Portland Oregon Safeway VIP Blogger Event Recap #Safewayj4u

On Wednesday May 16th, 2012 I was privileged to attend the Safeway VIP Blogger Event in Oregon at the Safeway Portland Division Office. This was my very first blogger event so I was thrilled to be invited! I met up with some other bloggers, traded information and socialized. We were also very well fed both breakfast and lunch. Safeway sure knows food :) The Signature Cafe Buffalo Chicken Pasta Salad, O Organics Blood Orange Italian Soda and the Safeway Select French Berry Lemonade Sparkling Soda was my favorite for the lunch portion of the event. On the table beside the food Safeway showcased some of their brand name food items.

We sat at long tables and Tweeted, Facebooked and sent our readers quick messages about where we were and what we were learning. Safeway showed us a presentation about their new clip-less coupon program called Just for U.

Essentially when you sign up for Just for U on the Safeway website you can save roughly 10-20% more than usual if you add the coupons that you want from their website directly to your Safeway Club Card. This makes it so simple to save money. These personalized price offers in Just for U are even better than Safeway's Everyday Low Prices and great Club Card specials. For those of us that don't clip coupons because of time restraints this is a much easier method and isn't time consuming at all. For those of us that clip coupons religiously or just part time this is also great for you too because you can still stack coupons with the Just for U offers as well and if you have a better offer on a clipped manufactured coupon than the digital manufactured coupon offered or vise versa you get the better offer...so the higher discount always wins. I will go into the program in more detail on another post to try to answer all your questions. There are some questions already answered about the Just for U program on the Safeway website.

After the presentation we were handed a Safeway $50 Gift Card and were told we would be going to one of their Safeway stores to shop so that we could get the feel for exactly how the Just for U program worked. First we needed to sign into our Just for U accounts on the Safeway website and add coupons we would use to our Safeway Club Card. So I added a few to my card that I thought I would buy, but when we reached the Safeway store by shuttle I found that I forgot to add a few of the offers. Fortunately they have computer consoles at the store with printers so you can load your cards with the offers there too and print out your lists. This is handy for those like me that have forgotten to add a few of the offers or those that do not have a home computer and need to add them before they start shopping. You can also add them from your iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad or Android.

When we arrived at the Safeway we were going to shop at there was a press conference held and Steve Frisby, Safeway Division President for Seattle & Portland spoke about the program to the media and answered their questions. After the press conference some of the bloggers were followed around by media and filmed for the news. I now wish I had been bold enough to have done this too as my blog could have used the media attention.

The Safeway sponsored shopping trip was a whole lot of fun even though I didn't buy too much because I didn't want to have to carry it all to the shuttle. I saved a nice 36% on my purchases although along with the Just for U savings I used a manufactured coupon I found beside the Tazo Giant Peach Drinks for $1 off and am also getting a rebate back for the 6 pack of Snapple. See how I did on my shopping excursion on my receipt.

After we got back to the division office we had a question and answer session. Then we were given a Safeway reusable tote full of Safeway swag goodies to take home with us. I was the last blogger to leave so they gave me the 5 red mylar balloons that were tied to the railing outside to give to my kids.

Here we are, the Portland Safeway VIP Bloggers. I am the shortest one in the front, with long brown hair wearing purple, green and blue. I really enjoyed my day with the other bloggers, Safeway personnel, and PR. It was fun filled and I hope to do it again soon!

DISCLOSURE/DISCLAIMER: I went to this event because I was invited. I wanted to let you, my readers, know of the savings you could get by signing up for the Safeway Just for U program so I wrote this post. Thanks to Safeway and their representatives for providing me with the information and inviting me to this event. I received free swag for attending. My thoughts are mine and my family's own opinion and have not been altered by anyone else. I did not receive any other compensation for posting.