First rolling out on the home page of Ben’s Bargains within the next week or two, we are pushing out a phased upgrade that will gradually transition the entire site to responsive design. If you are unfamiliar with responsive design, it’s a type of web design that keeps the look / feel / experience of the site identical across every screen resolution; desktop, tablet or smartphone.

Last year, we surveyed 1,000+ people about their experience on Ben’s, including the mobile version of the site, and conducted interviews. We took this feedback to heart, and took all that information into account when transitioning to responsive redesign.  

Here’s a look at the current design versus the new responsive design of the main deal box when on a mobile device. This is on the home page when browsing on a smartphone:

Responsive design helps us speed up loading times on the site. Some of our early testing has been showing significant loading time improvements, ideal for users that want to snag the best deals before selling out.

New mobile features include:

• • The ability to “Go to Store” directly from the deal feed. Previously, you had to load the deal page to take advantage of the deal.
  • The ability to click a drop-down in the deal feed to see the description / info related to the deal. Previously, you had to load the deal page to read the description.
  • The ability to set a deal alert in the deal feed. Previously, you had to load the deal page to set an alert.
  • The ability to keep your location in the deal feed. All deal details can be expanded / read without leaving the feed. Previously, going back from the deal page to the feed in your browser would restart you at the top of the feed.

Two important points: 

• If you are already using the Ben’s Bargains mobile app, your experience will not change. The mobile app is separate from the version of the site that loads in a mobile browser on a smartphone / tablet. 
• This won’t impact the desktop experience heavily. It’s primarily focused on mobile and tablet users.

Our schedule for pushing out responsive design to the remainder of the Ben’s will be happening in phases over the coming weeks. That’s going to include transitioning all of our deal pages, store, brand and category pages to the new design as well as search results

Ben’s Bargains is launching responsive site design soon. Here’s what that means for you

If you are a frequent visitor to the Ben’s home page, you may have noticed that we added coupon codes along the right side of the home page recently. That’s a feed of our most recent codes for popular retailers. (pictured above)

At the moment, we are monitoring roughly 70 popular retailers for new codes & will increase coverage over major shopping holidays like Black Friday & Cyber Monday. Regarding frequency, we update these codes each day to find new discounts for you.

Beyond the home page, we also have coupon code feeds on our store pages filtered to the specific store. For instance, the Amazon store page includes a batch of Amazon coupons above the deal feed.

Of course, our Deal Editors will continue to point out specific coupon codes within deal posts to help you save more money. You can use the “Copy Code & Go to Store” button on those deals to head directly to the retailer with the code copied to your clipboard ready to be pasted into the retailer’s site at checkout. (pictured below)

Let us know if these codes are helpful to you in the comments below!

Ben’s Bargains New Feature Update: Coupon Code Feeds

After two weeks, 13 states, and a blur of fun, we’re about five hours from home again! The drive through the southwest–Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, wasn’t as exciting as the drive down to California, but it was still pretty cool to experience yet another part of the country I have never been to before.

First up, Albuquerque. We didn’t spend a lot of time there, but it felt very…Breaking Bad. Our hotel ended up being kind of a dump, and didn’t feel like it was in the greatest part of town, so we decided to drive to one of the many local breweries in the area. When all else fails, grab a beer, right?

These smaller breweries are kind of hit or miss in my opinion, but La Cumbre was great. If you ever find yourself there, the Elevated IPA is excellent!

The next day we made the long, kind of boring drive through the rest of New Mexico and into Amarillo, TX, where we had to stop at Cadillac Ranch.

Yes, Cadillac Ranch is literally a bunch of old cars sticking of the dirt in a cornfield off the side of the interstate. We bought some spray paint from a guy at the entrance selling it out of his car, and got to be graffiti artists for about 15 minutes.

America: weird and awesome.

That night we made it to middle of nowhere, Oklahoma, then drove to Kansas City the next day. My husband heard about this popular Kansas City BBQ joint on one of his cooking shows (PBS’ The Mind of a Chef), and we had to stop for dinner.

