Photo – Smart & Savvy Savings
THIS DEAL IS DEAD!
Now this is an awesome MONEY MAKING DEAL. I have to say, I went to 7 different Walgreens (yes I’m pooped!) looking for this and I did not find it. However, that doesn’t mean you won’t be luckier than I was! This little travel sized bottle of the Neutrogena Oil-Free Acne Wash is producing the $10 RR!
Buy
3 – Neutrogena Oil-Free Acne Wash $.74
Total = $2.22, Get Back $10 RR
= $7.78 Money Maker!!!!!
If you find this let us know what city & state you are in!
(Thanks so much to Smart & Savvy Savings, Debbie Does Coupons & Chi-Town Cheapskate – you gals are all fabulous!)
{ 49 comments… read them below or add one }
My Walgreens in Utah pulled these because some lady wiped out the valley and ended up with 480.00 in RR…..wow!
can you still buy more than one and get double the rewards?
Well, that is just WRONG (wiping the stores out like that). I bet alot of WAGs are going to be pulling these for the RR deal because of people like that. Dang, wish I would have went at lunch today 🙁
So, I feel like a total scammer.
I went to wags and searched high and low for lip balm, found every other brand known to mankind. I decided to ask, and they mentioned a few places to check, which I did. Again, to no avail.
But then they mentioned something about an email from corporate about people buying them and trying to be fraudulent to get the RR. He used the words ‘scam’ and ‘fraud’.
Now, I was planning on buying another product I needed with two of them to bring down the cost, but man, I left feeling pretty lousy. Bad thing was, it was the manager, who I was
That’s ridiculous for that manager to say that! If they don’t want the item included then they should exclude it. How is it your fault that they have included something that is less than $10?
They are the ones who decide what’s included. If they want to say they made a mistake or an error, fine they can take it out of the promotion. How are you “defrauding” them because of something they did?
There is nothing i hate more than people who try to intimidate their customers by using that kind of language. Ok blood pressure going up again!
Oops, sent too early, stupid phone….I see other posts now too. But, I was going to mention it was the manager, who I was just starting to get in with, had talked to him on the phone about special orders. I never see him because I work, so I stop on nights and weekends. I don’t think he knows who I was, but now I’m afraid to ask for a special order especially on MMs!
Ugh, so frustrated and feeling so lousy about this. Ok, done venting 🙂
Why is it a scam or fraud?? That’s just stupid. Is it our fault that Wags doesn’t know how to program their computers to generate or not generate RRs for a particular product??
OK, I’m fairly new to the RR thing and I understand that we all need to be ethical about our MM’s & not wipe the stores out, give others a chance to purchase, etc, etc. But what I don’t understand is why would the manager call it a scam? Isn’t Neutrogena the company that decides what the RR are for? After all it’s a MANUFACTURER’s coupon right?
My Walgreens throws the ‘fraud’ word out a LOT. They are one of the Wags that refuses to accept a coupon or $1.00 off when the product is $0.99. They tell me that marking the coupon down to $0.99 is coupon fraud. Funny how other retailers have it in their policy to commit fraud…
Good Point! My Publix is very fraudulent! 🙂
You guys are making me feel so much better – I was feeling so, well, almost dirty, when I walked out, even though I know I wasn’t doing anything wrong! I left without buying anything, even though my favorite cashier was working.
I absolutely agree with your comments, and I certainly think that me buying two inexpensive and one more expensive item would have definitely been ethical, and is something I would feel no guilt about. I even bought my fave face lotion with two soaps for a small MM on Sunday. LOL, in my company, a test to decide if something is ethical is to ask yourself – “Would you feel comfortable reading it about yourself or defending your action in the local paper?” 🙂
One of the cashiers always comments how he hardly ever really checks my coupons, since I always use them right, and never use expireds, etc… I know I shop ethically, but it still just knocks the wind out of you when they throw around words like that. I think I felt bad, like I would be labelled as a “scammer” or “fraudulent couponer”.
And, just like you said, they decide what product to include. The problem may be though that the coding is for groups, but I imagine they can exclude specific products if they want!!! Maybe they should hire one of us (for a huge sum of money), to find their loopholes 🙂
Sorry to raise your blood pressure Christie, I’m right with you!
