From alaskaair.com Partner Earning Opportunities (http://www.alaskaair.com/mileageplan/PartnerMilesOps.asp): Tesoro's Free Fillin'® program offers an easy way to earn Mileage Plan Miles. Earn one stamp for every eight gallons of fuel purchased at participating stations. Collect eight stamps for 75 miles, or 24 stamps for 300 miles, then submit your completed booklet for the chance to win in our recurring sweepstakes drawing. See stores for details.
So I've been collecting stamps since last summer and my card is still only about 2/3 full. It's been a little slow for me because Tesoro is usually about 5 cents more than other places around where I live/work. But recently, I've found a station that gives me 2 stamps for around 8-10 gallons of gas, which speeds things up a bit.
Has anyone else been collecting these stickers? How have you optimized it?
Well, you need a minimum of about 1600 stamps for a free ticket. So, that means you need to buy 12800 gallons of gas, which is quite a bit.
If you get 2 stamps and use the AS credit card, you could shave that to about 3200 gallons of gas, but that is still 80 complete fillups even on my Suburban. :td:
If I went there normally, I would probably collect, but it doesn't make me want to go out of my way for sure.
3200 gallons psssh that's only like 3200 * $2.8/g = $8960 -- for a free coach saver award ticket? totally worth it - just buy a big boat (and invite us all to go out in it) you'll go through that much gas in no time :p
So I've been collecting stamps since last summer and my card is still only about 2/3 full. It's been a little slow for me because Tesoro is usually about 5 cents more than other places around where I live/work. But recently, I've found a station that gives me 2 stamps for around 8-10 gallons of gas, which speeds things up a bit.
Has anyone else been collecting these stickers? How have you optimized it?
I picked up one of the cards sometime after I started flying Northwest, so it'd have to have been in very late January or February at the earliest. I just turned it in, full, this morning. That's for 1 car, a Honda... but since they give a sticker for 8 gallons here, I've been waiting 'til it's 3/4 empty and putting in 8-on-the-nose gallons.
Here in Hilo, the price difference between Tesoro and the cheapest gas is usually only a penny or two a gallon. And for the last month, I've always paid with a Northwest mileage CC.
So by my math, on the one hand I've bought 24 * 8 gallons, or 192 gallons, actually a little more, since I hardly ever manage to stop it at 8.000... and the prices have usually been between $3.40 and $3.50 here, so that's about $700 worth of gas. And I didn't have the mileage card the whole time.
But... I would have had to buy gas anyway, so I think of the miles as having cost me the difference between buying that gas and buying the cheapest possible gas. At a couple cents a gallon, that's, say, 200 * .02 or $4.00 for 300 miles, which comes out to $.01333~ per mile. Not such a horrible price overall. If the price difference is 5 cents a mile for Whistler814, the incremental cost per mile would be $10.00 for 300 miles, or about $.033333~ per mile... I think.
Lately the Tesoro I go to has been 3 cents less than the usual cheap places. Plus I figured out on weekdays, there's an attendant who is just starting her shift at around 7:30-8:00am that gives me 2 stamps for ~<8 gallons. So I'm actually on my 2nd card now with a goal of actually saving enough to fly somewhere.
I fill up 3 times a week (remember ~<8 gallons each time) and get 6 stickers. Every month I can get 300 miles (or $5 gas credit). In about 5.6 years I can collect 20,000 mi.
I think it's a good program that requires pretty minimal effort beyond what one usually does.
...I'm actually on my 2nd card now with a goal of actually saving enough to fly somewhere... In about 5.6 years I can collect 20,000 mi.
I think it's a good program that requires pretty minimal effort beyond what one usually does.
I agree with the last part, and that's why I'm doing it. 300 miles every few months (given my car and how much I drive it) really isn't a significant amount compared to what I rack up actually flying, but I figure if I have to buy gas anyway, I might as well buy get some extra miles for doing it! :)
This Friday, I'm renting a car (which gets me miles) and paying for it with my CC (which gets me miles), driving over to KOA to catch one of those flights to SEA (which gets me miles) and I just happen to know of a Tesoro station right next to the Wendy's in KOA, so maybe I'll stop by there to fill up the tank (which gets me a sticker, and thus eventually miles) before dropping the car off at the airport. :)
If I could find a way to get miles for breathing, I would. :D
It's a bad joke of a promotion. Buy "good" gas at a real fillin' station. :td:
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Tesoro's Free Fillin'