One of my favorite days of the year to get money for nothing has been announced.

American Express’ Small Business Saturday will take place on November 30.

What is Small Business Saturday? (from Amex)

• A day dedicated to supporting small businesses across the country
• Created by American Express in 2010 , it’s celebrated every year on the Saturday after Thanksgiving

On Small Business Saturday American Express is generous enough to offer credit card holders a $25 statement credit for shopping at small businesses around the country. To qualify for the offer your credit cards must be registered. If you have multiple Amex cards, you can get a $25 credit for each card.

(While there is no official announcement as to what perk Small Business Saturday will have this year, the $25 statemement credit has been offered for the past few years so I’d expect it to stay the same.)

Some people like to shop at a variety of merchants or even just buy $25 restaurant gift certificates to make things easy. Over the past couple of years, Kim and I combined our credits to purchase bigger-ticket items for practically free!

Having a stack of American Express cards can lead to a nice amount of free money to shop with!

Here is what we bought:

2011– With Lucas’ arrival coming within the next few months we needed to buy some pricier items. One extremely important item was a high quality car seat. We set our sights on the Cybex Aton Infant Car Seat (2013) – Classic Black.  At the time, we found a small store that priced matched it for around $200. I explained the Small Business Saturday program to the store and asked if they minded if I split up paying for the purchase with a few (about 8) credit cards. The store had no problem at all completing the transaction for us this way so we ended up gettting an amazing car seat for around $30-$50 out of pocket.

2012– This time we used our credits towards 5 things including lunch, dinner and another pricey item for Lucas. We needed to get him bunting for the stroller to keep him warm during the cold, New York winters. It would also come in extremely handy during our trip to Russia. (Read about our trip here and here.)

We deciding to get him the 7 A.M. Enfant Pookie Poncho LIGHTWEIGHT – Baby Carrier / Carseat/ Stroller Cover, Color: Midnight Blue. Last year the Pookie Poncho cost around $110 so we called around looking for it. We had a very difficult time finding it available at a store that was a small business that also accepted American Express cards. After finally finding a store that had the bunting, we headed on over, checked out the item and asked if we could split up the payment using a few credit cards. The clerk had to call her manager. After explaining what we wanted to do, the store had no problem with us using a couple of credit cards. We charged the difference to one of the cards we used so the item cost us around $60 out of pocket.

This year we should have around $200 (hopefully) to spend once again. I’m not sure what item we’re looking for yet but it will most likely be something for Lucas. I can’t think of a better way to spend the money!

If you’ve participated in Small Business Saturday in the past, what did you use your credit for?  What do you plan to shop for this year?

Find out more about Amex Small Business Saturday and sign up for e-mail updates HERE.

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