Staples has launched a new rewards program called ‘Easy Rewards‘ (this replaces Staples Rewards). This provides users with the following:
- Earn one point per $1 spent every time members shop on qualifying purchases.
- Collect 2x or more points on the three bonus points categories members buy most.
- Redeem points to save on qualifying purchases at checkout.
I thought I’d only get $5 for recycling 10 cartridges, but I got 100 points per cartridge plus this appeared too “1,000 points when you recycle tech, batteries and more.” So I got $10 per month so far, no idea why but I’ll take it.
These points are annoying, I wish it would just show dollar amounts like the old system.
Do we have to sign up for an offer to get points for the tech item?
What is everyone going to do now? $5 is not worth my time. I’ve been researching online recycling companies but not as lucrative. I have so many cartridges and have been participating in staples for 10 years. This is a blow to the budget!!!! Would love any ideas.
i’m guessing gift cards don’t fall in any of their three-point categories?
Interestingly, eligible recyclable products include device cases, writing materials like crayons and pencils, headphones, and soda stream cylinders. If I’m reading it correctly they’ll take writing tools (crayons, pens & markers, wooden & mechanical pencils) and recycle them for reward points. The writing materials are a unique category to recycle. I’m glad that they’ll accept them because those things are quite wasteful and get thrown away when broken or unusable. All the teachers like me should earn a crazy amount of points from all the random broken crayons/pencils etc. that we find around the classroom and have at the end of the year.
Unfortunately points are much easier to obfuscate and devalue the rewards so even if it’s not terrible to begin with it will eventually be down the road. Staples is more expensive than competitors and the only reason to shop there was the rewards.
Yeah and they only price match in-store, which never has the good stock
Are they also doing away with the $5 for recycling tech per month? I went in-store this month, and the cashier said because of the new rewards program, they are no longer giving out rewards for recycling tech in-store, but the Easy Rewards landing page is showing that a reward will still be offered, just not how much.
No, that is still available. It earns 10K points now but that is equal to the same $5.
Though it isn’t a calendar month anymore. You can see on the app that the recycling offer expires “Sat Mar 2” so you have to wait until the first Sunday of the next month to recycle again.
Definitely a downgrade for most people when they can only recycle 10 ink cartridge for $5 monthly instead of the $20 before.
Good thing that I don’t have a lot of cartridges left to recycle anyway.
Would recycle at office depot but the nearest store is close to 2 hours away and recycle by mail doesn’t earn rewards.
incorrect interpretation it appears. Its 400 points which is $2 each. As to the number it varies widely from person to person. Some are still getting 10, 20 or even 40. The improvement is that you don’t have to buy ink to recycle. So appears an upgrade to me.
SOME people are only offered 100pts/cart, which is only 50 cents/ea. So if they do 10 carts/mo it is indeed now only a total of $5 in rewards – whereas under the old program they would have received a total of $20 in rewards for the same 10 ink cartridges.
Actually, you are ASSUMING that the people getting 20 or 40 are going to be getting that every month. Which is almost guaranteed to be wrong. They are going to target a few accounts each month with higher amounts, so anyone getting 20, 30, 40, or 50 this month will probably get the lower amount of 10 at 100 points for the next few months.
The only people still guaranteed to get 20 at 400, points each month are people who purchased the plus but it is only until their membership expires and then they will be like everyone else.
As to the buying ink, it was very easy to buy the ink when they had 50% in rewards and then just sell it on ebay and make a profit. This is definitely a downgrade.
On a related note, Lowe’s just launched a new rewards program
William Charles
What happens if you plaid for staples plus membership which has now ended? I don’t see anything about getting a pro rata refund?
Check your account Pete, I may be wrong but I’m under the impression that paid Plus members were the ones that received the offer of still being able to recycle 20 ink/mo for $2 (400pts) ea = $40/mo in rewards. If that’s the case that’s a good deal.
Plus membership continues to get 20 @ 400 points until your membership expires. However, they are not allowing any new signups for plus which seems to imply that anyone who already had the membership will not be able to renew their membership once it expires.
so still $2 reward/cartridge (without any ink purchase requirements)? I have not used their rewards program recently …
No…Now it is essentially $0.50 per cartridge unless you had purchased an old Staples Plus membership