Hooch Review: Earns Rewards at Top Retailers & Restaurants and Get Free Drinks

Hooch Review

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The Hooch app is a rewards app for travel, dining, and entertainment which earns ‘TAP Dollars’ which can be redeemed for gift cards.

• Dine at participating restaurants and bars and earn 5% back in TAP Dollars. There seems to be a focus on bars.
• Use your linked card at participating brands and earn 1% back in TAP Dollars instantly:
  • Uber
  • iTunes
  • Starbucks
  • Domino’s
  • Netflix
  • Shake Shack
  • Chipotle
  • Mexican Grill
  • Spotify
  • Audible
  • Redbox
  • UberEATS
  • Hulu
  • In-N-Out
• They also offer hotel booking portal, promising ‘up to 70% off’.

Paid Hooch Tiers

They offer various tiers above the standard free option. Here’s how Hooch describes it:

• HOOCH FREE: Free to download and join; simply connect your credit card(s) to verify transactions and start earning. Members receive up to 10% back on eligible purchases as well as access to unpublished hotel rates up to 70% lower than publicly available rates, for a limited time.
• HOOCH PLUS (HOOCH+): Upgrade for $9.99/month, and receive 1 free drink every day, up to 10% back on eligible purchases plus applicable bonus earnings subject to availability, and permanent access to lowest unpublished hotel rates.
• HOOCH BLACK: Upgrade for $295/year and receive 1 free drink every day with additional premium venues and cocktail options, up to 10% back on eligible purchases, permanent access to lowest unpublished hotel rates, access to special events, ticket giveaways, luxury brand discounts, and celeb experiences. Learn more here.

Redeeming Rewards

Each TAP Dollar is worth $1 toward gift card redemptions. They have hundreds of gift card options including Walmart, Target, Uber, eBay, Home Depot, Starbucks, and more. They advertise as having Amazon too, but I can’t find it.

You need a minimum of $10 or $15 (depending on the brand) to redeem for gift cards, so you’ll have to earn something organically before being able to cash out. Walmart and Target both have a $10 minimum.

Referral Offer

Hooch also offers $5 when you refer friends. New members also start off with a $5 bonus after linking an account.

Here’s my referral link, thanks to anyone who uses it. (For the record, you can signup without a referral and get the same $5 bonus too.)

Our Verdict

There are lots of card-link travel and dining apps, I haven’t compared well to see how their cashback rates stack up. I’m guessing the dining rates are similar to what’s found on other platforms, so might not be very enticing.

The free drinks on the paid Hooch tiers look interesting – for $9.99 per month you can get a free drink every day. There must be some gotchas there that I’m missing as it seems too lucrative for someone who drinks regularly. (Please drink responsibly.) I didn’t signup for the paid level, but it looks like they are offering me free drinks – maybe they give everyone one at signup? I’m not really sure, not near any of the drink establishments to try it out.

The 1% back card-link program also looks interesting. Most of the brands are things like Netflix that 1% back won’t get you much, but some might find UberEATS or the restaurants interesting.

You’ll want to link the account which you’ll be using for the card link program (e.g. CSR for dining). They require giving login credentials; you can’t just input the card number. Hooch uses the Plaid backend. We’ll add this program to our Complete List of Card-Linked Reward Programs.

Important note: the restaurants available are only in the following areas: Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, Hong Kong, Dallas, Austin. The biggest draw here are for restaurants, and it may not be worth signing up if you don’t frequent those areas.