Joe’s is inside a gas station, but the line was out the door! They were sadly sold out of the “burnt ends” we were hoping to try (apparently, it’s some kind of Kansas City specialty), but the food we did get was delicious!

Now that our trip is almost over, I can share more about what has worked well, and what we’ll try to change the next time we hit the road.

The Good

1. My remote work setup. Amazingly, I was able to work most of my normal hours for Ben’s during the two weeks we were on our trip! I took one Friday off, and cut back on some of my evening hours, but for the most part I was able to stick to my usual schedule. The only spot where I couldn’t get any WiFi signal was about a 3 hour stretch between Utah and Las Vegas. There were other areas where I’d lose service for a few minutes at a time, but for the most part, I was able to stay connected really well using my Verizon hotspot.

2. Last minute hotels. We originally thought we’d save money and camp for some of the nights on our trip, but it ended up being easier (and really not much more money), to just do Priceline Express deals. Campsites seemed to cost close to the same as cheap hotels, and because we made sure we always stayed somewhere with free breakfast , we never had to worry about finding food in the mornings. Also, having a pool meant “free” entertainment for the kids; we’d let them swim in the morning so they were nice and tired for the upcoming car ride!

I definitely recommend using the Priceline App for finding hotels from the road. One really helpful feature is that you can pull up a map using your current location, and see the prices for hotels in the area. There were lots of instances where we’d look up a city we were close to, then look another 20 minutes or so up the map, and the second area would have much lower average prices.

They also make it really easy to filter by amenities. We always wanted a pool, free WiFi, and free hot breakfast. Outside of that, we didn’t really care, so we’d just pick the cheapest Express option (where you don’t get the name of the hotel until you confirm your reservation). I think the cheapest hotel we stayed at was $35, and the most expensive was $70. You’d be surprised at how many decent hotels you can find along the freeway for under $50 a night (including breakfast!).

3. The car setup. Our cheap portable DVD player was pretty much the hero of this trip! The movies kept the kids entertained (and quiet), which kept the grownups sane. I don’t even want to think about how people used to do long car trips with children before this technology existed! If you can’t find one at Goodwill, you can find them as low as around $40 on Amazon. Totally worth it.

4. The route. Driving 5-6 hours a day felt about perfect. We’d drive 2-3 hours in the morning, stop for lunch, then just have another 2-3 hours to get where we were going. Breaking it up like that kept us all from going crazy in the car. Getting down to CA was also just a really neat stretch of America. It was really cool to see the country change from farmland, to mountains, to rocky, to desert, to coastal as we traveled.

Things I’d Do Differently Next Time

1. Do a better job packing. We brought along two huge suitcases: one for me and my husband, and one for all three kids. It ended up being a big pain having to drag them into wherever we were staying every night, then repack and bring them back out to the car in the morning. Next time I think we’ll come up with some kind of a system where we divide things into 2-3 day packs, and include clothes for everyone in the same bag (so we only have one smaller clothes bag to bring in at a time).

2. Pack less. Ok so kind of the same as the point above, but really, you should see our van right now. I brought along full-size bottles of shampoo and conditioner, forgetting that we’d be able to collect a million little bottles at the hotels along the way. I let the kids bring toys, and they got lost/buried on the floor of the car on the first day. We brought all sorts of stuff we didn’t really need, like pillows, that just took up a lot of space. You forget that you’ll be driving though towns with Targets and Walmarts, and if you need something you can always buy it.

3. Look into gas rewards programs/credit cards. We spent a lot of money on gas on this trip, and I stupidly didn’t even think about how we could have saved some money by signing up for “loyalty” gas station programs or by getting a credit card that offers a percentage back on gas purchases. Could be a good way to cut down the total cost of the trip even more.

4. Dedicate more time to Disneyland. We spent a full 12 hours at Disney, and I feel like we hardly made a dent in it. If I were to do it over again, I’d set aside at least one more day for Disney, and ideally do California Adventure too, because it looked really fun!

Overall, I am so glad we decided to get in the car and go. This trip has been epic and I’ll never forget it.

