So guys lets try the opposite end of the spectrum. What are some of your favorite or most liked shops and why. I'll start

1) Standard Parking at the airport. The report is simple and the shop is simple. I evaluate a parking garage shop takes 15 minutes amount of time to generate a fee. The report takes 15-20 minutes pay is $15. works out to $30 an hour rate.

2) Comic book store shop. It takes me 5 minutes to do shop in store and 15 minutes for report. I am able to get it increased to $10 original shop fee from 2 years ago. So again works out to $30 an hour rate.

Remember this is a positive thread so try not to bash other peoples favorite shops if you don't like them.

A small chain of convenience stores. All I have to buy is something cooked. I get a drink or something else up to the maximum. Then I write an essay to explain answers, such as employee courtesy, taste of food, condition of restroom, cobwebs, violation of Disability Act, and whether the pumps are working. They are in small towns near me. If I travel to another town where they have one, I can call the scheduler and usually no one has grabbed it yet. The one that had the difficult restrooms for wheelchairs is now building a new store.

COMIC BOOK SHOPS WHAT WHERE I NEED THIS LIKE I NEED AIR TO BREATHE.


Ahem.


Of the ones I've done, Five Guys is probably my favorite consistent one. I love their food. All-time favorite, though . . . when I was in the market for a smartphone, Market Force happened to have this (multi-company, no idea who the client was) cell phone shop that came up. Some you made phone calls inquiring about plan pricing, and some you went into different stores to say "here are my needs, please recommend a phone." The calls took about five minutes, the visits about twenty, the questionnaires for both about three. I made something like a hundred bucks in a single day, AND did all my research for my new phone that way.

ninamason Wrote:
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> COMIC BOOK SHOPS WHAT WHERE I NEED THIS LIKE I
> NEED AIR TO BREATHE.
>
......

Uh, this isn't the comic book shop where the whole point is that you don't get to buy the comic book, is it?

. . . . . well, rats. *sad little sigh* I was going to say, if I can expand my manga collection by mystery shopping, LEAD ME TO IT.

I also like one that asks me to send in the contents of an envelope from a specific utility bill each month. I send it in their prepaid envelope. The pay is pretty good and I don't have to write a report.

There's a locally owned, regional bank in my state. The shops are $15 each and take maybe 10-15 minutes. The reports are mostly yes/no, or rate on a scale of 1-10, with only 3 or 4 narrative questions. I can do the reports in about 15 minutes each. Depending on which route I make, I can shop anywhere from 25 to 40 of these in 2-3 days. Depending on the time of year and the need for the shops to get done, I can sometimes get an extra $5-10 per shop.

Any bonused shop that pays within 30 days.

nina:

Yes these are the comic book shops where you normally don't get to buy anything. However once in a great while you get an employee who breaks the rules and get a new release a day before its available. But time in store is only 5 minutes and report is 15.

My favorite shops are these new shops available from a big MSC. Just started doing these. They are gas station mystery shops. $25 fee and $5 reimbursement. You have to buy 2 gallons of gas minimum. While at the pump you check for: one special pump topper; squeegee and clean water; trash can; look to see if any banners that should be there are there. They want you to pay with a card and get a receipt at the pump. Then they want you to go inside and ask to use the restroom. After doing that you wander the aisles to check on the general condition of the place. After that buy some small thing like a bottle of water. At check out get the name of the cashier who is supposed to be wearing a nametag--but if they aren't you just report it. Then you go across the street or anyplace to get a good overall shot of the location, and a few shots of the main station sign. The report is all radio buttons and checkboxes and took me 15 minutes to complete.

The only downside to this shop is that the MSC wants you to upload all photos you took and asks you in the report how many you have. Best to just have 3 overall shots and 2 of the main station sign because the editing of the photos takes a bit of time (but not much).

Needed the gasoline so 2 gallons cost me $7.80 and the purchase in-store cost $2 so I'm out $10, but get $5 back, so the shop worked out to $20 fee and 10 reimbursement. Liked it because I could take my time and there was no pressure at all. First one I did I made the mistake of filling my car up the night before so I had to drive around for 50 miles to make room for the required 2 gallons. I've done five of these shops so far, all of them in the Houston/East-central Texas area.

