"Sneak Peek" Supermarket Catalogues

The current practice of Coles posting their new catalogue which starts on Wednesday at 5:00 PM on Monday afternoon is great, especially when we have one of their “Spend $60 a week for 4 weeks and receive 10,000 flybuys points”.
I had 1 shop to go and I was going to stock up on 10 can packs of Kirk’s Ginger Ale yesterday but when I checked the new catalogue, I saw that they are on special as of today for 20% less.
Whilst I appreciate that Supa IGA is not able to have prices on their website due to the individual stores all being independently owned and operated, I cannot see any valid reason why they cannot do likewise and provide a “sneak peek”.

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While Woolies also puts their catalogues up early, you may have answered your own question.

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Sorry but I don’t get your point.
I know Woollies also does what Coles do but I cannot see why IGA doesn’t.
They obviously have already received the new catalogues before each Wednesday and the catalogues are also online every Wednesday. Should simply just be a matter of posting the new catalogue online by Monday afternoon.

This is were the momey the 10000 flybuys comes from.

If one shops for points, one is likely not to be better off.

I expect that Coles and others anaylse data of products regularly bought and suspect these smae products possibly aren’t discounted through the 10000 flybuy point offer.

Coles wins because customers buy more (at regular shelf prices) to chase the 10000 points and at the end of the day Coles is better off then the customer receiving the 10000 points.

Nothing is free in life.

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I beg to differ.
I only buy the products that we actually need, and on special or marked down whenever possible, not items just so as to reach the set target amount.
Our 2 flybuys accounts show that we received over 50,000 major bonus points in addition to minor bonus points and standard points on one and over 20,000 major bonus points as well as minor bonus points and standard points on the other over the past 6 months.
That equates to a total of major bonus points worth almost $400 dollars which is well in excess of 10% of what we spent. We spent over $10,000 at Coles and our local Supa IGA in the previous financial year with Coles getting around 60% of it.
We have already redeemed $150 on one card and $100 on the other card and our current points balances are worth over $300 on one card and over $80 on the other card.
Would you seriously turn down an offer of a rebate in excess of 10% on items you would have bought anyway?
I can hear Dire Straits singing “Money for Nothing” in the background.

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Where do you think IGA would rather have 20% of the price? In their pocket or yours?

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It is the semantics. @phb is correct and @Fred123 does not buy to chase points.

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In my shop at Coles yesterday for week 4, I bought the following.
Broccoli. On special at $2.50 KG. Today $4.50 Kg.
Red chilis. Standard price $22 Kg.
Egg Pappardelle. Standard price $3.39.
Coles Finest sourdough bread. Standard price $5.50.
Glade Sense & Spray refills. On special at $4.20. Today $6.25.
Fluffy conditioner. On special at $5.00. Normal price $6.99.
Raw banana prawns. On special at $19.50 Kg.
Raw lobster tail. On special at $8.00.
Raw scallops. Marked down to $18.00 Kg. Normally $39.00 Kg.
Raw Orange Roughy. Marked down to $10.00 Kg. Normally $35.00 Kg.
Smoked mussels. Normal price $15.00 for 500 gm pack.
TOTAL $65.23
My wife did the week 3 shop in Nambour. I don’t know what she bought but the total was $92.12.
The week 2 shop was $105.75 as flybuys sent us an additional offer that if we spent over $100, they would give us an additional 6,000 bonus points.
They effectively gave us an extra $30.00 for spending an extra $40.00. Perhaps I should have posted this under my previous topic titled “Are Coles In La La Land?”
The week 1 shop was a total of $62.08
Total spend for the 4 weeks. $325.18.
Total major bonus points. 16,000 points worth $80.00. Can someone remind me of how we are not getting a great deal?
P.S. The pappardelle marinara I had for dinner last night was delicious as it will be for the next few nights.

This comment was not based on the purchases of one shopper but all shoppers who frequent Coles. I would find it highly unusual for Coles to set its prices based on what @Fred123 purchases.

It coild also be expected that some shoppers would find some regularly purchased items on ‘special’, but across all product categories, the average shopper could be paying more than would usually occur outside the 10000 point period…namely, less high volume products on special than would otherwise be the case.