Where to next: East Coast? Down South? If you have any suggestions or road trip experiences to share, please drop them in the comments!

Ben’s on the Road: Days 12 & 13

The drive from Southern CA to the Grand Canyon was an adventure of the best kind. One of the reasons I prefer road trips to flying somewhere for vacation, is that when you fly, you miss all the random gems that lie hidden between home and your destination.

If we’d have flown to California, we would have never ended up at the kind of dumpy, but weirdly charming Desert Hot Springs Spa Hotel in Desert Hot Springs, for example.

We saw “hot springs” and “$65” on Priceline and thought “hey why not!” Little did we know Desert Hot Springs holds the prestigious title of “Worst City to Live in California” and was not exactly the charming spa destination we’d seen in the photos online. The hotel looked like something straight out of National Lampoon’s Family Vacation. Pink and teal decor, a ceiling that looks like it might cave in at any moment, a “room service” menu printed on plain white copy paper and stapled together in the corner. I’m guessing it was pretty swanky in about 1970, and hasn’t been updated since.

But honestly it ended up providing us with one of the best nights of the trip so far! The kids had eight hot springs pools of varying temperatures to play in, we met some super nice and eccentric people (my favorite being a very friendly older woman who kept going on and on about how these waters were the best in the entire world and had the power to heal paraplegic children or something like that); we all got an experience.

The next morning we drove through the desert for what seemed like forever. There was literally nowhere to stop, nothing to see, and then a random thing like this would appear on the side of the road:

Literally a fence with hundreds of pairs of shoes hanging on it. I have absolutely no idea what it is or what it means, but it was weird and cool and just the kind of thing I wanted to see on our trek across the country.

After hours of driving with nowhere to stop, everyone was hungry and cranky. Just as we were about to finally turn off onto an interstate where we were sure there’d be a Subway or something to stop at, we saw a sign for Pirate’s Cove Resort and Restaurant. My son is currently pirate-obsessed so we decided to follow the sign and check it out.

The food was not great, and it was overpriced, but they had paper pirate hats, and silly pirate statues, and it was the perfect little break from the car.

Our next stop was the Grand Canyon. I had never seen it before, and had been told the best experience would be to hit it at sunrise. Well, we were staying about an hour away from it that night, and waking up at like 5AM the next morning to drive up there was, um, not going to happen. So we decided to hustle and attempt to make it there by sunset that evening.

We were racing against the clock, driving over the speed limit, watching it get closer and closer to 7:09PM. We got into the National Park with a few minutes to spare, parked, basically dragged the kids up to the closest lookout point, and…it was incredible.

It’s really not possible to capture the beauty of this thing in a picture (especially an iPhone picture!), but the colors were truly amazing. I’m sure it’s also pretty cool at noon, or 5, or whatever time you go, but seeing it at sunset was worth the rush.

So this whole post is basically me, convincing you, that you must do a road trip. Yes, we’re tired. No, you can’t see the floor of our van. Yes, there has been a lot of driving and fighting and “are we there yets.” But honestly it’s all been totally and completely worth it so far.

As I write this, we’re about two hours from Albuquerque, New Mexico. I have no idea what you do in Albuquerque (aside from drive around looking for places in Breaking Bad?), but I can’t wait to find out!

Ben’s on the Road: Days 10 & 11 (or something)

Welcome back to Ben’s on the Road, where one brave Ben’s Bargains editor (me!) attempts to drive across the country with three kids aged five and younger, for as cheap as humanly possible.

Yesterday was my first day on this trip working a normal Ben’s work shift from the car. It’s pretty cool, actually, how easy it is to do my job from anywhere I want, including a moving minivan (my husband is driving; hopefully that is obvious!). My tech setup is not complicated: my Macbook Pro laptop, a power converter (so I can have my laptop plugged in and charging), a mobile hotspot, and my iPhone.

