Mother's Day gifts that keep on giving: Five great subscription deals

Mother's Day gifts don't have to be one-timers. Give a Mother's Day gift that will last the whole year with deals on subscriptions for wholesale clubs, beauty supplies, and even video games. 

|
ShopRunner/PRNewsFoto/File
Shoprunner is one of many subscription retailers looking to poach customers disgruntled by the recent Amazon Prime price increase. A free one-year Shoprunner membership is one of several subscription deals available as a perfect Mother's Day gift.

Some purchases are for having: Swarovski crystals, a Calder mobile, the best cheeses, and so on. But other purchases are for doing. These five membership deals are gifts that will keep on giving, allowing you to shop, game, or beautify better. Get a free two-month membership to BJ's Wholesale Club and a gift card, six months of unlimited free same-day deliveries from Google Shopping Express, and much more.

  1. Beauty Box 5 1-Month Subscription
    Vendor: Beauty Box 5
    Price: Free via coupon code "FREEBOX6"
    Lowest by: $12

    Is It Worth It?: Get five beauty products shipped straight to your door every month with Beauty Box 5. And with coupon code "FREEBOX6," that first box is totally free. A reviewer at My Subscription Addiction has noted that deliveries from Beauty Box 5 can hold as much as $27 in merchandise, which easily knocks deal this into Editors' Choice territory.

  2. ShopRunner 1-Year Membership
    Vendor: ShopRunner
    Price: Free with Amazon Prime membership
    Lowest By: $79

    Is It Worth It?: Amazon Prime had subscribers grumbling this year when it announced a price increase, from $79 to $99 annually. According to a DealNews survey, 65% of respondents said they wouldn't pay more for the service, which includes free 2-day shipping on all orders (although that number dropped to 45% after Amazon announced its streaming partnership with HBO).

    The folks at ShopRunner are too smart to let this opportunity go by. Offering similar 2-day delivery from retailers including Toys "R" Us, Lord & Taylor, and drugstore.com, ShopRunner is now offering a free year of membership to any current Amazon Prime users who haven't yet renewed at the higher rate. And unlike many other "free" subscriptions, this Editors' Choice deal won't automatically renew (and charge you) when your free year is up.

  3. BJ's Wholesale Club 2-Month Membership
    Vendor: Groupon
    Price: $5 bundled with a $10 Club Gift Card
    Lowest By: $13
    Expires: May 9

    Is It Worth It?: This Editors' Choice deal is essentially like getting two months of membership and a $5 gift card — a $13 value — for free. That's the best we've seen all year. Arm yourself with our guide on how to avoid overspending at warehouse stores, and you'll be well on your way to savings.

  4. Google Shopping Express 6-Month Membership
    Vendor: Google
    Price: Free with $10 off first order
    Lowest By: $5 per pickup

    Is It Worth It?: Yet another Amazon Prime competitor is making a grab for disgruntled customers. This Editors' Choice deal offers same day shipping. And while Google Shopping Express normally charges per store pickup, it is currently offering six months of unlimited deliveries absolutely free. (That is, if you can get anything delivered at all.) This is maybe a better deal than the ShopRunner subscription above &mdash but this one is only open to residents of San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York City.

  5. Xbox LIVE Gold 1-Week Membership
    Vendor: Skittles
    Price: Free via coupon code "M95MN"
    Expires: July 31

    Is It Worth It?: Are you more of a gamer than a shopper? Then you still probably deal with subscription services. The good folks at Skittles (yes, Skittles) are currently offering their fans one week of Xbox LIVE Gold membership, completely free. Codes are also available inside specially marked Skittles product packages. That will cost a little extra — but then again, you'll have Skittles.

Benjamin Glaser is a features editor for Dealnews.com, where this article first appeared: http://dealnews.com/features/Gifts-That-Keep-On-Giving-Top-Membership-Deals/1044975.html

Follow CSMonitor's board Mother's Day on Pinterest.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Mother's Day gifts that keep on giving: Five great subscription deals
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/Saving-Money/2014/0509/Mother-s-Day-gifts-that-keep-on-giving-Five-great-subscription-deals
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe