Our 1 Year Experience with Buying Groups

Over the past year we funneled over $30,000 through 3 main buying groups as a large part of our manufactured spending. 

If you’re wondering what that even means—or why someone would do it—this post is for you. I’ll walk through how manufactured spending works, what buying groups are, the real risks involved, and our own experience running this play across three platforms.

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What's the point of manufactured spending?

Two words: points and leverage.

Let’s say you run $30,000 through a 2% cash back card. That’s 60,000 points—enough for a free business class flight or a solid cash rebate. Now layer on a sign-up bonus: maybe 5%, 10%, even 20% back. Those numbers add up quickly. 

For us, manufactured spending was a strategic way to:

• Hit minimum spends for new card offers

• Earn points on purchases that would otherwise go on a debit card

• Turn everyday deal-hunting into travel rewards or cash back

And while there’s occasional small profit on individual deals, the real win comes from stacking the rewards game. (Then imagine you use a new card with a promotional 0% APR for 12 months...)

Are there risks?

YES

They’re real, and aren't small.

The biggest one: what happens if a retailer fails to deliver an order, and you’ve already committed to the buying group? If Amazon ships the wrong product or cancels altogether, you could be out hundreds (or thousands) of dollars. Buying groups don’t pay unless they get the item.

Even small mistakes - like inputting the wrong gift card number- can cost you. And not all retailers like this kind of activity. Amex, for instance, is known to frown on repeated gift card purchases. If you’re not organized, detail-oriented, and comfortable with occasional uncertainty, this might not be the move for you.

Our experience with 3 different groups

We mainly used one gift card reselling group and two buying groups this past year to manufacture spend. We'll share our numbers, some tips, fails, and other pieces of advice if you're looking to join. 

Buy For Me Retail (BFMR)

BFMR was our entry point. It’s easy to use, with a clean dashboard that helps you see at a glance whether a deal makes sense. You know the cost and payout, so you know all the numbers before committing to a deal. We ran around $17K through BFMR, mainly on Amazon. Firesticks, Echos, iPads. Orders were simple to track, and payouts usually landed before our statement closed—letting us float the cost interest-free. We started small. A $20 Echo. Then ramped up once we got into the rhythm. Occasionally, we even accepted a small loss on an item because the sign-up bonus we were chasing made up for it.

Finally, they were pretty quick to payout - once the item was processed. Processing, espeically during the holidays, could take a while as they scan the shipment and make sure it's what was promised. 

A couple hiccups

While we didn't run into any main issues, we did have to manage a couple issues that popped up. 

One time, BFMR closed one of its deal for iPads before Amazon had shipped, so I had to quickly ask Amazon to cancel the order since I wouldn't be receiving payment. BFMR did offer to return items if they still ended up shipping, but that was a logistical issue I wanted to avoid. 

Sometimes the price listed for the cost of them item on BFMR's side doesn't match up with the actual price of the website. So make sure you double check how much profit you'll actually be making!

Overall, a great site to start with if you're thinking about using buying groups. Customer support is usually pretty responsive and if you're tracking everything we haven't had any issues with lost items - even on secondary addresses. 

Pointsmaker

Pointsmaker works the same way as BFMR, but logistically operates differently. Instead of an online dashboard and tracker, all you get is a Whatsapp group that announces deals. If you find a deal you like, you submit a google form letting Pointsmaker how many items you bought. You don't have to submit any order numbers, just the tracking number when the item ships. So you have to be a little bit more attentive to the details when tracking what you bought and calculating how much you should receive. Finally, they seem to pay slightly slower than BFMR. 

Why I still like using them is for two reasons: 1) they offer more items than BFMR and 2) I seem to be able to get more items to their alternate addresses. I only started using them in August and have only funneled around $4,000 through them without any major issues. The only issue that happened was on Amazon's end where they sent a random box of stuff and the right item. Pointsmaker was really helpful in sending info and pictures and was able to quickly get that resolved and paid. 

Overall, another good site to resell things to, just need to be on top of tracking all your purchaes, especially when juggling between two different groups. 

Aligned Incentives

This site is slightly different and focuses only on gift cards instead of physical items. This makes it nicer since you can quickly get e-gift cards, have the number information and then submit them all in the same day. YOU MUST BE DETAILED ORIENTED when copying over the gift card numbers and pins - otherwise you might get banned if you put in wrong info. 

Over the past year we've funneled almost $10,000 in gift cards through them, bringing us a couple dollars of profit, but more important sign-up bonuses 

The site makes it really easy to see which cards will make you a profit when you buy outright. They also offer bonus payouts if you delay payment (e.g., 1% if you wait 6 weeks). The payments come 2 weeks after submitting and they've been pretty consistent about that. Instructions are really clear and payouts are posted (though they are dynamic). I like how they're pretty consistent with some of their deals and have never had any trouble with them. Definitely recommend doing. Just remember, try not to funnel too much with Amex since they frown upon gift card purchase. 

Overall Takeaways

Buying groups are an effective way to reach high sign-up bonus requirements, or just get more credit card points overall. While there are a lot of horror stories, we personally have not run into them, so it's best to get other perspectives if you're planning on doing this. Happy to answer any questions at matthew@wuhoogroup.com 

A couple pieces of advice

• There is a balance of using "seasoned" accounts and not wanting your main account being banned. Generally new  accounts with no order history won't be able to send things to buying group addresses. At the same time, buying too much and too fast could get your main account banned. All I have to say is start slow and be okay if the Amazon account you're using or something else gets potentially banned - hasn't happened to us yet.  

• Have a tracker of sorts to make sure you know which deals are going to which retailer - and when to expect payment. GC Galore has a good gift card reselling tracker. 

• Start small - don't go all in right away, do your research and test it out with low cost products until you get the hang of it.
  
  

Good luck, with these strategies you can definitely get a lot more credit card points than you otherwise wouldn't have!