Jill Cataldo


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Drop Down Deals $500 Giveaway Week 2… Shake N’ Take Smoothie Makers!

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UPDATE: THIS WEEK’S GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED! WINNERS are Momof3Js (blog,) Stringofpearls (blog,) and LvCarolee (Twitter.) Congratulations to our winners, and thank you to everyone who entered!

Super-Couponers, have I got an incredible MONTH of giveaways for you… as well as a cool way to save on lots of online purchases!

Drop Down Deals is a free browser plug-in that tracks thousands of discount codes for you. Instead of having to use a search engine or coupon-code website to look for percentages off, free shipping, and dollars-off discounts, Drop Down Deals automatically shows you any available coupon codes for the site you’re shopping on.

Recently, the makers of Drop Down Deals got in touch with me and asked if I would like to try out their service for one month, shopping online and using Drop Down Deals to find coupon codes for the purchases I’d be making. They gave me $500 to spend on anything, as long as I used discount codes that the Drop Down Deals browser provided to me while shopping online… and of course, shared my shopping experiences using the Drop Down Deals plug-in with my readers.

I’m giving my month’s worth of Drop Down Deals purchases to YOU! It’s Week 2, and I spotted something cool from SkyMall last month when I was traveling. It’s a Shake n’ Take Smoothie Maker! Instead of having to wash out a big blender every time you want to make a smoothie, you can blend it right inside its own flip-top bottle and take it with you! Too cool:

AND… SkyMall also offered bonus 2-packs of bottles for the smoothie maker. I purchased three smoothie makers and three 2-packs of bottles as bonuses for the THREE winners who will be chosen from this week’s entrants! Drop Down Deals offered a 10% off my entire order for SkyMall, which I used to purchase everything.

There are FOUR ways for you to enter each week:

  • 1. Reply to each week’s Drop Down Deals giveaway post on my blog. Just like every giveaway I host… post a comment under this story, and you’re entered!
     
  • 2. Become a Facebook Fan of Super-Couponing, if you’re not already, then posting under my weekly Drop Down Deals writeup on my Facebook Wall.
     
  • 3. Follow me on Twitter, if you’re not already.
     

(You will get an additional entry into the contest for EACH of these, so if you’d like to do them all, that’s three giveaway entries for you this week.

Which that brings us to #4…

I’d also love YOUR help in deciding what to buy!

  • If you’d like to install the Drop Down Deals browser plugin too, feel free to post any great coupon codes, deals, and potential prizes that you find in the Comments below this article! For every deal that you post that includes a coupon code you found on Drop Down Deals, you will receive ANOTHER entry into that week’s contest. If you spot five great deals and post about them, you just picked up another five entries! (Each deal needs to include the URL of the online store, the product that’s on sale, and the discount code you found with Drop Down Deals for the product. Limit 10 prize-suggestion posts per person per week.)

Want to win a Shake n’ Take Smoothie Maker, plus two bonus bottles? This Drop Down Deals / Three Shake n’ Take Smoothie Maker (plus bonus bottles!) Giveaway begins TODAY, April 4th, and will run for one week. Next Monday, April 11th, I’ll announce the three winners of the Smoothie Makers and bottles, and I’ll kick off Week 3 with another round of prizes for you!

Remember, there are FOUR ways to enter:

  • 1. Reply to each week’s Drop Down Deals giveaway post on my blog.
     
  • 2. Become a Facebook Fan of Super-Couponing, then post under my Drop Down Deals writeup on my Facebook Wall.
     
  • 3. Follow me on Twitter.
     
  • 4. Install the Drop Down Deals browser plugin too, then post any great coupon codes, deals, and potential prizes that you find in the Comments below this article! For every deal that you post that includes a coupon code you found on Drop Down Deals, you will receive ANOTHER entry into that week’s contest. (Each deal needs to include the URL of the online store, the product that’s on sale, and the discount code you found with Drop Down Deals for the product. Limit 10 prize-suggestion posts per person per week.)

Good luck and happy deal hunting!

