Get Bulk Rate Discounts (Without Buying Bulk)

Posted on January 29, 2010 by The LearnVest Staff

saveOne of the newest shopping trends is the growth of websites that provide bulk deals to consumers. Buying in bulk works for schools and institutions, so why not for us?

Groupon has been doing just that—minus the whole begging 300 of your friends to agree to buy the same thing—since November of 2008. But now, other websites like Scoop St. and BuyWithMe are heating up. Which one is best? LearnVest has you covered.

How It Works

Business owners post incredible discounts (up to 50% off, and often more) on the site, and readers can get these “group rates.” Only a limited number of deals are posted at a time, and each is dependent upon enough people signing up. If only five people sign up for a deal that has a 100-person “tipping point” (the cutoff at which the deal is officially happening), then none of those people receive the special deal. But we’ve been using these sites for a long time, and the deals nearly always happen.

We compared the deals on a regular day, January 25th. Here’s what we found:

Groupon

In New York: $145 worth of custom-fit jeans for the price of $80. Groupon currently serves tons of cities, including New York, Nashville, Los Angeles, and Jacksonville. Deals are usually for food, exercise classes or other services, and fashion. Recent deals include $25 for $50 worth of tapas and drinks, and $45 for 10 Pilates mat classes ($180 value).

BuyWithMe

In Washington, D.C.: Half-price on a 60-minute massage or facial at a spa. One of the newer players on the scene, BuyWithMe seems to be particularly strong in its offerings for activities. In Washington, its past offers include a number of reduced-price museum tickets, exercise opportunities, and even golf experiences and tourism. BuyWithMe has an advantage because it posts more than one deal at a time (three, generally), but it currently only serves Boston, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.

Scoop St.

Back in New York: $50 credit toward food and drink at a downtown cafe for the price of $25. This site only serves New York at the moment, and, from what we’ve seen, it doesn’t do as much as it might to differentiate itself from Groupon. All the same, its deals are different.

The moral of the story? If you really want to find the best deals around town, we recommend you peruse all three of these sites, since their deals are unique from each other. All three have newsletters with deals, so you can skim them straight in your inbox. As this sort of buying becomes more mainstream, you may as well play the field!

THE BOTTOM LINE

If you do what’s in this Daily, you save:

$65 per coupon*

If you invested this amount today and earned an 8% return, you would have $1,412 by retirement.**

That’s LearnVest.

*Savings if you participate in Groupon’s New York offer for custom-fit jeans.

**If you are 25 today and retire at age 65. We calculated that number here.

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  • Sara

    I love Groupon and use it regularly; however, I would argue that I may not saving money in the long run. I find myself going out to dinner more often because I found a Groupon to get $50 worth of food and drinks for $25 + tip, when typically I would have stayed home and spent much less on groceries for two. Also, I recently bought museum tickets that expired before I had an opportunity to redeem them.
    So, if you have a tendency to buy something just because it’s a bargain, you may want to stay away. For an occasional treat, though, you can get excellent deals.

  • The LearnVest Staff

    Hi Sara,

    We absolutely agree! We definitely want to emphasize that something isn’t worth purchasing just because it’s on sale, no matter how good the deal. But, if you’re in the market for something, then we think that Groupon, BuyWithMe, and Scoop St are interesting concepts and resources.

  • Alli

    Livingsocial.com is another similar site I go to too. Got a great deal on kickboxing!

  • http://superduperfantastic.net/ suki

    I love these sites! There’s also Joffer and Townhog. In addition to finding great deals on local businesses you’ve been meaning to pay a visit to, you’re also introduced to many you’d never heard of before. It’s a great way to sample what’s out there and get a good deal too.

  • MAF

    In Washington, DC (and some other cities) there’s also LivingSocial.com and Goldstar.com (which only does events and has some small fees, but quickly pays for itself).

    I hadn’t heard about Buywithme, but I looked at the past deals and almost all of them have appeared on one of the other three websites recently. So it might be good if you miss the deal you liked on another site, or want to go for seconds, but not much new there.

  • The LearnVest Staff

    Hi Alli,

    Thanks for the tip! It looks like Livingsocial.com is mostly a phone app, yeah? Why do you like it/what do you think makes it special? (Or do you like it in addition to the other sites, rather than necessarily preferring it?)

  • The LearnVest Staff

    Thanks, Suki! Cool tip. Just checked out your recommendations. It looks like, for Townhog, you have to subscribe to the newsletter in order to see the deals? Joffer seems to be more like Groupon/BuyWithMe/Scoop St in that you can view the deal straight from the home page. It’s amazing how many sites are out there like this, right? It seems like it’s a really recent trend. Wonder if it’ll keep up for many years to come or if something new will sweep in.

  • The LearnVest Staff

    Hey MAF,

    Good to know. Was just looking at Goldstar–do you find that you regularly go to those activities? Some of them looked cool to us (there’s a John Lithgow show in NYC! Love him, though he was incredibly creepy in Dexter, if you saw that), but, honestly, not all of them. In your experience, how many events do you have to go to for Goldstar to pay itself back?

  • bandsxbands

    My friend and I were recently talking about the ubiquitousness of technology in our daily lives. Reading this post makes me think back to that debate we had, and just how inseparable from electronics we have all become.

    I don’t mean this in a bad way, of course! Societal concerns aside… I just hope that as the price of memory drops, the possibility of transferring our brains onto a digital medium becomes a true reality. It’s one of the things I really wish I could experience in my lifetime.

    (Posted on Nintendo DS running R4i SDHC DS SysBro)

  • Danna

    Living social is not just a phone app. I don’t have a phone that uses apps. The difference is that if 3 of your friends buy the same deal using the link you give them, you gets your deal for free. Other than that it’s just like Groupon.

  • The LearnVest Staff

    Hey Danna,

    That’s awesome! What kind of stuff have you gotten that way. Also, how do they know if any given person is your friend?

  • alicedebrax

    A 50% off first month sounds pretty nice as I'm sure many people would benefit a lot from this deal. Maybe there wasn't enough exposure because I can't explain how people could miss on such a good deal.