Shop for Free: How I'm Helping My Sister Pay for Her Honeymoon Cruise

Hello and good morning everyone! I wanted to throw a post together explaining how I'm helping my sister and her fiance pay for their Honeymoon cruise for FREE.


Here is a little backstory. My sister, Reagan and her fiance Tim have been together for almost 5 years now. They have tried to put a wedding together a few times but it has always fallen through. They have 4 children! Tristan and Cadence (4 and 2 this March) and Hayden and Holden (7-month-old twins!) They decided to elope to Las Vegas in October utilizing points they have from playing the MyVegas game on Facebook. I will have to do a whole blog post alone on MyVegas but it's a game you play where you gather these gold coins that you can redeem for things like hotel room stays, free buffets, show tickets...there is even a redemption for an actual wedding! So she's wanting to use all these points that have to try to pay as much as they can using just their points. I think this will be amazing. She wanted to go on a cruise as well, considering that Vegas is only a few hours from Los Angeles and the port in Long Beach. Carnival has 2 ships that leave out of the port one being the Imagination which is the cruise ship we sailed on many years ago.

So what happened was she booked it paying the deposit of $98 during a sale! Super exciting right? But this is going to the Wedding/Honeymoon of paying for stuff in an alternative way. I'm a planner. I'm huge into planning trips. I never get to go but I 've planned at least 10 cruises and watched as the day comes and goes. But this is different, this is for my sister.

The first thing I did when they even decided to do this Vegas escape wedding was set them both up with different survey companies. I get tons of free gift cards just from doing surveys and they were excited to be able to try and pay for things without actually paying them with real money. Make sense?

Now they are booked. The total of their booking before the deposit was $819.72 which includes the prepaid gratuities. They were booked in an interior cabin on the Main Deck (Deck 4, almost at the bottom of the boat.) But I know Carnival like the back of my hand and I waited. Wasn't even two weeks later they ran a different sale. With THIS sale you got an upgrade to the cabin as well as $50 in onboard credit to spend on anything you wanted.

Stay with me I know this is a long and boring post but you will want to see how they went from owing $819 on their cruise to owing $490 in just a month without spending much of their own money.

I immediately filled out the Carnival Price Protection form to request the $50 credit as well as the upgrade in the cabin. It wasn't even a few hours later that not only did I receive the $50 credit but also a bill that they owed another $52 towards their deposit. I was expecting that but I knew they had that money so it was fine, that was money that would have to be paid anyway right? So I had them pay the $52 making their total deposit towards the cruise just $150. That is the only "real" money they have spent. So we did get the $50 in onboard spending now to kick up the upgrade in the cabin. I called Carnival and talked to a lovely lady who understood exactly what I was trying to do. Without raising the price that they paid for the cabin I was able to move them from the Main deck (deck 5 remember) up to the Empress deck (Deck 7). I think this is an amazing place for them to be, deck 7 is the deck you walk onto when you Embark on your cruise. They are literally just a few hundred feet from their room when they walk on board the ship on day one. With Tim's bad back this would be great for him. Not tons of long walks to make it to the elevator and just steps from the Atrium and guest services.

So we've upgraded, had some onboard credit added to the room and still our total balance due now after the $150 deposit is $669 and some change. Keep in mind Tim and Reagan have been doing surveys for various companies, Tim mostly has Reagan works and sometimes she forgets to do them. lol. Tim alone had amassed almost $75 on Swagbucks by this time and he decided to redeem. He redeemed for Visa gift cards, not only that but he also had some money sitting in PayPal from other Survey companies. So all in all...Tim and Reagan have redeemed for over $176 in survey money and made payments to their cruise with that money! How awesome is that?

But that's not all folks! Tim and Reagan both wanted the Faster to the Fun package. This is the package that lets them board very quickly and have their room ready as soon as they step foot on the ship. It was priced at $49.95. Tim redeemed $50 from Swagbucks and bought that package. He didn't pay one red cent for that package and now they have an awesome package. I did take that other .05 from that gift card and made a .05 payment. Every penny counts right?

One more thing I wanted to discuss. We had some issues with some Pampers diapers. They were splitting and falling apart some even were broken as soon as we took them out of the package. I emailed Pampers and explained the situation. They were really awesome. They did want some photos which I did take and send over to them, after that they sent us a $25 gift card to purchase any diapers we wanted for the future. At that time we had enough diapers for all the kiddos so we bought $25 in onboard credit for their cruise.

So this is how they sit right now.