I’ve experimented with a bunch of different  hotspots and have found that if you’re going to be traveling cross-country, you really need to have the ability to connect to multiple service providers. They all have different areas where the signal is spotty or just nonexistent, so it works best to have more than one you can connect to. I have a Verizon pay-as-you-go 4G LTE hotspot, as well as my T-Mobile iPhone with unlimited data and tethering capabilities. Because my T-Mobile data is unlimited, I use that for WiFi whenever I can. Then if the signal goes weak, I switch over to my Verizon hotspot. I have used a prepaid AT&T hotspot before as well, but I wasn’t as happy with the speed/reliability on that one.

I bought my Verizon hotspot on clearance at Best Buy for $15 (it’s currently $50 online though). It’s called the Ellipsis Jetpack. I pay $100 for 10GB of data that needs to be used within 2 months. Because I also use my phone for WiFi, I shouldn’t have to refill the data at all over our 15-day trip.

To keep my laptop charged, I have this power converter for the car. You plug it into the cigarette lighter and it gives you two AC outlets and two USB outlets. Nothing fancy about this model, but it was like $20 and has worked just fine.

Add my beloved Macbook Pro (which is fancy and was not like $20!), and that’s all I need to work from the road. I feel pretty lucky I’ve got a job I can do from anywhere. And that I don’t get car sick!

Aside from a few 5 to 10 minute chunks of time where neither my phone or my hotspot had service, I have been able to stay connected really well! We just passed through the mountains in CO and I rarely lost connection even on the stretches of road between small mountain towns. Not bad!

We stayed with family close to Denver last night, and today we’re headed to a cabin near Capitol Reef National Park in Southern Utah. The drive has been absolutely gorgeous! Looking out the windows at the mountains is almost entertainment enough, but we also stopped off and spent some time in the little town of Idaho Springs. I love mountain towns, and this one was about as charming as they come. They have a nice park/playground right by the river, and a very unassuming and inexpensive taco joint called Del Rio Taco that had some of the best fish tacos I’ve ever had. You can sit outside on their patio and watch people rafting down the river below. If you’re ever in the area I highly recommend it!

I’m a sucker for a good photo opp, so a few hours later we also just pulled over on a random exit with a view, had a snack and snapped some pictures.

To find things like this to do when we need a break from driving, I use an iPhone app called Roadside America ($2.99). It uses your phone’s location to give you a list of “off beat” things to do close to the highway. I also like the app Roadtrippers (free!). With this one, you can see things to do, quick snacks, outdoor activities, etc, near your current location, or put in a specific route and see everything along the way on a map.

Tomorrow we’ll be exploring Utah and giving hiking with kids a try. I’m so excited to spend some time in an area I hear is just gorgeous. Watch for lots of pictures soon!

Check here for latest Travel gear deals

Ben’s on the Road: Days 2 & 3

We’ve just updated the Ben’s Bargains mobile app for both iOS and Android devices (version 1.2), specifically with a sleeker design to showcase more deals. In addition to the new design, we’ve also added landscape support on iOS as well as an iPad version of the app.

On the iPad version of the app, we’ve placed the category listings on the left side as well as a search bar and your most recent searches. You can quickly jump between product categories without having to switch to another page within the app. You also have the option of switching to landscape mode automatically in order to browse a larger number of deals at a time.

Managing deal alerts is easier in the new layout, ideal for anyone watching mulitple product categories for specific deals. We’ve also added optional push notification options within the app, useful if you want to catch an extremely hot deal before it sells out. You can set push notification for each specific alert as needed.

You can download (or update) the new versions of the apps on Google Play for Android users (LINK) and the App Store for iOS users (LINK). The Google Play version is compatible with Jelly Bean and higher (Android version 4.0.3 and up). Our iOS version for Apple devices is compatible with iOS version 8.2 or higher.

Ben’s App on Google Play –  Ben’s App on iTunes

You can also see more photos of the new iPad version of the app below:

The Ben’s Bargains app now offers iPad support, new design

Launching on Google Play for Android users recently (LINK) and iOS today (LINK), the new Ben’s Bargains mobile app incorporates all the account functionality found on the main site in a compact, speedy package with more features than our mobile Web version of Ben’s.

