A Free Digital Camera - That's a Good Deal

Last month, our digital camera bit the dust on the first day of our vacation.  Sigh.  I was sad, but thankfully we were on vacation so it was pretty easy not to be too sad.  It's a silly thing to be said about, I know.  But I knew there were moments I'd miss recording.  These Young'uns keep growing way too fast.

Running out to buy a new camera isn't in the family budget, but amazingly, we got a brand new digital camera yesterday thanks to the MaxPerks Reward program at Office Max.  What a great thing!

Here's how it works: you sign up, buy things you need either in store or online, get MaxPerks money put into your MaxPerks Reward account, use the money in your account to buy other things you need at Office Max.  Pretty simple, right?

But wait...there's more.

Every so often, Office Max has a crazy sale and you can earn lots of MaxPerks reward money.  Last Fall, Office Max had a special going and I bought 2 cases of printer paper, a box of file folders and a box of those cardboard file boxes.  I bought it all online and shipping was free.  The total came to about $50.00 which is not exactly a great deal on the surface.  However, Office Max put all of the money I spent on the purchase into my MaxPerks Reward account.  So, it's like I got all those things for free...kind-of.

Then in January, they had another crazy sale just like the one above.  This time I got 2 more cases of paper, a box of legal envelopes, a box of Sharpie markers and a box of manila envelopes.  Again, all delivered to my door with free shipping.  This time, however, I didn't spend a dime out of my pocket.  I spent the money in my MaxPerks Rewards account and I received all of the "money" I spent on this current purchase BACK into my Max Perks account.  Do you see where this is going?

In between then and now, I also brought some old printer cartridges into Office Max.  They deposit $3.00 in my MaxPerks account for every cartridge I bring to them.  You can bring in 10 cartridges each WEEK - that's $30.00 per week, if you could get your hands on that many used cartridges.

So yesterday, I went into Office Max to look at backpacks.  MaxPerks Rewards "money" expires after 6 months, so I needed to spend my money.  If you buy a backpack at the store this week, you'll earn your entire purchase back in MaxPerks Rewards (limit of 2).  My plan was to "roll" my Rewards money and get some nice backpacks in the process.

When we got to the store, I had to walk by the cameras on the way to the backpacks and there it was - an awesome camera on sale BIG time - just waiting for me.  Needless to say, I didn't even look at the backpacks.  The MaxPerks Rewards in my account covered the whole amount of the camera.  I was actually a bit giddy and grateful.  I've said a few prayers about the camera.

So, for $50.00 and a bit of time, I've gotten 4 cases of paper, file folders, business envelopes, manila envelopes, file boxes, Sharpie markers and a CAMERA since last Fall that's a good deal!