Their original cruise price was $819.78
Deposit paid: $150 leaving a balance due of $669.78
Total paid by Survey money: $179.78
Faster to the Fun Option: $49.95
Onboard Credit: $75 (Upgrade + $25 purchase)

Total in FREE money they have used on this cruise so far: $254.73

This leaves them with a balance right now of $490. Tim is still working hard on his surveys so I know that balance will go down. I'm super proud of them for doing this.

Now when it comes to packing for this whole trip (Vegas + Cruise) they will be utilizing some of the samples I get in the mail. Not only that but Tim has also received some Amazon gift cards from a few sites that only pay out in Amazon gift cards to buy things that they will need. He purchased some packing cubes (coupon brought them down to about $2.89), A carry-on bag (coupon brought it down to $2.95), a travel pillow set (coupon brought it down to $1.30), a black bowtie (coupon brought it down to $2),  and a black set of suspenders (Coupon brought it down to $1.29).





I also helped them set up a Carnival Honeymoon Registry which you can view here. Anyone can opt to make a purchase for them for their honeymoon you can pay for a photo from the photographs, pay on an excursion (I know they really want to do the Blowhole excursion in Ensenada!) or just pay on their cruise balance in general, so much to choose from and I can assure you they will be excited about any gifts they receive. They also have a small wishlist for their Vegas wedding on Amazon which you can see here.

If you have questions feel free to post them below or reach out to me on social media! If you know any other ways the couple can save just post below as well!

The Best Campaign Websites to Join

I love joining survey sites and Word of Mouth campaign sites. Here are my favorite sites!

I recommend that you sign up for the 4 biggest social media sights if you haven't already! Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest. I also recommend that you go ahead and write out a few reviews on websites such as Amazon for products you already have and use. Be honest! Don't lie about what happened with that product. Start a blog! They are completely free with Blogger.com or Wink.com. (I use Blogger.) Above all have fun, try new products, get some gift cards. I know some can be time-consuming but...well what else are you gonna do when you have nothing to do? lol.

1. Crowdtap. I ADORE Crowdtap. Crowdtap is an influencer marketing site like many others however what I love is that for every 1000 points I get I receive a $5 Amazon gift card. It's pretty easy to get too. Crowdtap asks short simple 1 to 2 question surveys that pay 2 points each, some small "campaigns" where you share things to your Twitter or Facebook account for 20 points and there are also Samples to be had, mostly full sized! Revlon and Unilever are frequent sample campaigns. You receive a cute box or package with your sample in it, try it out then share your review to your social media. Crowdtap has more than helped me buy Christmas this year. I've bought CDs, cards, Christmas gifts. The $5 gift cards do add up!

2. Globaltestmarket. This is a great LEGITIMATE survey site. You get between 25 and 300 points for each survey which can last up to 30 minutes but once you reach around 1100 points you can choose between a plethora of gift cards. Recently I've been gathering the Amazon gift cards for my Christmas shopping. Some of the surveys can be repetitive but those gift cards are more than worth it. I get several surveys invites a day but keep in mind you can be screened out of some. Definitely, give Globaltestmarket a try!

3. Smiley360. This another influencer marketing site! Here there are no points to be traded in but I've been able to try and review some great products. They've tested everything from vitamins to makeup! It's great fun and you'll enjoy it!  Join Smiley360 and tell me how you like it!

4. Bzzagent. Bzz was my first influencer marketing site and they are near and dear to my heart. I've been able to test makeup, hair care products, skin care products, food items even a cell phone!! I love them and always make sure I check out the newest products and answer all the surveys. They aren't very long, it's just to gauge your compatibility with the product. (You don't want to receive dog food if you don't have a dog!) Bzzagent always has something going so give them a try.

5. Influenster. This company is very similar to the way Bzzagent works. You receive products to review on your social media using certain hashtags. It's very cool and I recently receive a VoxBox (this is what Influester calls their campaigns) for Garnier Fructis. I'm sure you saw my review on my new Instagram account!) I love the boxes I receive as they are full-size products and not just sample sizes. It really is a great program and I highly recommend it. 

6. Swagbucks. Swagbucks is very different than the rest of the programs on this list. It's everything you can imagine to get points. Surveys, shopping, searches, polls. You get points and can redeem them fairly quickly. You get varying types of points for each task that you do and can redeem them for gift cards for as little as 300 points. Let's just say they have contributed a lot to my Amazon Christmas fund. :D 

So that's it for the day. I hope you give each of these products a change. I know you will find that they are very fun and you can start getting some awesome things in the mail!!