BuffaloNY101 Wrote:
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> 2) Comic book store shop. It takes me 5 minutes to
> do shop in store and 15 minutes for report. I am
> able to get it increased to $10 original shop fee
> from 2 years ago. So again works out to $30 an
> hour rate.
>

Ha ha, I did that comic book shop one time, and it just was not for me. I am kind of a conservative looking 40-ish soccer mom, and I walk into this store where a slew of younger people were dressed in elaborate costumes playing some sort of card game--it reminded me of the Dungeons and Dragons scene from the 80's. In any event, I pretended like I was trying to buy for my teen nephew, but all the while, I had a couple dozen sets of amused eyes on my dorky Land's End cardigan and Gap Khakis get-up.

My fave shops are Karl Strauss Brewery and Armstrong Garden Centers. The brewery shop has an easy report, a generous reimbursement and a fair fee. And I just like that place. Armstrong Garden Centers....also easy with $30 pay, and I get to chat about plants with some of the nicest people in town.

AggieJim, if you have too much gas in the tank, carry a gas can. Then when you really have driven 50 miles or so, you can empty it and put it wherever you store it. This helps if you have too many gas station shops, too.

One thing you're neglecting on both shops is the travel time between your house and the shop and back home. I would suspect that the airport shop is probably at least a 30 minute drive each way, if your airport is anyway like ours here in Atlanta and I only live 15 miles from the airport.

My favorite by far is a dinner at the bar shop at the steak house with peanuts on the floor. It usually does not pay a fee but it reimburses me for my meal up to $25. And the service at the bar is much quicker and friendlier than it is when sitting in the restaurant. I can order a large steak with two sides and a drink and include my 20% tip under or just slightly over the $25 reimbursement limit.

The report is easy to complete and takes about 20 minutes to do. It is mostly checking to see if certain restaurant buzz words are mentioned during the meal and commenting on those that aren't. The only gripe I have is that I have to wait 90 days before I can do the same location again. The good thing is that there are about six locations in my metro area and several in other metropolitan areas that I also shop on long routes.

tanmanlovespool:

My airport is maybe about 10 minutes from my house. I usually grab it when I am out that way anyways. I also like the steak house with peanuts on the floor shop. I dine there every now and then not on shop. Yes I don't really figure travel time when I am in town as I can get from anywhere to anywhere in 30 minutes or less usually 10-15. Combine that with the fact I book at least 3 in the same area cuts down on travel time. Traffic here is nothing like Atlanta I am sure.

1) A certain super popular Chinese food place. Yes, I am the shrimp-addicted person who keeps picking those up and keeping the shop pay miserably low. Forgive me.
2) Gas stations. Especially compliance shops with bonuses but normal ones will do too. Usually $20-$30 each, I did over 30 last weekend alone.
3) I didn't think I'd actually like banks, but I've actually learned a lot about finance I wouldn't have otherwise known.

Fine dining for Coyle and Customer Impact. I can take my wife and my high school education downtown for a $150 dinner on a Tuesday night, double dip the valet shop, and get both reports done the next day.

Lethe2779 Wrote:
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> 1) A certain super popular Chinese food place.
> Yes, I am the shrimp-addicted person who keeps
> picking those up and keeping the shop pay
> miserably low. Forgive me.

I love the super popular Chinese food place. And I'm one of those awful people that take them at regular stinky pay, but I don't like taking a picture of my food.

I like the gas station mystery shops that I can do when I'm driving by, but not the crappy pay ones. Love the upscale car wash because I love, love a clean car but am too cheap to pay for it and the report is easy, oil changes when the pay is more than $5 for when I have to do an oil change anyway, really anything that I might be already driving by and it is a service I would use or a well bonused shop.

