As I have already reported here, Toys ‘R’ Us has sent out emails with exclusive coupon offers that have discount on video games.

First of all, you get $10 off any video game.

SAVE $10 on ANY video game over $30 when you present your exclusive email coupon! Choose from XBOX 360, PlayStation 2, Nintendo DS, Nintendo GameCube, GameBoy Advance, Nintendo Wii, PlayStation Portable and Original XBOX games.

That’s pretty much covering all major consoles. Sorry your Super Nintendo or Atari games don’t qualify :)

There’s also 20% off any Sims computer game.

SAVE 20% on ANY Sims Computer Game when you present your exclusive email coupon! Choose from The Sims Unleashed, Hot Date, Superstar, Making Magic and more.

You need to follow the link, and download the PDF coupon file, print it out, and bring along with you when you shop for video games. Promotion expires on 23 Jan 2007.

Sometimes, you need to do a bit of bargaining to get a real good bargain, even for online stores.

Shopping for a washing machine

Recently we bought a brand new washing machine, because our old top-loader had constant problems over the last two years, and we could almost buy a new machine from the money we paid to fix that bugger up. We settled on a front-loading Electrolux, model EWF 1087 to be exact. It has great reviews, Electrolux is a trusted brand, and it is an out-going model we heard, which means there is a chance we might grab a good bargain.

The next thing? Find the cheapest one.

What we did first is to use the online price comparison sites like DoorOne, ShopFerret and ShopBot. Yes — use them all because they do not always carry the same list of shops. Another cost to factor in is delivery charge. For white goods it can become very expensive, especially if they are inter-states or you don’t happen to drive a ute.

The cheapest comes down to The Electric Discounter in Queensland — $688. However, delivery to Sydney will cost $55, which comes down to $743 — still the cheapest on the list.

Well, we then try to bring the online price we gathered from the price comparison sites to a real shop front and asked for price match. We tried The Good Guys Discounted Warehouse in Alexandria and RetraVision in Kingsford. One laughed at us, and one never called back. Well, maybe their “low price” is not really guaranteed. No, we did not even bother to ask Bing Lee — their listed price is already $250 dealer than The Electric Discounter’s.

However, my wife and I really like to buy from a Sydney shop just in case there’s any warranty claims. So my wife rang up Appliances Online, who is selling the same Electrolux online for $747 including delivery, to see whether they are willing to match the price. They are in Waterloo so very close to us.

Then the person on the phone was willing to sell us the washing machine for $730, delivery included. Moreover, their technician will install it for us, i.e. connecting the pipe, etc, whereas The Electric Discounter is only willing to drop it at our front-door. Plus Sydney’s $150 rebate on front-loading washing machines, our 7kg new Electrolux turned out to be only $580 delivered and installed. Well, that sounds like a done deal to me.

Moral of the story — sometimes you can even try a bit of bargaining on online stores, if they happen to have price matching policy and a number you can call. Do your research, and you might be surprised that how willing they want to do business with you.

Shopping for furnitures

Here is another story. During the Christmas-New Year holidays, we also brought a new single bed + a tall boy from Knott’s Pine in SupaCenta. Tall boy is on special for $199, and the bed frame costs $299. So together it should be $498.

However at checkout, even without asking or any act of bargaining, Knott’s Pine knocks off $48 from the final price, and made it $450 for both items. Yup. Quick discount WITHOUT a single request.

Maybe we could have bring down the price even further if we asked. Maybe.

Yan tagged me with the recent Internet craze that was started by Jeff Pulver about a month ago. I have actually been tagged before, and has written 5 things people probably didn’t know about me. However it was on my other blog (which is web hosting related, btw).

So I guess I will need to come up with 5 other things people didn’t know about me, and will hopefully be about personal finance/bargains/shopping/etc.