On a similar note, I think it’s fraudulent for a store to adjust a coupon down, they redeem them for full value!!!! 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
Ok, this is really long – so sorry for the serial posting this evening!
did anyone see the neurtrogena rebate?
Can’t find these anywhere in TN – but will keep looking!
Facial moisturizer rebate – http://www.neutrogena.com/econsumer/ntg/images/site/fmt_rebate.pdf
Nashville- I found them here in Johnson City, I know it’s just a bit of a drive but they are in TN! :0) Good luck in your hunt!
I’m going to check my walgreens out romorrow!! I don;t think anyone should make us feel bad that we are trying to save money for our families….I guess I’ll be going to walgreens mutiple tiems now instead oftrying to get them to do more thwn one transaction at a time so they don’t see me coming and thinking I am scamming them.. That is just sad
Okay, I have to say again here that my walgreens ladies know that it’s just a game to play with the register and they are always willing to help a person play the game! Not that they encourage shelf clearing,but if you get a money maker, they pat you on the back! Not literally, but they get excited along with you.
Ok so I just wanted to know: where are these acnes wash located? Where exactly (or most likely) can I find them at?
I found the lip balm in the lotion section of all places! It was not with the other lip balms or with the facial Nutragena products. I will definitely be going back to look for the travel wash! WOW
Allison (1st comment) Gee, I wonder what the lady with $480 in RR will buy??? Does she realize she has only 2 weeks in which to use them, AND she can’t use more coupons/RR than she has items?
Found them at three Walgreens in the Minneapolis metro area:
Richfield (66th Street)
Bloomington (Portland and 79th)
Bloomington (Penn and 79th)
They didn’t ring up at any of these stores, so I told them 99 cents for a total of $2.97 and the $10 RR printed.
None in Houston, Texas. I went to atleast 5 different walgreens ranging from suburbs of Houston (cypress) to Houston without luck. One BA told me they are going to get some neutrogena shippment at the end of the week, will to get it out later.
I meant will go check it out later.
Christie, I went to walgreens today and got $91.78 worth of merchandise for $1.97 before taxes and I still have $25 in rr left. I used $31 in rr toward my purchases along with the coupons. I got (1) all he detergent, (2) shick hydro razors, (3) nivea mens body wash, (4) memo notebooks, (3) John fredia shampoo/cond, (2) 3 pack ivory soaps, (2) reach toothbrushes, (1) pack of index cards, (1) candy, (3) neutrogena lip moisturizers. Thanks for the heads up on the trial size acne wash.
Wow Denise Great job!
Allison, which Walgreen’s in Utah do you shop? I frequent the ones in Sandy, Draper and sometimes West Jordan.
Today I bought 3 Neutrogena soap bars. I had 2 coupons from yesterday’s paper for $1 off a cleanser, but they would not let me use both…said I would have to do separate transactions. If that’s the case, I’m out of luck on future deals. (I did get $10 RR.)
It’s still a great deal but it doesn’t make sense that they wouldn’t let you use more than 1 when you were buying 3 bars of soap? What was their made up reason for that?
I always get a bit of anxiety shopping at my walgreens since they also sling around the word “fraud” a lot. If I ask to do two transactions, or if I use “too many” coupons, I get the evil eye…so…I only do one transaction per visit, and I don’t use more than 5 coupons (including the RR)…this seems to make everyone comfortable. However, during one visit recently, I had to combine what I usually do in two trips and used (quoting the cashier) “SO many coupons” that she would not even try to scan another RR which would have brought my OOP to mere cents, even though I had the appropriate filler items. I asked VERY nicely if she would just try to scan it and SHE WOULD NOT!! She reiterated her “So many coupons” comment. The manager was in the back and by this time, there were other people in line, so I just said thank you! and left. Some days I really don’t like feeling like a “fraudulent scammer”…I have to psych myself out just to shop?!
