First off, as a HUGE DISCLAIMER – I am in no way saying that this is a sustainable day. Much of it was due to deals or rates that aren’t necessarily open to the public, as well as taking advantage of one-time deals like Amex Offers. Believe me, if I could reliably and consistently profit $900 / day selling gift cards, I’d be quitting my day job.
Still, I think it is somewhat instructive to look at some of the deals out there, to show what can be done
Deal breakdown – first in-store at Sams and Kroger
The morning started off with a notification on the Points With a Crew Slack Channel that there was a one day flash sale on iTunes gift cards. I bought 10 $100 iTunes at $84.47 and should be able to sell them at $86.
Later on in the morning, I realized that there were more gift card deals at Sams, so I made a stop in-store and ended up buying 160 O’Charley and 40 Papa John’s cards. They were both on sale for $34.98 for a 2-pack, and I should be able to sell at about $18-20 per card.
The real benefit of these Sams deals were that 2 of my cards had been targeted for an Amex Offer offering 20% off at Sams Club up to a purchase price of $1250 ($250 off). I split tendered the transaction, using up both of my offers for a cool $500 just from those Amex Offers. I guess I’m glad to pay the $99 annual fee on that SPG Business card after all! 😀
While I was out, I stopped by 2 of my local Kroger stores. They are currently offering discounted gift cards with digital coupons. I bought 16 Yankee Candle $25 cards and 16 Limited $25 cards. I also bought 1 $100 Visa card for $95.95. I still have one Serve, and I wanted to make sure that I could still load it at Walmart before I bought a ton (it worked)
Coming home for some Amex offers
There are quite a few Amex offers (besides the big Sams Club one) that can make sense for gift card purchases. I always find it a little time consuming to go through and buy gift cards, one at a time, to use up all my Amex Offers (and I only have like 8 Amex cards, MUCH less than I know some people have)
I bought 5 Newegg $200 cards with my ($25 Amex Offer), and then tried to buy just 1 $75 Lancome card again (I had bought 5 before but all 5 of my orders were canceled)
Breaking down the totals
All in all, I got 249 gift cards, and the face value of the gift cards was $7775.00
I ended up with a purchase price of $6,058.65, and yes, I did feel a little nervous after I left Sams Club walking around the parking lot holding like $5K in gift cards….
There is $640 in Amex Offers that should come off my bill (mostly the 2 20% off orders from Sams), making my net price $5373.65
If all goes according to plan, I should be able to resell them for $6327.50, leaving me with a net profit of $953.85
And all those gift cards finally convinced me to buy this magnetic card reader so I don’t have to type in all those numbers!
Not counted in my totals are
- 2798 SPG points (~$50)
- 2150 Barclay Arrival points (~$21.50) – meeting the minimum spend on one of the 2 cards I just signed up for
- 600 Amex Membership Rewards ($10.00)
- 400 Hilton HHonors points (~2.00)
- 914 fuel points good for 90 cents / gal off at Kroger (~$30)
Not bad for a day’s side-hustle! Though actually that’s only my SECOND-BEST hustle day ever….
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
Have you ever incurred unexpected losses while reselling gift cards? For example a buyer would claim that the gift card has zero balance and wants money back.
Yes it happens – see my first post on gift card reselling. But I’ve learned a few things about how to minimize the odds of that happening. I had that happen to me recently on an Old Navy card I sold via Raise. They charged me back because the buyer said the balance was gone, but I filed a complaint and after a few weeks my account was re-credited
Why are you excluding your windfall of $500 Amexoffer rebate from your profit? It reduces your cost so you really should change your title to “more than $1400” which is even more amazing! Just a thought….
The $500 Amex Offers are included (as a subtraction of my net cost)
Mind sharing where you sold this loot? At least majority of it, please!
I had all of my Lancome orders cancelled as well. I called in and the customer service rep said she saw nothing that should cancel my orders. She said that she would discuss with her bosses and call back. She called back and left a message saying that my address couldn’t be verified for billing.
Sounds like my experience. I tried just ordering 1 this time and we’ll see if that goes any better
May I ask where you sell iTunes gift cards? I’ve found that most of the major gift card exchanges won’t accept listings for iTunes GCs.