By Wendy Mihm | February 15, 2011
No one is going to believe me, but I actually had this idea in a Von’s grocery store parking lot about a year and a half ago.
When I reminded my husband of this upon discovering the website this morning, I bounced up and down, pointed to my monitor and yelled “Look! Look! Somebody made Coupon Bandit!” That was my name for it. My mascot was going to be a little raccoon because for some reason, everybody thinks raccoons are bandits. Including me. But it’s cute, right?
Chris peered at my monitor, raised an eyebrow and said, simply “Oh yeah. Did I like it at the time?”
Obviously he did not have any recollection of my brilliance whatsoever. But that’s the thing about business ideas. They are a dime a dozen. Sure it was a great idea, but I didn’t do anything about it—someone else did, and from the looks of it, they did a great job and they called it “Yowza!!”
Now I am going to tell you about their business because I think it could save you some money. I also just downloaded it onto my iPhone because I think it will save me some money too. I am notoriously bad at using traditional coupons and maybe this will help me out.
Here’s how Yowza!! works.
Step 1.
Download the Yowsa!! app onto your iPhone or other smartphone. It’s free!
Step 2.
Let it go to work downloading local deals in your geographic area. This is automatic—you don’t have to do anything.
Step 3.
Tap on the app and have a look at the shops and restaurants that came in. Then when you visit one, simply pull up one of the deals on your smart phone, show it to the cashier when you check out and—badda bing! You save money!
Now I must warn you: this is a brand new application and the team behind it is still pounding the pavement to establish relationships with more and more vendors to get on board. That means there currently are not a huge number of shops and restaurants participating yet. But the list should continue to grow as the company does. So be patient—you have nothing to lose. Since it is free, you might as well start saving now, rather than letting the existing deals pass you by.
Plus you look really good hanging out there, on the cutting edge!
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Perfect. I always gave my mom a hard time about cutting coupons when I was younger. We called her the coupon queen. I think that was the only reason we subscribed to the local paper was for those damn coupons. Anyway now that I’m a mom, I sometime feel too cool for coupons but secretly I know they can save me a bunch. I look forward to using Yowsa to get the coupons saving without having my kids give me a hard time.
You should never feel bad having your kids see you save money. I think today’s moms need to show kids that things are expensive and saving money is a good thing.
I see moms buying their kids everything they want. Rap stars (the ones my boys love) promote “bling” lifestyles but smart people know most of those fools are broke. I want my kids to see me saving money and not dream of fools gold. I would use Yowsa coupons in a minute but I don’t have a “smart” phone. My “dumb” phone was free and works perfectly as a phone. I guess I’ll stick to paper for now.
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