Legal: This giveaway is sponsored by Drop Down Deals. Posting a response in the Comments area under this story qualifies readers to enter to win one (1) of three (3) Shake n’ Take Smoothie Makers plus one (1) of three (3) bonus 2-packs of bottles (Skymall items #84867 and #84868.) Readers can also gain additional entries by becoming a fan of Super-Couponing on Facebook, then posting in the weekly Drop Down Deals writeup; following Super-Couponing on Twitter; and installing the Drop Down Deals plugin and posting shopping suggestions that include website URL, product, and coupon code found via the Drop Down Deals browser plugin. There is a limit of 10 shopping suggestions giveaway entries per week per person. This week’s contest began at 12:00am CST on April 4, 2011 and will end on April 10, 2011 at 11:59pm. Three winners will be chosen via random-number generator. Winner will be contacted via the Private Messaging feature of JillCataldo.com and via email; or via Facebook messaging; or via Twitter. If winner does not reply to the message within one week (7 days,) the winner will forfeit the prize, and a new winner will be chosen. A $500 American Express gift card has been provided by Drop Down Deals for the purpose of utilizing the site’s discount code browser plug-in while shopping for merchandise online. I have been compensated for this post. I have received information to help promote Drop Down Deals as part of this giveaway. All opinions and experiences with Drop Down Deals expressed either in writing or verbally are my own. To date, I have spent $200.59 of the $500 stipend provided to me ($62.28 during week 1’s giveaway and $138.31 during this current, week 2 giveaway.) In the event that, on the last week of the giveaway, there is not enough of a balance remaining on the gift card to purchase another prize for this giveaway, the remaining funds will be used to offset the postage costs of shipping prizes to the winners. This giveaway is part of a larger, month-long giveaway series. Next week’s giveaway will begin on April 11th, 2011. The giveaway series will conclude after one month. Good luck to everyone!

Comments

  3. Sounds like a cool way to beat the heat this summer! These Drop Down Deals gifts are great!! Thanks, Jill.

  4. We would love one of these for our dairy-free kiddo! We make “Monster Ice Cream” in the blender a lot out of frozen bananas, rice milk, pineapple and spinach. She loves it and it’s healthy too. Would love not to clean up the big machine! : )

  5. Daughter in college and will share an apartment (much less than a dorm) next semester … she is trying to eat much healthier and this smoothie maker would be ideal !!!

    Thanks Jill !!!

  7. I was thinking of keeping it at the office actually. If it comes with more than one bottle, I plan on sharing it with my cube mate who has started a diet (I want to help her succeed, and she’s been kind enough to give me her coupons each week from her paper).

  9. I love browsing the Sky Mall catalog on the plane too. There are always so many neat things in there. This blender sounds wonderful. It would be great to use at work.

  12. I HAVE TWIN 20 MOS OLDS AND THEY LOVE SMOOTHIES, AS DOES MY 9 YEAR OLD. HOPE TO WIN ONE

  13. My husband is a new cardiac patient and we make homemade smoothies for a healthy treat. This would be wonderful to make a quick treat instead of dragging out the blender!!

  20. I have a protien and fruit smoothie everyday, that smoothie maker would make that easier.

  21. We are smoothie lovers in my house. My 18 month old has a dairy allergy and a deep aversion to the rice, soy, almond milks. Smoothies are my way of sneaking it to him. 2 a day…my blender is a hurting unit!!! We would love a smoothie maker.

  23. We just remodeled our kitchen and I am trying to make more home made things for my children in our new kitchen. This would be a great addition…the kiddies love smoothies!

  28. i love smoothies but am too lazy to get the blender out! i would love these :)

  36. I hate eating early in the morning so a breakfast shake would be perfect in this gadget!

  37. i make smoothies for myself and my kids all the time, this would be a great gadget to have! jill u find great stuff u rock!!

  39. And I love smoothies too! This sounds like a cool way to make smoothies on the go.

    Jill – I have a question about twitter – I already follow you – do I need to leave a comment about that here each week or do you go off of your “followers” list?

    Thanks!

  42. This would go perfect with some greek yogurt and fresh fruit from the farmer’s markets this summer. Yummy.

  45. This is such a fun way to see how drop down deals work! Would be thrilled to have a personal smoothie maker.. LOL

  46. Love smoothies… and would love to be able to make my own (without using my blender!). Thanks Jill!!

  49. Sky Mall has a lot of cool stuff and this is no exception. Great idea. My family is wild about smoothies.

  51. Hey Jill!

    So, in the previous giveaway, I had a few questions about how Drop Down Deals works which I never did hear any answers for, but that’s fine though. You’re understandably busy (BTW, congrats on wrapping up the SC2 video shoot) and I’m more than capable of doing a little research on my own. So I did some poking around at their website, found all the answers I was looking for, and figured that I should share with you and your readers what I found so that anyone else interested in this service can make a slightly more informed decision as to whether they feel it is worth installing the application.

