Turn everyday shopping into a points-stacking spree

Hiya, friends.

Welcome back to what I’ve been mentally referring to as Daily Drop’s greatest hits.

We’re admittedly short on Backstreet Boys and Prince this week (how’s that for straddling music decades?), but still throwing it back to review this week’s hits.

I’m not a singer, so instead, think of me as your personal time-travel guide — your very own Marty McFly. 😂

Let’s fire up the jukebox/DeLorean and check out the highlights!

📩 Confused about transfer partners? Our new, free Transfer Partners 101 is for you!

💺 Delta is taking business class back to the basics — like all the way back.

🤔 Check out this interesting chance to buy a lot of Lufthansa miles.

✈️ Yep, this program just added yet another new transfer partner.

😴 Don’t sleep on this 100% transfer bonus to IHG — it’s especially useful in The City that Never Sleeps.

🎥 Catch the latest episode of our summer series, Points Pursuit, on our Daily Drop YouTube channel.

🏆 Our Favorite Pick: Stacking points in the portals

Summer isn’t over yet, but the back-to-school sales are already rolling in, even here in the travel world.

Personally, I think back-to-school shopping would be waaaay cooler if it involved shopping for vacations, but we’ll settle for earning extra points on the essentials.

Thankfully, we’ve got a ton of shopping portals to pick from.

So, let’s run through how we can turn some of these purchases into points and miles… for all the trips we need to take. 😉

Portal #1: Rakuten Dining

You’ve heard us mention Rakuten before — it’s one of the most well-known shopping portals out there, helping you earn cash back at thousands of retailers.

If you’re a savvy Daily Drop reader, you know you can choose to earn MR points (if you hold a card that earns MR points) or Bilt Rewards (though the ratio has been devalued if you don’t have Bilt status) instead of cash back.

It’s traditionally an online shopping portal, but their Rakuten Dining feature lets you link various cards and earn cash back (or points) when you use that card to eat at certain restaurants.

You can also earn 5% back automatically, which is appetizing all by itself.

And they make it pretty simple:

• Link your cards to Rakuten

• Open the Rakuten app

• Click “In-Store”

• Click the tab that says “Dining”

From there, you can see all the restaurants near you that would qualify for earning cash back.

I did this when Mike shared it earlier this week, and lo and behold, my favorite local coffee shop was listed!

So my $15 little latte and croissant pick-me-up turned into a pretty decent points sweep, earning 4x points from my card and 5x points from Rakuten Dining.

Plus, there’s a one-time $10 Dining Bonus promo going on, so that’s another 1,000 MR points, right there.

Not bad for a quick coffee run, eh?

Portal #2: Airline shopping portals

Mike also talked about Southwest’s Shopping portal this week, one of many airline shopping portals — useful for earning points on everyday purchases.

And during their back-to-school promo (running through August 10), you’ll get a bonus of up to 2,500 Southwest points when you shop through the portal:

• Spend $100 = 500 bonus points

• Spend $250 = 1,000 bonus points

• Spend $500 = 2,500 bonus points

Keep in mind, you can’t stack these offers, but you will earn additional points or miles based on the card you use at checkout.

And you’re not limited to Southwest co-branded cards, here, so you could use a Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card to earn an additional 2x miles.

Portal #3: Rove Miles

Clearly, we’ve been a little cuckoo for about Rove Miles lately, and for good reason…

It’s part shopping portal, part third-party booking platform, and it also offers loyalty-eligible direct bookings through its own transfer partners.

Very cool. Very cool.

And they’ve got some truly exclusive transfer partners that no one else has.

Plus, using Rove Miles is an easy way to earn a bunch of transferable miles without opening a new line of credit.

I’d blab about that nonstop too… in fact, I did… to my dad.

When my parents came to visit us earlier this year for my daughter’s birthday, I excitedly suggested he book a hotel through Rove.

He was skeptical (but I’m convincing), and the hotel down the road was available on Rove for 20x miles.

That booking earned him a few thousand Rove Miles (plus the 1,000 he got for signing up).

And I really want him to use his new points to book a United flight for just 5,500 points to visit us again later this fall.

How can he get a United flight for that cheap, you ask?

By transferring his Rove Miles to Air India, which offers domestic United flights for killer award rates. 😎

That, my friends, is called a sweet spot, and Rove has them in spades right now.

Portal #4: Apple shopping platforms

This one’s a little more niche, but if you’ve got some Apple tech on your back-to-school shopping list, it could be for you.

Flying Blue, the shared loyalty program of Air France and KLM, recently launched Apple shopping platforms in the U.S. and parts of Europe.

When you shop through their portal, you can earn Flying Blue miles on eligible Apple products.

And as someone who has taken advantage of multiple Flying Blue promos, I love to have a stash of Flying Blue miles on hand. 💁‍♀️

Earn rates vary by product, as shown below:

• 1x mile per dollar on most Apple products

• 2x miles per dollar on select products

• 4x miles per dollar on select accessories

While these rates aren’t earth-shattering, this can be a good way to top off your Flying Blue balance if you have an Apple purchase on the horizon.

Bottom line

Shopping portals can be a convenient way to earn additional points and miles on purchases you were already planning on making.

They’re an extra layer to your points strategy, helping you make every hard-earned dollar count and bringing you that much closer to discounted travel.

👀 This Week’s Must-Reads

🌍 Week in Review

• Monday: 🏨 Earn 125,000 points for saying “no”

• Tuesday: 🍔 Earn 9x points on dining

• Wednesday: 🏨 Earn a 142% return on spend

• Thursday: ✈️ Yay! Another new transfer partner

• Friday: 🏨 New 100% hotel transfer bonus

Alright, dropping y’all back off in the middle of your weekend plans!

I hope you can take advantage of some of these shopping portal opportunities, but can we also put back-to-school on hold and latch on to the remaining weeks of summer?!

Gonna go live it up while it’s here, and I’ll catch y’all next weekend!

29.7604° N , 95.3698° W

With contributions by Mike Dodge and McKay Moffitt ❤️