1. I never really “worked”, i.e. in a job getting regular paypacket, until I was 21, when I had my first full-time programming gig. Shame on me.
2. One of my biggest financial mistake was spending $20k of my own money on a brand new car. I was 23. Should have spent $7-8k on a second hand car and saved the rest.
3. Bought our current house at the peak of the Sydney property boom (Oct-Nov 2003). Another big mistake :(
4. I spend around $15 on mobile phone every 6 month. Not that I am on a super cheap mega-saving plan, but I just don’t use my phone that often.
5. I am fascinated by a lot of good bargains, but I actually don’t do much shopping. I think I have worked out my “need” vs “want”, and I seldom buy the things I talked about here. You didn’t know that, did you? :)

Alright. Here comes the fun part — tagging the victims :) I’ll tag the Aussies, and will be bargain related. Jonks of Jonks Bargain, someone from the Zazz team, Raja from Save as u Spend and The Bargain Queen.

I have just announced our second competition, which will be running from today (3 Jan) for 3 weeks (until 23 Jan). Here’s the summary version:

• Post a deal, and you’ll get a chance to win, up to 5 entries.
• 1x$50 and 5x$20 Deals Direct vouchers to be won.
• Deals Direct will actually sponsor this competition by match the prize dollar for dollar, i.e. double the amount.

So it’s effectively 1x$100 and 5x$40 vouchers to be won. The only down side is that it has to be Deals Direct vouchers, although it was the most popular choice from our previous prize winners.

Yup. Time to get rocking!

The first day of 2007 is almost over. The blogosphere over the last two days has been filled with posts reviewing 2006 and welcoming 2007. I think I shall do the same.

2006 — Out!

2006 has been a year of growth for OzBargainBlog. It wasn’t even called OzBargainBlog when the year started, and it was hosted on my good old home server on my ADSL connection at home. In January 2006 I was getting 1182 unique visitors on this blog, but everything is good — I was having fun sharing some bargains with some close friends.

Continue reading »

Bargains and deals blogging is getting more and more prominent in Australia. I started this blog 18 months ago when I could not find any, but there are more and more on the horizon. They talk about the latest deals and great bargains that they can find in both brick & mortar stores and online stores. In the era of Web 2.0, where user-generated content is the king, online stores should try to actually take advantage of those bargain blogs to bring in more traffic thus making more sales.

No. I am not talking about advertising, nor bribing the bloggers. There are already Google Adsense and ReviewMe/PayPerPost that can send you traffic and some link juice if you have some $$$ to spare. I actually want to talk about the things that online stores can do to make bargains bloggers’ lives easier to write about your deals.

There are quite a few that I can think of, but I will just write about two today.

Continue reading »

Koorong is running a similar end-of-year super sale like last year, starting from 26^th of December 2005 to 6^th of January 2007.

You get:

• 15% off all purchases up to $100
• 20% off all purchases $100-$300
• 25% off all purchases over $300
• 50% off all Christmas cards, calendars, and other selected Christmas items.

You can shop in person, fax or email your order from Koorong, or just visit their website to make purchases. As usual, they have free Australia-wide delivery if you purchase over $99 from the web.

At the same time, WORD, another popular Christian bookshop in town, is also having a very similar sale with slightly different conditions.

• 15% off all purchases up to $50
• 20% off all purchases over $50
• 50% off all Christmas cards and calendars

They too have free freight discount when you spend over $100, and their discount actually starts today, 23^rd of December. It is also finishing on the 6th of January.

Yes! Last day at work for the year 2006. I will be taking three days off next week + 4 more days the week after. New posts here will be more sparse while I am in the “holiday mood”.

Meanwhile, there are only 12 more hours to go to contribute your bargain findings on OzBargain, to be in the draw for gift certificates. There are actually less partitipants that I have originally hoped for (d’oh) — which means there is a higher chance for you to win a prize, unless the website suddenly got a big flood of postings at 11pm today.

Winners will be contacted by email early tomorrow morning.

Jonk’s Bargains is an interesting Australian bargain site. First of all, it is what it claims:

This website turns grown men into excited school-girls.