    Like pretty much every web service out there, registering with the website and installing their application requires acceptance of their Terms of Service (TOS) agreement and Privacy Policy. The vast majority of the TOS is just your standard CYA software EULA legalese stating that you have to take everything on their terms, can’t sue for damage, if you do sue it has to be in their home court, etc, etc. However, there are a few phrases included in the “General Usage” section that raise a red flag in my book:

      2. General Usage.
      Drop Down Deals grants you a limited license to use the Services in accordance with this Agreement and the instructions and guidelines posted on the Drop Down Deals website (“the Site”).In exchange for providing the functionality of the Drop Down Deals application, users may be shown advertisements within the application. Drop Down Deals reserves the right to discontinue any aspect of the Service at any time. Drop Down Deals further reserves the right to terminate your license to use the Services at any time and for any reason, or in the future, to charge for commercial usage. To provide services to the User, Drop Down Deals requires certain third party software to operate. When installing Drop Down Deals, this third party software will be included in the installation package. The software is used primarily for the purpose of enabling Drop Down Deals to provide its services.

    Agreeing to the TOS also requires agreement to the Privacy Policy which happens to include the following gems:

      “We collect information from you when you use a Drop Down Deals service, register on our site or enter a contest.”

      “Any of the information we collect from you may be used in one of the following ways by Drop Down Deals or our strategic affiliates or partners.”

      “The email address you provide for order processing may be used to send you information and updates pertaining to your user account, in addition to receiving occasional company news, updates, related product or service information, etc.”

      “We use cookies to understand and save your preferences for future visits, keep track of advertisements and compile aggregate data about site traffic and site interaction”

      “We allow third-party companies to serve ads and/or collect certain anonymous information when you use Drop Down Deals services or visit our web site. These companies may use non-personally identifiable information (e.g., click stream information, browser type, time and date, subject of advertisements clicked or scrolled over) during your visits to this and other Web sites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services likely to be of greater interest to you. These companies typically use a cookie or third party web beacon to collect this information. To learn more about this behavioral advertising practice or to opt-out of this type of advertising, you can visit http://www.networkadvertising.org.”

      “Occasionally, at our discretion, we may include or offer third party products or services on our website. These third party sites have separate and independent privacy policies. We therefore have no responsibility or liability for the content and activities of these linked sites.”

      “This online privacy policy applies only to information collected through our website and not to information collected offline.”

    Besides the fact that “anonymous cookie data” is not really as anonymous as you might think, that last statement is particularly onerous. If I’m reading it right, the privacy policy is only offering it’s (moderate) protection when you are at the Drop Down Deals website and make purchases directly through their website. However, as the installed application resides on your computer and from there interacts with whatever websites you happen to be visiting, any and all information collected by the application could technically be considered “collected offline” and not even be subject to the privacy policy. Who knows what may be done with it then!

    So, the bottom line is that like all internet applications out there, we have to decide if the benefits provided are worth the cost (in this case, information on your browsing and shopping habits) given in exchange. In this particular case there are just too many holes in the privacy policy for my personal comfort. Now, for anyone else reading this, they may have a different threshold of what they’re comfortable sharing (you don’t have to look any farther than Facebook to see how low some people’s privacy threshold can be!) and this may be a great application for them to install and use. However, as so often seems the case, many people don’t realize what they’re actually agreeing to when they sign up with websites or install software, so I hope this helps to illuminate the issue a little more.

  56. The thought of cleaning the blender often times convinces me not to make a smoothy. I’d love one of these!

  57. The name Jill means sweetheart. Thanks for being one and for offering these sweet giveaways.

    Love ya,
    Jill D.

  59. Do you know how nice it would be not to have to wash out the big ole blendor after hubby’s daily smoothie??

    Thanks, Jill

  61. My wife love to make smoothies with fresh fruit and yougrt. Can’t beat this deal!

  62. My son is always asking for smoothies and I always say no because I don’t want to clean the blender!

  70. What a great gadget!! I think this house needs one….
    I might even have to break down and buy one :-)
    Thanks for all you do!

