My Gift Card Sales Figures With Cardpool

Chasing The Points

Administrator
Staff member

So we covered GiftCard Zen on my sales numbers and it was a little over $16.5k and I got back approximately 85.5%.

Today, we’ll look at my numbers with Cardpool. My total transactions with Cardpool is a little bit larger compared to GiftCard Zen only because I’ve worked with Cardpool since the end of 2012. I started my relationship with GiftCard Zen at the end of 2013.

That being said, I think it’s amazing that my percentages returned with GiftCard Zen and Cardpool is very close. Only off by 196 basis points. That means both sites buy the gift cards that I sell at nearly the same rates.

I can say I did sell a few more Exxon gift cards and a ton of Wholefoods gift cards on Cardpool and those vendors are generally 90%+ and that is why Cardpool is a slightly higher rate.



Do I have a preference for either site? Not really, I sell to whoever has the highest rates. The biggest gripe I have with Cardpool is the 5% lower rate you would get for selling a digital gift card. Other than that, I have no complaints. Especially after figuring out the best practices to shipping thanks to some great reader contributions here and here. Well, the most recent time, trying to negotiate a rate increase I was met with silence for two weeks, but they made it up with timely responses for this spreadsheet and finally an answer on the rates which made me happy.

Sure, the total sales is 49097.84, compared to some of the heavy hitters out there who do this in less than a month. I have been gift card churning a little over 2 years, but I go at a pace that’s comfortable for what I do. I must balance my time commitment, deal finding, and everything else outside of the blog to these adventures.

Now that I know what cards to buy and resell, less time is spent on the hunt and more on the execution. I am debating if I should add a third site to sell to like when Plastic Jungle was around. It slightly complicates things, but additional leverage for me to sell.

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Fuerza

Guest
I'm confused, if you took a 12.64% loss why are you doing this?

I've been following your gift card churning series and I still don't think I know how it works. I know you are buy/finding deals on store gift cards and then selling them back to a gift card exchange for profit or break even something to that effect. I'm assuming miles/points are generated though the purchase of the gift card but if your are talking a 12% lose then what is the CPP?
 

Chasing The Points

Administrator
Staff member
Apologies for the delayed response (still trying to figure out the best way to receive notifications)

Correct to what @MilesJunkie posted, the loss is is at face value and doesn't include the cashback from portals or the miles I earned from the portals.

Generally speaking, I only do it for the points or miles because gift card churning is losing money at the end of the day, but the ability to buy miles/points under a penny makes it worthwhile for me. Yes, buying the prepaid cards and liquidating for MO's or loading into BB/Serve/RB is cheaper, this method (gift card churning) is quicker and easier for me. Not that I'm a recluse or afraid of leaving the house, but it sounds like it when I say it, oftentimes, I don't need to leave the house to make the transactions. End to end could be all done at home and digitally. Buy egift cards sell gift cards electronically
 
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Fuerza

Guest
I see what your saying however I still don't see the deal. So many portals don't pay out for gift card purchases.

For example yesterday Ebay/GCM was selling Sears cards $80 for $100 value. That is a pretty simple to understand the buy online sell to a GC broker. In this example the limitation was 2 per account if I remember correctly. Deal is pretty cut and dry.

Take away the discount buy for $100 value sell for 90% value ($90). Say you find a portal that does pay 6x points per dollar. 600 points for $100 GC you aren't earning those at less than a penny per point.

I can't wrap my mind on how you are doing this.
 

Chasing The Points

Administrator
Staff member
There's only a handful of vendors that are worthwhile to gift card churn and earn points from the portals.

Here's how I stack up the deals:

I have a US Bank Cash+ card that offers 5% off Department stores. I have an alert on Cashbackmonitor if Sears is 5x+ (depends on the mile or point program or I'd need it higher). I've also negotiated with GiftCardZen where I will always have a floor price of 86% that I resell Sears.

Already, I'm looking at buying a gift card at 95% of the value. So if the portal that pays miles or points is at 10x or 12x, I don't think twice and jump on it because you would be buying the miles at $.009/mile or $.0075/mile. It's close to a penny a point, but on the redemption side, on a business class or first class fare, its value will be much greater than the price I paid for the miles.

This is especially helpful when I need to top off accounts and buying direct from host program is too expensive
 
F

Fuerza

Guest
I see what you are saying however Sears.com redirects to GCM when buying them online. You can reload a physical card from my research. Also 5% on US Bank is capped, not really scaleable. Amex BCP is unlimited at 3% on Sears.com Hhhmm....
 

Chasing The Points

Administrator
Staff member
For Sears - you want to buy Sear's GC's

Correct, 5% capped/quarter up to 8k/yr. This is why I'm a huge fan of all the 5% quarter cards and am trying to sign up for as many as I can because it helps lower the cpp. The portal pay our has to be at least 12x to make the BCP worthwhile. This is why I was excited about hearing the AT&T Universe card described here: http://saverocity.com/pfdigest/citis-quietly-replaces-universal-card-new-att-access-card/

Since it offers 2x TYP on "retail sites" and Citi allows phone debit card payments, it helps the denominator piece of the math and further lowers the cpp.
 
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