While I do not completely agree with this statement, but I have no doubt that whoever runs this site do “spend THAT many hours on the internet finding the best, cheapest websites for Australians”, as he claimed two sentences later. For example, check out Jonk’s list of online stores. Most of them are accessible by the Aussies, and there are some great shops out there that I have never heard of. Instead of running blog posts of “latest deals” like this site and my other site, he has organised all the good online resources into easy-to-navigate pages.

Great job! I think I’ll have to bookmark them all.

However, Jonk’s Bargains wasn’t really a smooth sailing. The site was only created early this month, and in less than a month, he has received legal threat for posting negative comment about another website! Jonks wrote about 22 Percent Off in his Discount Cards section:

It’s hard to find anything that’s a worthwhile discount. Barely any businesses, nearly all of the deals are just crap. And they spent tens of thousands advertising this. What a waste of time.

Subsequently he received a cease and desist letter from them, asking him to pull down the comment by a set time or face legal action. Wow, didn’t know you can get legal threat that easily on the Internet by writing honest opinion! Jonks doesn’t think that they will have a leg to stand on in court if it does go that far. I don’t either, but it is always troublesome when some lawyer send you a C&D. I believe the legal system will exercise justice, but a letter like that is still “threatening”.

If you have been a reader here for a while, you’ll know that I don’t always write positive reviews on shops, websites, etc. Like Jonks, I write honestly for editorial integrity. It is actually important as I no longer just write for myself (like in the beginning of this website), but there are real readers who trust the information I have posted.

All the best to Jonk’s Bargains. Maybe I also need a lawyer when something like this strikes…

Tell you a secret. While I am not finding bargains on the net, I am actually a Linux geek. Since 1995, Slackware 2.2 and kernel 1.2.8, but I guess I won’t go into details.

So I was pretty happy to know that ELX.com.au (formally EverythingLinux for those who remembered) is having a 20% off everything in store until this Friday (22 December 2006)!! There are some conditions:

• In store purchase only. I guess that means you can’t buy items off the web.
• In stock items only. I guess it makes sense as you can only buy from the store.
• Exclude items already on special.

They are in Silverwater in Sydney (1/2 hour drive from my place), and there’s even a Google map link on their website. If you live interstate, or can’t physically get into the store, you can still call their 1300 number to place the order, and they will even ship the item free within Australia.

You can check the stock level on their website, as they usually have stocks for items that can be dispatched immediately. Lots of books, geek items and geek T-shirts to be grab. Don’t miss out!

Catch of the Day is having a Catch-A-Thon today!!

Heaven for Bargain Shoppers — We have compiled some of our past CRAZY Catches (33 to be exact) and put them all, up for the taking for 24 HOURS ONLY.

They have listed all their past deals on their other website, Daily Deals. It’s all on the front-pages now for all to browse through, and there are lots of bargains and great gift ideas there.

For example:

• Teac DV3120 DVD Player — $19.80
• Superfly Pocket Helicopter — $29.80
• Authentic VB Portable BBQ — $49.40

Their Catch-A-Thon is running for 24 hours only, that means the price won’t be there after 11:59am tomorrow (19 Dec 2006).

Update: It has now been extended to Wednesday with more items.

Just found another great Aussie cashback shopping site — Buckscoop, with its tagline “shopping… with a cherry on top”. It’s a new website (since Nov 2006), and WA-based. Its front-page pretty much tells us what this site is:

Scoop: Earn cashack at loads of major online shops
Save: Browse the hottest member-submitted deals
Share: Hang out with other Buckscoop members

Wow. It’s like OzRewards (which I reviewed back in May) + OzBargain (which I launched back in Nov as well).

Like OzRewards, it gives you cashback/rewards when you purchase from its affiliated merchants, and it actually has a pretty good list of it and very well categorised. The same deal — you login, find the shop, click through, make purchase, and you’ll get a percentage cashback from Buckscoop. You can then set up a pay out threshold, so whenever you’ve collected enough cashback from Buckscoop, it would automatically deposit that amount into your PayPal account.

