Senior sells discount cards
Matt Cook
Issue date: 10/22/09 Section: News
Everyone likes a good discount. Senior Alex Shoker, an economics major, created an easy way for students to receive discounts at locations including Hungry Howie's or Jilly Beans. He calls them 'discount cards' and sells them every day during lunch hours in Grewcock Student Union for $10.
Discounts on the card include 20 percent off any entrée at Chicago Water Grill or Johnny T's Bistro, buy-one-get-one-free from Jilly Beans, or a large one-topping pizza from Hungry Howie's for $5.99.
"The nice thing about these cards is they save college students money, and they stimulate the local economy and help independent businesses," Shoker said.
Once the idea cleared the deans' offices, it was a simple matter of putting the deals together.
"I spent a couple weeks over the summer talking to business owners, getting their support," Shoker said. "Most business were quite willing to get on board. I worked with a lot of them a couple years ago when they bought ad space in my satirical newspaper, The Roasted Times."
The idea for the cards came from the ads that occupied the same space each week in The Roasted Times.
"It occurred to me that, rather than having to tear out the ads each week, people could simply use a card with these coupons printed on them," Shoker said.
The deals are printed on the cards, and the guidelines are simple. One person per card, meaning you can't make a purchase with the card and then allow a friend to use the card; or buy a "community card," where you and a group of friends all share the card.
"It's part of the contract, but there's not really anything that to stop you; officially it's bad, unofficially, it's what I would do," Shoker said.
Local business owners were positive about the prospect of added business.
"Usually when we do promotions, we see about 15 to 20 percent of the coupons used, but with the discount cards, we're expecting an amount somewhere in the range of 20 to 30 percent of the coupons will be used," said Wayne Babcock of the Chicago Water Grill.
Students who invested in a card hope to enjoy deals on many college expenses.
"It pays for itself if you use it often enough, there are some pretty big discounts on there; I'll probably use mine at least once every couple of weeks," senior Andrew Untal said.
Discounts on the card include 20 percent off any entrée at Chicago Water Grill or Johnny T's Bistro, buy-one-get-one-free from Jilly Beans, or a large one-topping pizza from Hungry Howie's for $5.99.
"The nice thing about these cards is they save college students money, and they stimulate the local economy and help independent businesses," Shoker said.
Once the idea cleared the deans' offices, it was a simple matter of putting the deals together.
"I spent a couple weeks over the summer talking to business owners, getting their support," Shoker said. "Most business were quite willing to get on board. I worked with a lot of them a couple years ago when they bought ad space in my satirical newspaper, The Roasted Times."
The idea for the cards came from the ads that occupied the same space each week in The Roasted Times.
"It occurred to me that, rather than having to tear out the ads each week, people could simply use a card with these coupons printed on them," Shoker said.
The deals are printed on the cards, and the guidelines are simple. One person per card, meaning you can't make a purchase with the card and then allow a friend to use the card; or buy a "community card," where you and a group of friends all share the card.
"It's part of the contract, but there's not really anything that to stop you; officially it's bad, unofficially, it's what I would do," Shoker said.
Local business owners were positive about the prospect of added business.
"Usually when we do promotions, we see about 15 to 20 percent of the coupons used, but with the discount cards, we're expecting an amount somewhere in the range of 20 to 30 percent of the coupons will be used," said Wayne Babcock of the Chicago Water Grill.
Students who invested in a card hope to enjoy deals on many college expenses.
"It pays for itself if you use it often enough, there are some pretty big discounts on there; I'll probably use mine at least once every couple of weeks," senior Andrew Untal said.
Be the first to comment on this story