The core new feature in the app is mobile notifications. When you set a deal alert on a specific product, we will send you a mobile notification the second that it’s posted on the site (assuming you toggle notifications on). This way, you won’t miss out the next time we post deals that sell out in less than an hour.

Tied to your Ben’s profile, you can manage preferences including Deal Alerts you’ve set on specific products, products that you have set as favorites over time and products that you have recently viewed (either on the Web version of Ben’s or the mobile version).

Similar to the main site, you have the ability to filter products by categories, stores and price range. You can also use the quick filters at the top of the app to see the latest deals, the hottest deals and your recently viewed deals.

We’ve also includes easy icons to trigger specific events. Tapping the bell icon will set a Deal Alert on the product (and tapping it again will turn it off). The same goes for the heart icon, which triggers the favorite function.

We also have a share icon on the deal page that allows you to share to Facebook, Twitter or via email. Also similar to the main site, you can visit the deal page within the app to make comments as well as vote on comments left by others.

The Google Play version is compatible with Jelly Bean and higher (Android version 4.0.3 and up). Our iOS version for Apple devices is compatible with iOS version 7.0 or higher.

Ben’s App on Google Play –  Ben’s App on iTunes

You can check out pictures of both versions of the app below:

Android App Photos:

iOS App Photos:

Introducing the new Ben’s Bargains mobile app

Welcome to “The Deal Dozen,” where we showcase the 12 best and most popular deals of the week on Ben’s Bargains. These are the best of the best, the cream of the crop, the deals you’d take into a foxhole with you.

*A quick briefing of this week’s highlights*

Just 12 shopping till Christmas, kiddos! In the online world, that really means you’ve got half that amount, since next Friday is generally considered the cutoff point to have your orders delivered by Christmas via standard shipping. After that, you’ll pay exorbitant prices for express shipping (unless you’re sitting pretty as an Amazon Prime member).

Check out our guide to Holiday Shipping Deadlines featuring a list of the major retailers’ cutoff dates. And don’t forget that next Thursday is Free Shipping Day, which has nearly 1,000 merchants participating (many big names among them).

The deals below won’t last long, so get clicking! Also stop by our Freebies page where we’re continually adding new free goodies. Your mission: to save some money!

(Click the image to view the deal on Ben’s.)

ASUS X550LA 4th Gen Core i5 15.6″ Laptop $380 at Best Buy	20% off One Groupon Local Purchase at Groupon	10 MP3 Songs Free at Google Play
Lambskin Thinsulate Gloves $17 at Jos A Bank	Dell Inspiron 15 3000 4th Gen Core i3 15.6″ Touch Laptop $310 at Best Buy	Star Wars Men’s Hoodie $11 at Target
Leatherman 832139 Handy Sidekick $18 at Home Depot	Buy Two Video Games Get One Free at Best Buy	Acer Chromebook 13 Quad-Core 1920×1080 13.3″ Laptop $200 at Amazon
LG 65LB5200 65″ 1080p 120Hz LED TV $699 at Walmart	Monster NCredible NErgy In-Ear Headphones $24 at eBay	51-Piece HDX Screwdriver Set $5 at Home Depot

Top Expired or Sold Out Deals

Don’t forget to set up deal alerts on Ben’s Bargains so you don’t miss out on any great savings!

TurboTax Deluxe Federal + E-file + State 2014 Free at Intuit

Microfleece Pullovers $3.49 at The Children’s Place

Extra 20% off Sitewide + Free Shipping at 6pm

The Deal Dozen: Week of December 12th, 2014

Welcome to “The Deal Dozen,” where we showcase the 12 best and most popular deals of the week on Ben’s Bargains. These are the best of the best, the cream of the crop, the deals you’d take into a foxhole with you.

*A quick briefing of this week’s highlights*

The bulk of the Black Friday ad scans rolled out, including most of the big guns like Target, Best Buy, Walmart, Staples and Toys R Us! Best Buy will have a 50″ Panasonic HDTV for $200 at 5PM on Thanksgiving, and Staples will have the ASUS X205TA 11.6″ Windows laptop for $100 an hour later.  Those are going to be some scary scenes, folks.

