Saturday, September 05, 2009

One of my favorite resources for affording more frequent date nights is restaurant.com

The regular price for a $25 gift certificate is $ 10.
But there are codes throughout the month (sign up for email to get the codes, or simply run a Google search for restaurant.com codes) that give you 50 - 80% off that.

This is the way it works:

You buy the gift certificate at 80% off near the end of the month (some popular restaurants are sold out at that point, so if you have a restaurant you like, you may want to get it for the 50% off early in the month.) So, that is $ 2 for a $ 25 gift certificate.

Now you go out to eat.

The rules stipulate that you have to spend at least $ 35 in food to use the $ 25 gift certificate. Alcoholic drinks usually don't count toward the total. (Do read the fine print/rules on the certificate.)

So, let's say my bills comes to $ 38.

- minus the certificate, I pay $ 13 (plus tip on the pre-certificate amount. Some restaurants add it automatically when you use the certificate -- so that the servers don't get stiffed -- and some don't.)

So, including the $ 2 I paid for the certificate, I get $ 38 of food for $15 (plus tip.)

It's a way to get a really nice date night out for the price of a burger joint. In our area, restaurant.com has quite a large choice of restaurants (I know some other areas are more sparse.) But it is worth checking out!

Once you purchase the certificates, they are good for a year. I usually buy five different ones when there is a good code, and then when we want to go out, I just pull one out from the binder. There are also $ 10 certificates (which require a $ 20 purchase.)

I've never had a problem using them, and we've been doing this for close to two years.


(Current 50% code is MENU!)

(No, I am in no way affiliated with the site, LOL -- it's just been great for our family!)

posted by Birgit
0 comments at 4:02 PM