The Peasley Bug Family Blog : For the love of buddy bucks!!

Grocery shopping with one or both of my boys is not my or their idea of a great time, but HEB buddy bucks make the whole experience more enjoyable for all parties involved. :)

I don't know much about marketing, but as a mom, I know some companies do a much better job of catering to kids than others. I completely understand that some people LOVE shopping at HEB while others stay as far away from HEB as possible, but when I think about how much we shop at HEB, I really think part of it is these silly little buddy bucks. We are very fortunate where we live to have several grocery stores near us to choose from (i.e., Krogers, Randalls, Super Target, Super Wal-Mart, Aldi, and HEB). While there are a few thing we like from a particular store, most of the things we eat (we're not very adventurous eaters) can be bought at any of these local establishments. When I need to go to the store, and I have one or more of the boys, there is a very high probability we will end up at HEB because the boys LOVE their buddy bucks and that in turn makes my life easier.

So what is a buddy buck? At the check out, the cashiers hand the kids one or more buddy bucks. If they happen to forget, one of my little guys will politely ask them for a Buddy Buck. Typically they get two buddy bucks, but they have gotten up to eight each. I'm not sure if HEB has an actual policy, but this has been our experience.

After we checkout, we head to the buddy buck machine. I would say about 25% of the time, the machine isn't working. I'm not sure why it goes down so often, but it does. My guess is it runs out of stickers. Anyway, the boys put in their buddy buck, a wheel of points starts to spin, they push a blinking red light, and the wheel comes to a stop. The machine then prints off a sticker with a point amount (1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50 or instant winner). The kids then put their stickers in a little book, and when they earn enough points, they get to redeem their "score card" for a prize. In the nearly 7 years that we've lived in Pearland and that HEB has been open, I think we've only redeemed two score cards - one for a plate and one for a straw or something. It takes a LONG time and many trips to earn enough points (usually between 100-500 points) for a prize, but the boys don't mind. I think they just enjoy spinning the wheel, or maybe they just enjoy that there is a part of the whole shopping experience that is completely for them. In any case, I love watching how excited they get (as well as all of the other kids that think buddy bucks are the bee's knees :)). I thank HEB for thinking about their littlest customers.