I never have been interested in cruising because I get motion sickness and sunburn easily - no thank you! Then, I saw a travel show about Disney cruises. Stop the presses! WHAT?!?! Have you seen the documentaries? How could you not want to go? They have cruises all around the world! Maybe an Alaskan cruise for my fair skin?
Since carving out $200-300 a month is not going to happen on our salary I had to do something. It has become my mission to find ways to save for a trip. Yes, you hear about gift cards and ways to save once you are there you still need the money, right? Let's get down to business. Check out my collection of ideas:
First, and foremost, Swagbucks. I cannot say enough good things about this site! I use the points I earn through this site to purchase gift cards to Sam's and Target. You may not be able to purchase Disney gift cards with these gift cards but you are probably buying other things. Has anyone made it out of either store for under $50 dollars? If so, please tell me how because I can go in with a list of two things and come out with ten items! Best thing is if you keep your eye on the rewards you can get cards at a discount. Click here for my post on how to earn Swagbucks. Refer your spouse and both of you can earn!
Another way to earn free gift cards is to Cardpool.com. I admit I was a little wary at first but they have got the gift card exchange down to a science! You can purchase gift cards to your favorite places for up to a 35% discount. They have Disney gift cards, too! If they don't have the cards in stock you can set up an alert to let you know when they are available. I received an email today alerting me that a $50 Kirkland's card was available for $42. Nice! You can also sell them your new or partly used gift cards. Use your Disney credit card and earn those points. Even better, refer your friends and both of you get $5 off. Check out Cardpool today!
Raise.com is another gift card site. The discounts may not be as deep as Cardpool but they are more likely to have the cards in stock. The last time I looked Disney gift cards were 1% off. Use your Disney credit card to buy the cards and get another 1% off. Hey, every dollar counts! You can also set alerts to your favorite stores and adjust those alerts to a certain percent off and dollar amount. Raise also has a referral reward of $5. If you have a Swagbucks account you can earn 2-7% of your purchase in Swagbucks. Just make sure you are logged into your Swagbucks account and use the search bar at the top to search for Raise.
An app called Ibotta is another way to save for Disney. All you do is download the app, select the grocery store (there are other shopping options, too), select the products you are buying, and scan your receipt and possibly the item's barcode. Voila! Ibotta starts calculating your savings and you can transfer the savings to your Paypal account or an Amazon gift card. We recently cashed in $85 towards another trip we took but the next one will be for Disney! If you sign up using my link you can get $10 after your first use! Then, refer others and get $5 for each referral. The bigger your 'team' the better the offers from Ibotta.
The other app I use on my phone is Shopkick. You earn points for walking into stores and for scanning certain products. The points add up and you turn those points into gift cards. No, there are no Disney cards but there are Target gift cards and Target sells discounted Disney cards, right?
How do you save for your Disney vacations?