Leanna, I think in that situation I would have asked her one more time to scan it and if she had refused I would have politely asked “Have you ever heard the term mystery shopper?”. I know, I’m terrible. 🙂
Ladies, I want to ask if anyone has called the corporate office about the “fraud” word being thrown around? Would you be afraid to ruffle feathers or make waves, fearing the RR would dry up or something similar? Seems if the word comes down from corporate to stop the bullying-“it’s our coupon policy”-that the problem of intimidation might stop. just curious
BTW I have nice people at my store that applaud (almost literally) when you get a MM or a great deal. I do live in a small town though. I found out the other day there’s actually a guy they call the “Coupon King”.
My question is, how in the world would Walgreens know that one lady went store hopping and racked up $480 in RR? I know they have video cameras at the registers and can watch from the office, but I can’t imagine they’re calling other stores when someone walks out with a handful of register rewards. Do I need to worry about shopping at multiple stores?
On another note it’s a bit frustrating for me for Wags to look down at us because we walk out with free or very cheap RR’s. It’s not like they are handing us cash!! I know many people just throw theirs in the trash!! RR’s are nice perks and help us stretch our dollars, but they also help us spend more money at Wags as well.
Here are my thoughts on Shelf Clearing.
Corpus Christi, TX has 8 Wags. Each store has shelf space for 12 Neutrogena Cleansing Bars. That’s a total of 96 bars if all stores have full shelves, which they never do. There are 300,000 plus a few, 40 or 50 thousand illegals here. So what are the chances of 350,000 each getting a single bar from Wags? You do the math. Then they want you to spend $6.00 and they will give you $10.00 RR back. It’s the decades old mad dash full of empty promises. If you buy 12 bars, enough to last about a year, then have you cleared their shelf for selfish reasons? If this item was not on sale and there was no RR, they would beg you to buy all 12 bars. If you only buy 4 bars, who are you leaving the other 8 bars for? The 8 Wags here in Corpus Christi haven’t had a single bar on their shelves since May 28th. The sale is this week and the RR’s are all month. I say buy what you can while you can. Wags has no sense of loyalty to its customers.
I am a power buyer and have purchased an average of $11,000 in products per month at WAGS so far this year. Do I clear their shelves? Very seldom; rather I spend a lot of time on this site and on iheartwags and project my purchasing power, coupon needs, and I have three managers who will order 50 to 100 items each week per my request.
Many coupon shoppers do this and most managers are more than glad to work with these shoppers. This week I had 99 Neutrogena Bars and 100 Nivea BOGO Body Wash waiting for me Sunday Morning. I also had 50 Schick and 80 Gillette Razor and several bulk Always and Reach products with my pre-sale order. There will always be shoppers who will clear the shelves and the next delivery truck will not bring replacement stock. If you want to minimize you shopping trips, have much more reliable purchasing success, and are willing to plan you spending well in advance, you can preorder as well and you won’t need to worry about empty shelves.
So take a look at what on sale next week, review the RR deals, do a little planning and ask you local manager to order 5 or 10 items for you. In no time you will be able to gain the manager’s trust and order more items if that is what you want to do. Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water. Make a few small orders and purchases and see if this works for you. Christie writes her scenario for someone WITH Register Rewards and With NO Register Rewards. These can help you gain a better understanding of the kinds of deals you can work with you future planning. So good luck; let’s not worry about those greedy people who clear the shelves. We can beat them at their own game.
Some of you are probably wondering what a power buyer does with $11,000 dollars of retail purchase every month. Easy, every community has shelters for women, shelters for women with children, homeless men’s shelters, food kitchens, etc. Here in Corpus Christi, all of these shelters fall under the umbrella of an organization named Metro Ministries. My OOP averages just over $300/mo. If I gave Metro Ministries $300 per month, they would be hard pressed to buy $11,000 worth of products. Based on my ability to capitalize on the generosity of P&G, Kimberly Clark, Kellogg’s, GM, Scrubbing Bubbles, Unilever, and probably 100 or so other national brand manufacturers, and let me not forget Walgreens, I am able to make the equivalent of $10,000 to $12,000 in monthly contributions.
There is a much larger mission here that looks far beyond worrying about who is clearing the shelves this week. I hope this helps many of you take positive steps to make your coupons shopping more enjoyable and more meaningful.
