Walgreens Balance Rewards #CBias

As a couponer, I am always looking for the best deals and ways to save money. Walgreens has had its Register Rewards program for a while and this month they are unveiling their new loyalty card, Balance Rewards.  The Balance Rewards program goes live on September 16, 2012 but you can sign up now and everyone who signs up by September 15th is entered into a sweepstakes for 1 million loyalty points…and there are 10 winners! Watch this video about the new Walgreens Rewards program then I’ll show you how to sign up and how to use the upgraded Walgreens App to make your shopping even easier.

Signing up for Walgreens Balance Rewards is easy, just visit the Walgreens website and click on the “Join Now” button. If you already have a Walgreens.com account you sign in with that otherwise you just create a new account and you are all set.

Here is the breakdown of how the #BalanceRewards are going to work.

After I signed up online I downloaded the Walgreens App to my Android phone so that I could see how the app makes my shopping trip even easier. You can use the app to request refills on your medications just by using the scanner in the app to scan the barcode on your prescription, I wish the pharmacy I have my prescriptions at included that option!

You can also use the app to order prints from pictures you take with you phone or from Facebook. I used the app to order 2 pictures of my puppy, Mushu and one of me with Rene Syler that we took after dinner one night in Charlotte at Type-A.

It was easy to use the app to upload my photos to be printed and they were ready in about an hour.

I plan all of my shopping trips ahead of time so I know what I am going to buy and which coupons I am going to use. I was excited to see that there are a few mobile coupons on the Walgreens app. I planned on buying the 6 pack of Reese’s candy bars and using the $1 off coupon but…they were sold out of the candy bars when we went shopping. 🙁 I also used the weekly ad, located in the app to create my final shopping list. This interface was a bit clunky. You can view each page of the ad but then you need to click to list view to see each individual item and there is where you can click on the item to add it to your shopping list.

After creating my shopping list on the app and clipping my coupons, my husband and I headed to Walgreens to pick up our photos and purchase the items on our list.

As we entered Walgreens I was expecting to be bombarded with signage and information about the new Balance Rewards program…but there were none! There was this sign about the app though.

I was looking forward to using the store map feature in the Walgreens app to help me find the items on my list more swiftly but, I had such bad cell service in the store I wasn’t able to try that feature out. I did purchase most of the items on my list and I picked up my photos from the photo department before we checked out. At check out was another opportunity to be introduced to the Balance Rewards program but again there was no signage and the cashier didn’t mention it to us.

I took a lot more pictures during this project so please check out my slideshow, it goes into much more detail than I could in this post.

You can stay up to date with everything going on with the Balance Rewards program by following Walgreens on Facebook and on Twitter. You can also check out the #BalanceRewards and #cbias hashtags on Twitter. Please share this post with your friends, it would be awesome if a MomMaven reader won 1 million points!!

Disclosure: I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community.  This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Walgreens  #CBias #SocialFabric all opinions are 100% mine.