I have a brief sample of some of the retail stores there, and the cashback rate is actually very good. For example you’ll get 2.5% back from Deals Direct, 3% from OO.com.au, 2.5% from Wishlist.com.au, etc. They are generally better than OzRewards and Email Cash, and checking against some affiliation networks, Buckscoop is giving back roughly 50% of the commissions — very very generous! (Unlike me, who keeps every single cent. Bwahahahaha!)

Moreover they have a large collection of online shops which most people can get bored pretty quickly browsing through it. Here’s an idea for you Buckscoop admins and developers — I think you guys should make a RetailMeNot bookmarklet, that a shopper can click while inside an online shop, and a popup window will appear showing whether the current shop is affiliated with Buckscoop so you can earn cashback.

It is definitely a website that I’ll use when I go online shopping next time.

Another aspect of Buckscoop is its “community”. It allows its members to submit deals, coupons, rate the submissions, and use the forum to chat amongst each other. They even have competitions to encourage community building.

That sounds exactly like that hobby website I launched late last month. They serve the same purpose — community-driven deal hunting. In fact I was initially a bit hesitated to blog about Buckscoop as it’s a better looking website that can feel a bit “threatening”. At the end I guess I just can’t let a great Aussie bargain site slip through.

Anyway. Please head down there, create an account, and catch up on your Christmas shopping :) Went to East Gardens Westfield yesterday and it was so crowded it took me ages to find a parking. Online shopping is the way to go…

How much do you pay for a normal music CD from well-known publishers? $30? $24.95? $19.95? Or maybe you buy all your music from iTunes Music Store. Recently I have seen shops like Deals Direct and Daily Deals selling popular CDs for $9.95 (+ $2 shipping).

Take Robbie Williams’ “Intensive Care” for example (not his fan, but that’s just an example I can find on both stores):

• Deals Direct — $9.95
• Daily Deals — $9.95

Both listed $29.95 as recommended retail price. The same CD is sold for $30.15 from Chaos.com (who said you can’t sell for more than RRP?).

How did they do it? Apparently those CDs are imported. The fact that Chinese characters are printed from top to bottom shows where they might possibly be imported from.

So instead of flying to Asia, and load your suite cases with cheap CDs, they have actually done all that for us by importing them. And 100% legal copies of music compact discs do actually sell that cheaply there (as well as DVDs and sometimes packaged software) to combat piracy. I always bring back some when I visit my families in Taiwan.

Now what I wasn’t so sure is, the actual legality of reselling imported CDs in Australia. Is that okay for consumers to buy CDs or DVDs that were intended to be sold overseas over here in Australia? It’s a bit like buying online music from places like AllOfMP3.com — they said they are 100% legal selling to the Russians (Your Mileage Might Vary if you are a foreigner, but we are happy to take your credit card).

I am pretty sure Deals Direct and Daily Deals have worked everything out, and in fact you can buy imported CD here in many places (but mostly are those that can’t be sourced from local distributors). I guess I am just looking for a confirmation that says “yes, it is okay” :)

Thanks to Anthony and Shan who both sent me the discount voucher for this weekend’s Team Member Double Discount at Target. It’s “double discount” because you get an extra 10% off on top of regular discount and sales off catalogue.

Download Double Discount coupons (PDF, 968kb). The coupons are on page 2, which you need to print out and bring along to your local Target when you shop. Discount is valid between Friday 15^th to Sunday 17^th of December, i.e. this coming weekend.

It also appears to the very last team member discount coupon for Target this year, for their family and friends to catch up on Christmas shopping. So don’t miss out!

(Thanks to Peter G for forwarding the message to me.)

Koorong, a Christian bookshop which I featured here frequently, is having a one day only web sale — everything in stock 20% OFF!

It’s only available on their online store, and the purchase must be made with a credit card. It’s one day only — from 0:00am to 12:59pm Thursday 14 December 2006. Also the same deal on delivery — your delivery charge will be waived for all orders over $99.

Do note that the 20% OFF applies to items IN STOCK only. We bought over $400 worth of items in the last sale (shared with other friends), and did not get discount on some items because we did not check the stock availability. You do get discount, however, if the item is available in other stores but not in their main warehouse. Just that delivery will come in separate packages.