Many times my reciept always has the survey stuff to fill in online, and I do for the fact if I’ve been treated poorly I let them know(or if I’ve gotten good service). I am very pacific in what has happened. I don’t know if this gets back to the stores, but I hope it does. Their are many employees that should be patted on the back, and others that maybe should taught customer service. If it was my store I would want to know. In today’s economy many people are in need of jobs, and I would not want to employ people that give customer dirty looks or comments when they hand over a coupon or RR.
On another note I never have made more than one transaction at Walgreens. A few weeks ago I forgot the pop and I came back in and bought it. I apologized to the cashier and she was very friendly and said at this price you have too. Well tonight I was shopping with my 15 year old daughter at the same Walgreens and the same friendly girl was working. I haven’t had luck finding the small John Frieda bottles at any of the stores, and they had them. I had all the items in my cart, and my daughter was buying some nail polishes and other junk little girls like for herself. I wanted to use up all the coupons I had for the John Frieda and I asked her if she would mind buying a set of the John Frieda for me. My daughter checked out right ahead of me, and when I checked out the cashier said “it is alright if you ever want to do more than one transaction.” She was nice, but I felt soooo embarassed.(I was wondering if she thought “Look at that looser that makes her little kid check out for a deal.”) I didn’t know what to make of it. I have been thinking about it all night long, and have been considering never shopping their again. She wasn’t quite as friendly as she was the first time I saw her weeks ago, but there was a line and she was probably just trying to get every checked out as fast as possible. After reading the rest of your terrible walgreen stories, I’m hoping that she was just being nice. She wouldn’t have said it if that what she didn’t mean(I hope?)
I have to tell myself this many times before and after I shop, “Who Cares” and “So what if the cashier gives me a dirty look.” Besides at Walgreens where am I going to see this person ever again, and why should I care what this person thinks about me? They don’t know “really” what kind of a person I am, and let them think what they are going to think. I know this is hard advice to fallow(I have a hard time fallowing it myself), but try not to let another person’s comments change the way you want to do things.
Sorry so long and I’m wishing all shoppers out their the best.
I have had my share of “Evil Eyes”, “Statements of “Coupon Fraud”, and “Where did you get all these coupons?”. I have found that most of the evil eyes belong to the inexperienced; the coupon fraud statements come from cashiers who failed to properly check for fraud and got burned; and I tell them that I get my coupons from the newspaper and that my IP Coupons come from my 4 computers in my home, the 2 I have at work, and from my 5 younger sisters. I tell them that I print 24 times for each IP Coupon. Then I show them the coupons and explain the unique barcode and serial numbers. Most seem to appreciate my willingness to help them gain a better understanding of coupon fraud.
After coupon shopping for about six months and getting the evil eye, all but being accused of committing coupon fraud, and cashiers refusing many of my coupons because of their “One Coupon per Purchase”, I met with each of the Walgreens Managers in the 8 local stores . I shared my “Bad” shopping experiences in THEIR STORES and asked if there was a way we could turn this into a Win/Win situation. Each said that they wanted my business and agreed to ensure that there were many opportunities for improved customer relations, and especially for coupons shoppers. If you have read my previous post here, you already know that I am a power buyer. I have made it my business to learn the names of all of the Walgreens employees and I have a great customer relationship with all but two; you can’t win them all. This past Sunday after I made 30 purchase for 90 Neutrogena Bars and 30 Schick razors, and another 30 purchases for Gillette Razors and 60 Nivea Body Wash, all in the same store, the Assistant Manager asked my if I wanted to place a duplicate order for their Thursday truck. You bet, that’s how good things have gotten.
What’s the probability that talking to your store managers will bring forth the same kinds of successes that I have had? I would say that you have more than a 90 percent chance of success. When you learn the names of the store employees and greet them with a personal greeting, you will not only win their favor, you will probably end up with a few new friends. Most of us have seen the irate customer who lashes out on a cashier, cosmetic or photo representative, or a floor employee. It’s never a pretty sight; and a few kind words from coupon shoppers will help to mitigate or minimize the evil eyes, the fraud statements, and cashiers will be willing to help each of us maximize the proper use of our coupons.
