Not All Offers are Scams

For the past three months you’ve enjoyed being paper-statement FREE. To thank you for making the switch – and giving the environment a little break – we’re giving you this Starbucks Card loaded with $5. Enjoy!

This comes at the interesting time because a few days ago I just wrote about going to Starbucks less often by making your own in this article!  

At first, I thought it was very honorable because Southern California Edison is trying to be environmentally responsible.  I thought how there is no way they can get the $5 back by simply getting rid of a piece of paper which cost nothing more than 1 cent.  However, as I thought about it a little more, I realize that there’s more to this than that.  Every paper statement probably costs them the postage, which they probably get a deal on (say that cost 20 cents), the paper (say 1 cent), and the extra computer handling and printing (say 4 cents).  In this theotical example, each paper statement costs them $0.25.  Add the fact that they probably got a deal for the Starbucks card (I say at least 20%, making the $5 card really cost $4), they will be able to get the total cost back in 16 months.  At that point on, they will be saving money every single month without doing anything else!

The lesson here on the surface is to sign up for offers from trusted companies, which in this case asked me to trade in something I did not really need (paper bill) with something I like ($5 gift card).  However, there is more to it than that.

Remember that little analysis we just did?  There are a ton of ways we can save money just like my utility company did.  For example, has anyone ever thought that buying a car would ever be a money saving measure?  Some of us have cars that are so old it costs $500-$1000 every time it needs to be repaired.  If this happens too often for you, perhaps you can think about buying another used car that is newer.  It might cost money up front and not make too much sense on the surface, but it might save money down the road.  

There are so many examples of this which everyone can relate to.  The key is to sit down and really think about how we can save money.  There are infinite number of ways to do this, and everyone will be able to come up with something different.  We should not say “no” as soon as we hear that we have to pay first.  We need to think about the long term savings since that is the ultimate goal.  Sometimes biting the bullet makes more sense than procrastinating.