When you’re on a strict vacation budget like we are, every
penny counts. The more ways there are to
save, the better, in my opinion. I’ve discovered some
new ways to save money on your Branson vacation, so I thought I’d share them
with you.
National discount websites
In the Discount Web Sites tab above, I reference Half Off Deals, which has deals for dining and shows. The sites listed below offer deals on dining, shows and attractions.
Groupon is the granddaddy of all the discount sites. Not only do they offer deals on dining, shows and attractions, they offer occasional hotel discounts called Groupon Getaways with Expedia. As I write this, the present Branson discounts are 248 Take and Bake, LedgeStone Country Club Grille, Indian Point Zipline, and World's Largest Toy Museum and Harold Bell Wright Museum. The last Groupon Getaway offered was at Chateau on the Lake.
LivingSocial is another national discount site. They send out daily emails with like Groupon, but they also send emails for deals in other categories once a week. LivingSocial is
unique in that if you purchase a deal and advertise that you’ve done so via
your favorite social media sites (by posting a link to the deal), if 3
friends purchase the same deal you did, your deal is free. That’s a way to really save some money!
Local discount web sites
I have a lot of the local TV/radio sites bookmarked, but most of their deals are also offered through HalfOffDeals.com. There are some local discount web sites that are not affiliated with HalfOffDeals, and I have summarized them below.
417 Magazine Deal of the Day - These deals are offered by 417 Magazine. You will only get an email when they're offering a deal.
102.9 KHOZ Bids for Bargains - No emails are offered here. You will have to bookmark the web site and keep checking back.
Here's a few tips. A word of warning – read the fine print on the offer before
you purchase it. If the deal expires before your Branson trip, it wouldn’t be
worth your while to make the purchase.
Most of the dining deals are 2 certificates for the price of 1, but some
restaurants won’t let you use more than one certificate at a time. That’s fine if you were planning to go to
that restaurant more than once, but if you weren’t, then it’s not worthwhile to
purchase that dining deal, in my opinion.
Be sure to allow plenty of time for the certificates to be
mailed to you so that you can have them in time for your trip. If you have the company’s zip code, you can
go to the U.S. Postal Service web site to see how long it will take for your
certificates to reach you.
If you’ve purchased certificates for shows, call the show
box office once you’ve received your vouchers and make your reservations for
the show time and date you want to attend.
You will need to tell them that you have radio station vouchers. You will take your vouchers to the box office
and turn them in to pick up your tickets, so don’t lose them! Put these in your organizing folder that I
told you about in my post here. With Groupon and LivingSocial, they will email a link to your deal and you will print it out. There may be a date you have to print your deal voucher by, so don't wait too long.
I hope these tips are helpful to you in budgeting for your vacation. Thanks for reading! See you soon!
Diane
Diane
P.S.: We have our vacation week to Branson set up and lodging has been reserved. We will be staying at the Branson Yellow Rose Inn this year. The Yellow Rose is the #1 rated hotel on TripAdvisor.com and I got a great deal at Priceline - free cancellation and we don't have to pay until we check in. I can't wait! :)