But the deals this week have been pretty sweet, including a PS4 bundle with The Last of Us for $380, a Wii U Deluxe bundle with Super Mario 3D World for $260, 20% off for REI members and the new PlayStation TV for $80.

The deals below won’t last long, so get clicking! Also stop by our Freebies page where we’re continually adding new free goodies. Your mission: to save some money!

(Click the image to view the deal on Ben’s.)

2 x NCAA Fleece Hoodies & Sweatpants for $35 at Finish Line	HP Pavilion AMD Quad-Core 15.6″ LED Laptop $300 at Best Buy	Up to 50% off Technical Outerwear + Extra 20% off at Oakley Vault
Tumi T-Tech Forge Fairview Messenger Bag $120 at Amazon	Select Men’s Quiksilver Jeans $16 at Quiksilver	$10 off Video Game Consoles, Games & Accessories $50+ at eBay
Sharp Aquos Crystal No Contract Android Smartphone $130 at Amazon	Thirty48 Calf Compression Sleeves $12 at Rakuten.com (new customers only)	Nike Flex Show TR 2 Men’s Training Shoes $45 at Finish Line
10% off Select Solid State Drives at Newegg	Sony PlayStation TV $80 at Amazon	AEO Men’s Double-Breasted Pea Coat $49 at American Eagle

Top Expired or Sold Out Deals

Don’t forget to set up deal alerts on Ben’s Bargains so you don’t miss out on any great savings!

12-piece Silicone Reusable Cupcake Liners Free at Amazon

The North Face Men’s Nimble Jacket $49 at Cabela’s

PlayStation 4 Console + Last of Us Remastered Bundle $380 at eBay

The Deal Dozen: Week of November 14th, 2014

Welcome to “The Deal Dozen,” where we showcase the 12 best and most popular deals of the week on Ben’s Bargains. These are the best of the best, the cream of the crop, the deals you’d take into a foxhole with you.

A quick briefing on this week’s highlights:

Happy Halloween! The smartphones had it this week with several scary good deals…  Amazon launched its new streaming player, the Fire Stick, with a bang by dropping the regular price from $39 to $19 for Prime members. Not surprisingly it was backordered to late December by the time the sale was over… The winter apparel deals kept coming with great sales from Sierra Trading Post, Tilly’s, Jos. A. Bank, Levi’s and Cabela’s…

The deals below won’t last long, so get clicking! Also stop by our Freebies page where we’re continually adding new free goodies. Your mission: to save some money!

(Click the image to view the deal on Ben’s.)

Apple iPad Air 2 Retina 16GB Tablet $460 at eBay	40 Select Android Apps and Games Free at Amazon	LG 40UB8000 40″ 120Hz Smart 4K Ultra HDTV $619 at Dell
Sharp Aquos Crystal No Contract Android Smartphone $130 at Best Buy	Motorola Moto G 8GB No-Contract Android Smartphone $100 at Sears	LG G3 4G LTE 5.5″ QHD Android Smartphone (Unlocked) $400 at eBay
30% off Sitewide + Free Shipping at Sierra Trading Post	TCL Roku TV 48FS4610R 48″ 1080p LED Smart HDTV $398 at Amazon	Samsonite 5-Piece Travel Set $79 at BuyDig.com
Jos. A. Bank Cedar Shoe Tree $7.50 at Jos A Bank	Extra 50% off Sale Items + Free Shipping at Tilly’s	12-pack 8 oz. Stacy’s Baked Pita Chips w/ ShopRunner $2.29 at Drugstore.com

Top Expired or Sold Out Deals

Don’t forget to set up deal alerts on Ben’s Bargains so you don’t miss out on any great savings!

Amazon Fire TV Stick $19 at Amazon

SEGA Genesis Classic Video Game Console $40 at Groupon

Citizen CA0295-58E Nighthawk Eco-Drive Watch $184 at Amazon

The Deal Dozen: Week of October 31, 2014