Brugge

These are huge corporations moving around Billions of $ a year. With entire departments devoted to analysis of marketing schemes and spending patterns. Why would anyone think they wouldn't know about MS? Of course they do. The only thing that would actually shock me is if Chase didn't have employees whose job description includes "read travel blogs and FT, and report what you find".

I'm guessing around 2 years ago, I don't quite remember when, but it was before I knew about SMing to cancel a card, I called Citi to cancel a HH card. I got transferred to Retention, and the guy was really trying to talk me out of canceling. As a last attempt, he said "remember, this card gives you 3 points per $ at drug stores." He could have also said supermarkets and gas stations, but he didn't.

I knew exactly what he meant, which while unspoken, was: 'I see you do lots of $5K purchases at CVS for MS, don't you want to get the 3X points per $ for that?'

And he was just a Retention guy, so imagine what the VP of Marketing knows about MS. That's why it cracks me up when people have a fit because some junior CSR at Target says something out loud about "are you doing this to get miles"?

Or the other fear, this is "too good to be true, and will be shut down next week". AMEX and Target knew exactly what they were doing when they set this program up. AMEX knows what we all did with BB at WM, probably read all the moaning on FT about how horrible it is trying to load BB with Kate, and offered Target RB as a way to take massive market share from WM when we do our shopping when we go to load.

Do a stock comparison for both stores. The drop in gas prices is great for both of them. Shoppers have more disposable income, and it costs less to drive to the stores to shop. But since early Oct WM is up 17%, and Target is up 29%. Just sayin...