The Offer
Applebee’s has a Mystery Rewards promotion going on now until January 3, 2016. There are two ways to take part in the offer:
- Purchase $50 in Applebee’s gift cards in-store or online and receive a free Bonus card with a mystery value on it.
- Request a free Bonus Card without making a purchase: Hand-print your name, complete address, and email address on a postcard, and mail to: Applebee’s Mystery Value Bonus Card Request, P.O. Box 1579, Palatine, IL 60078-1579. Requests must be postmarked between October 26, 2015 and January 4, 2016 and received by January 11, 2016. You will receive your Bonus Card via return email within thirty (30) days of receipt of your request.
The Odds
It appears that every bonus card will have some value – either $5, $10, $15, or $25.
- Around 60% will get $10
- Around 30% will get $5
- 5% will get $15
- 5% will get $25
The Fine Print
- Offer ends 1/3/16
- Bonus card will be valid until 2/28/16
- Bonus card will be received via email (for in-store gift card purchases, promo card will be handed to you at the time of purchase)
- Bonus card is not redeemable on date of issuance (must wait until the next day)
- Bonus card is only valid at Applebee’s restaurants
- One Bonus Card may be redeemed per party, per table, per visit; gratuity and tax not included
- Cannot be used to purchase alcohol or gift cards
Our Verdict
This offer has been going on for over a month already, but I just came across it today.
If you’re planning on buying Applebee’s gift cards as gifts, this is a nice little bonus addition. And it can also make sense to go ahead and mail in postcards and get free bonus cards for the price of a stamp (35¢ for postcards). And, based on the odds, you’ll most likely get a $10 card. Not bad.
The biggest issue with this promo is there is a limit to the number of available bonus cards (~800,000), and there doesn’t seem to be any way to know how far away that limit is at any given time. The latest reports on Slickdeals are that they are still coming through and it may be worth a shot. Many have sent out 5 or 10 postcards and gotten back bonus cards for most of the submission, usually $10 cards.
But don’t send in more than you can eat! Remember, it’s limited to one-per-visit.
I’m trying to find out if you have to mail in a postcard? I emailed Applebee’s and got a response stating it can be a post card or index card. However I was wondering if anyone has done this before because I wanted to know if I can use a thick card stock paper, the size of printer paper and cut it into fours, put it in an envelope and mail it out that way?
Postcard only cost me 39 cents, I say it’s worthy for the novelty.
I’m not seeing a limit (either a daily limit or per household). Does this mean you could mail in multiple submissions per day while supplies last?
Seems so. Folks on Slickdeals got a bunch of these.
It is one per household per day. I received an email response from Applebee’s this morning because I had the same question. 🙂