it just didn’t add up. I never liked Doms and now I won’t ever go back!
Cheapolak says
I agree that Dominick’s should have announced that they would no longer be accepting e-coupons from sources other than their own website. This could have easily been done amongst all the brouhaha about “Just for U”. I also agree that they should’ve stopped the capability to load e-coupons from other sites to shoppers’ Fresh Values cards to avoid confusion and disappointment.
But honestly, if you look at the e-coupons offered via Doms.com, they are duplicates of everything you’d get at P&G, Cellfire, etc. Sure, it was a nice surprise for a few weeks there when multiple e-coupons would come off the same item, but clearly it was a mistake– a system glitch essentially comparable to using more than one manufacturer coupon per item, which any follower of Jill’s knows is a no-no. Dom’s should’ve taken the opportunity to make a positive PR announcement, with the spin that “now you can get all your ecoupons in one place, without having to go to each of the other sites.”
But by not explaining what was going on, they really dropped the ball with this and seem to have built more resentment amongst the couponers they are supposed to be enticing.
MamaHan says
The email mentions saving more than $100 on participating brands, and even includes Doms in the list of participating stores. What gives? I didn’t bother signing up, and this is totally confusing for someone wanting to stay on top of things. (Though all things considered, this is par for the course, right?!)