  81. She loves smoothies and I do hate to drag out the big blender and clean it up. Would love to win this! Thanks Jill.

  82. ….and planning on moving into an apartment after she finds a job. This would be ideal for her apartment, and would hopefully encourage her to make some healthy treats :-)

  84. This looks great! Especially nice for busy moms on the go! I think we should start turning to you for pointers on xmas gifts! Got some great ideas from your site!

  85. I love to make healthy smoothies for my family…I buy strawberries when they are on sale and then freeze them on a tray then bag them up! They are good for months…Yummy

  91. This sounds like a great thing to win! Count me in, & thank-you Jill for all the things you’ve taught me. :)

  92. My friend has one of these and she said its so much fun. The clean up is as simple as washing a water bottle in the dishwasher, no awkward blender to try and clean by hand. Please enter me into this giveaway!

  95. WOW! Thanks Jill for all that you do! It was great to meet you at the taping of the Super Couponing 2 DVD! Even though the taping did not go as planned at first, it was such an interesting experience to learn more about how to save even more money from you and to see how the filming was done. It was also great to see your daughter and watch her help at your taping. I also have a 15 year old daughter (in fact, today is her birthday!) It was sweet to hear your daughter’s comments about you (all good) and I could tell how proud she is of all of your accomplishments. OK… Now to the Drop Down Deals….. this looks great. WOW…. they gave you $500 to spend! How nice and even more nice that you are sharing with all of us!

  96. I downloaded the plug-in, and had some suggestions-
    1) MP3 players at Target (get 10% off coupon), or at Office Depot (get $20 off of $125). I was thinking about the 4GB ones, that run around $30 each.
    and
    2) Jewelry from Ann Tayor anntaylor.com. They are giving 30% off full price (w/o coupon code), free shipping, no minimum (from drop down coupons). They have a nice variety, and I think they would make nice mother’s day gifts. :)

  97. I recently got the “Hello Bombshell” makeup kit from victoriassecret.com for $29.50, and I think it’s an incredible value, as you get $143 worth of makeup in the kit. From the drop-down deals, VS is having $15 off of $100, and free shipping on orders over $100. I think they might be able to be combined, but I don’t know for sure. Either way, then $29.50 x 4 = $118, minus $15 is $103. It comes out to about $25.75 per kit.

  99. There are cute messenger bags on sale at Land’s End for $19.99. (Item# 39256-9AJ2). The drop down deals mentions an extra 30% off, so each come down to $13.99. The front page of land’s end also has free shipping with orders of over $50. :)

  101. Smoothies have made a comeback, they are a healthy way to get fruits and veggies into your diet. Also a great way to use all those frozen fruits we have stocked up on!

  102. My kids love Jamba Juice but that is a rare treat for us. This would be worth 24.99 to make smoothies for them. It would take only 5 smoothies to recover your cost.

  107. Thanks for posting all your great tips! I love how you mentioned that one doesn’t have to spend hours to get good deals b/c I sure don’t and save.

    Thanks for all the help!

  116. A smoothie maker would reduce my urge to frequent Jamba Juice. An expensive, but delicious addiction.

  123. In the spirit of kitchen appliances, I was looking at Cotton Candy makers. I saw one on the Sear’s website (which featured drop-down discounts) and one on the Carson Pirie Scott website, which was cheaper, but without a drop down discount.

  130. This product looks gr8! Pls enter me in the giveaway! I am looking to have a healthier household & smoothies are the only way I can get my 7yr old 2 eat almost any fruit! lol lol

  133. Following you via Facebook and Twitter as well as the blog site. I would really love to win one of these – pretty please, pick me!! ;)

  143. I would love a new smoothie maker – would be great for my protein shakes!!
    Thanks for all your hard work!
    Lisa

  148. I would love to make smoothies but with 3 jobs I don’t have the time to make them. This would be a great time saver and a nice treat. I hope it is my LUCKY DAY!

  150. This looks like a really neat product that might come in handy for me since my son has become more active after school.

  151. My soon to be two year old son loves Smoothies and drinks most in the car. This would be perfect for him as he is not a great eater and I am always looking for creative ways to get anything healthy down him!

  153. Just joined the site and “liked” to become a fan on Fb and I follow you on Twitter!!! This looks like a nice item to have to use all my stockpiled frozen friut in!!!

jillcataldoheadshotI'm Jill Cataldo, founder of Super-Couponing® workshops and author of the nationally-syndicated newspaper column and video series "Super-Couponing Tips" enjoyed by over 20 million people each week.

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