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As I have previously posted on this site, I believe that these reward programs should be called customer disloyalty programs. The more you spend, the less they give you.
Our elder daughter and my wife’s youngest sister both spend over $300 a week at Coles and both they and other persons have said that the 4 week shop offers they receive are for around a $350 weekly spend to get 20,000 flybuys points worth $100.00, so that they have to spend 5 to 5.5 times as much as us to get double the rewards points we get.
Often after we have completed a $60 a week offer, the next one will be for a higher weekly spend, but if we do not take up the offer, they will reduce the weekly spend on subsequent offers back to $60.00 or $70.00 a week.
As the McDonalds ads stated “I’m loving it”.

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I just went to check the current catalogue for our local Supa IGA, and surprise, surprise.

The site now also lists the next catalogue as well, just like Coles. They have now removed another disadvantage they previously had.

Now if only they could have their own website but it is probably impossible unless they standardised prices which would probably draw the attention of the ACCC.

Coles, Woollies and our local Supa IGA have now all resumed their junk mail weekly catalogues after stopping them during the panic buying crisis.

At least both Coles and Woollies are now only printing them on non-gloss paper so less waste of resources and easier to compost.

Both the Woollies printed and online versions are now in a landscape format instead of the traditional portrait format which I find makes the online version hard to read.

Howvever, I have found that using the download PDF button on the first page provides the catalogues in a much larger size and with the pages one below the other so they are easy to read and scroll down through.

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I signed up for Coles weekly email of their catalogues and the first one just arrived.

As well as the “View Catalogue” link, there is also a “Half Price” specials link which is not in the catalogue or the home page so very handy for seeing the best offers.

https://shop.coles.com.au/a/earlville/specials/search/half-price-specials?cid=wsm

There is even a half price special on Violet Crumble Dark Choclate which I did not know even existed.

https://shop.coles.com.au/a/earlville/product/violet-crumble-dark-choc-honeycomb-bag

Coles are at last pulling the pin on printed weekly catalouges.

Great stuff. Save some trees. Yes. Help the planet. Yes. Reduce Coles prices. ???

‘Reduce Coles costs’ - and put a few thousand school kids or people who really need an extra few bucks out of work, and still not understand how to advertise to customers based on locality (I received two offers recently that were only valid for a Coles store 1500 km away that I shopped at once using a FlyBuys card that has an address where I actually live - and don’t get me started on Woolworths inept ‘targeted’ advertising :wink: )

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At the bottom of the email I received from Coles tonight was this statement.

#### Did you know?
We’re no longer delivering our paper catalogue to letterboxes,

however you can still get our paper catalogue in-store.

This change will save over 10,000 tonnes of paper every year, or the equivalent
of around 80,000 trees! It’s another important step toward our goal
of becoming Australia’s most sustainable supermarket.|

image

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Not to mention all the water and chemicals required to produce the same. Coles might be selling that benefit short. It is Aussie paper and trees they are taking about?

The decision is not all that popular with some consumers - up to 2 million older Aussies who are not into the online future.

Do Coles have a solution? No unless picking up one in store works. Probably a bit late for some specials and more time wasted on the day going thru it.

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Having just looked at both Coles and Woollies lists of half price specials for this week comprising around 1,000 items, I did not see a single product that we buy or want.

The catalogues also had little of the products that we buy, and of course, they only list a small selection of all the items on special.

I find that the emails from Flybuys each week which show products we have previously bought are of far more use than either the lists of half price specials or the catalogues, as they only show products we buy which are on special.

Whilst people might object to their data being recorded and used, I find that in this instance, it is beneficial.

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I find that the flybuys emails come hot on the heels of the shop I already did a few hours before, exhorting me to spend more. Nope.

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Ever since COVID-19, the supermarket catalogues seem obsessed with teaching us what to eat and how to cook, rather than listing specials! I have been an online supermarket shopper for 20 years and until about 2 years ago when they started transitioning to dedicated online “fulfilment” centres, I was happy with the service. Over the last couple of years, the range of products offered has declined and now so have the catalogues! It seems to me, the more online customers they get, the worse the service provided.

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