Here in Oregon where we have Safeway, you can use your RR’s to shop at Safeway. They will accept them just like a MQ. It seems kind of wierd to me, but some people will do those money makers and take their 10.00 RR’s to Safeway.
Wow, reading these sure makes me feel better. Sometimes I loathe going to the store because when I first started couponing a particular lady kept giving me grief. One time I used two RR for the same amount (even though they WERE for different products, because I was too new to the whole thing to venture multiple transactions and such) and she scolded me saying “the RR deals are supposed to be one per person, and it’s obvious since you have two RR for the same amount that you did not abide by that.” In addition to that, before I knew you needed the Manf. Q’s to equal the # of items you have, this lady actually tried to TELL me what to buy and what would be the best deal for me. My first instinct was to grab a caramel from by the register but she just made this big deal about how I should do it her way! She’s older, and I just tell myself she’s mad cause she doesn’t know how to use the internet to get coupons!!!
I always tell myself i can’t control anyone’s behavior but my own and I am only responsible for my behavior.
I totally lucked out last night in Chicago. The Neutrogena bars were wiped out of all the shelves, but the mini-soaps were just sitting in the beauty aisle (the one that has seasonal/special products) completely untouched! I did 7 transactions. Didn’t want to clear out the the whole display. My cashier was a teenage girl and she wanted to know where they were so she could get some! 🙂 Thanks for posting this Christie!
*BTW I LOVE the “Mystery Shopper” line. I might have to use that one!
To Bev, comment #20: ROTFLMBO! Didn’t think of that!
To Ira, comment #35: WOW! Thank you for the good advice. Well said!
I did find the Mini travel bottles. In my store they were located in the cosmetic area where they put all the displays and new products. I’m in Manistee, MI.
found the mini ones in michigan! they had about 15, just bought 3 for one deal so some other ladies can get a nice surprise!
Went to 2 Walgreens today: one in Thomasville and another in Lexington, NC. No travel size acne wash…no transparent soaps,and no .49 Hallmark cards either.
Found the lip balm though near the lotion area and they rang 2.16 each so it was a good MM too.
My cashier has known me to do several transactions and she has been very helpful the whole time. She actually greeted me with “Oh, I found that “Skin Worshipper” brochure that you were looking for.” and handed me a bunch of it. Then she approached me again while I was searching for the Neutrogena stuff and gave me some coupons that she found in the buggy left by another customer…Nivea body wash, 2 B1G1 Reach toothbrush and Schick razor! Some days you get lucky….
Btw, I didn’t use those coupons…yet. 😉
I have had NO LUCK finding either the Bar Soap (which is $2.01 by my work WAGS, but $2.46 about 10 miles down the road) OR finding the travel size face wash. I went to two stores so far (that is all that is close to work) At one WAGS, she said she is going to put aside 3 bars for me if they come in. Hopefully they come in. I am pretty sure I have a shelf cleaner in my area as everyday I go into WAGS and the shelves are EMPTY!! 🙁
I found these in my store purchased the first 3 along with a Shick razor and 5 mq from Sunday’s paper. Everythng worked fine.
Decided to go back in and just purchase 3 more because it was a good deal. This time a manager rang up my transaction he was surprised when RR printed, looked at it and I could tell he didn’t want to give it to me. I just held out my handand said “what a deal”.
Tonite after work I stopped again was going to use some other RR I have, and they are gone. Either, they removed it until next month or bought them all themselves.
Obviously,this was a mistake and that product shouldn’t have been included in eligible items. But I was able to score 2 10 RR, from their error and besides I have to spend it there.
Just started following your website in May, and my Husband is in awe of much money I have saved. Thanks, bunches!!
Jeanne – I love your response to your managers surprise! I’ll have to use that one next time! LOL.
DEAD DEAL! Just a heads up! They stopped it! I tried at 1:30AM 6/16/10 and it did not print. 🙁 Fun while it lasted! (I did get my other RR’s though so I know the machine was working!)
I hope your getting some sleep now. 🙂