My pre-teen loves it when I pick up Aeropostale because the report is the easiest ever and has a decent reimbursement (but haven't seen those in a month or two), Pandora because she has a charm bracelet and the report is not that bad, and Sonic/Wingstop/Orange Leaf because we have just us the two of us time, she gets a treat that I normally would never pay for and thinks it's fun to text names and take stopwatch timings on my phone.

Who does the mystery shopping for pizza hut, Pier one, Macy's, Chili's. Walmart, Applebees, comic books, Armstrong garden centers, Aeropostale, Pandora and whole foods?

:pops popcorn:

Last year, a certain MSC had the Roundy's chain of supermarkets. In Wisconsin, they were typically Pick 'n Saves, but in Illinois, they were known as Mariano's - upscale supermarkets.

Excellent pay, great food and wonderful people. In the mornings, they served frree fresh orange juice, their deli sold Gypsy Ham and their liquor department had daily (or so it seemed) wine tastings.

Sadly, like many of its other clients, the MSC lost the Roundy's.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/23/2014 12:59PM by Tatjana.

pushp, it's against the rules of the forum to name clients of the mystery shopping companies. See the posting guidelines at the bottom of this page. It's also against the independent contractor agreements we sign with the mystery shopping companies. If we name the clients of a mystery shopping company, we can expect to be deactivated from shopping for that mystery shopping company. To find your target companies, keep signing up with more and more companies. Welcome to the forum.

My fave is doing the to go shop for the Dessert Manufacturer. You get the $30 gift card but only have to get one item, which can be as low as $5 or so. I have stockpiled over $100 in gift cards.

I like test driving super fancy cars . I like the upscale car wash ones too....except when I brain fart and get the wrong level wash and don't get paid for the shop--but I go there anyway to get my car washed-oh well.

There is a MSC who has been offering a drive-thru convenience store shop that pays 10.00 and give you a 5.00 reimbursement. The report takes less than 8 minutes (well that is how long it takes me-half that for the average mystery shopper). The shop is super easy: drive in, give the always perky and polite team member your order, they grab it for you, you pay them, get your receipt and drive out of there in less than 3 minutes. The only drawback is that the food is a little overpriced but hey, you get a 5.00 reimbursement and the cranberry chicken salad is delicious!
It is great because I have about 7 of these shops less than 5 miles from my house; unfortunately I am limited to three each round.

Whatever pays the most with the least amount of work.

RIMS, I had the exact same thing happen once. The scheduler was so cool when I called. She actually looked to see if they had filled the quota for the kind of wash I got in order to save my fee and reimbursement. Alas, they had. At least my car looked spectacular

Call me crazy, but I like the blue bank overdraft shops. I am generally in and out within 10-15 minutes, the reports are easy-peasy. I've gotten the 'photo session' down to 2-3 minutes with the documents, and the money is good. There are also blue banks on every street corner in this part of the world. The downside is every banker in my county probably thinks I'm a frequent check bouncer...

I also like the FL grocery store competitor shops where you have to go to the WM neighborhood Market that doesn't have half the departments you're supposed to check. Just put in a lot of "NA" answers and collect free groceries (and pay, frequently bonused). Me likey.

Lastly, I've recently discovered that I like doing trailer checks at the local movie house. Not every variety of these, mind you, but the ones where I only have to be there for one showing and sometimes get audience reaction (how come "indifferently texting" isn't a valid response?) These get bonused sometimes and are super-easy to report.

I just did this one last week, same company!
Loved them as well, a lot better than the one in the past. Paid great with the bonus


aggiejim72 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My favorite shops are these new shops available
> from a big MSC. Just started doing these. They are
> gas station mystery shops. $25 fee and $5
> reimbursement. You have to buy 2 gallons of gas
> minimum. While at the pump you check for: one
> special pump topper; squeegee and clean water;
> trash can; look to see if any banners that should
> be there are there. They want you to pay with a
> card and get a receipt at the pump. Then they want
> you to go inside and ask to use the restroom.
> After doing that you wander the aisles to check on
> the general condition of the place. After that buy
> some small thing like a bottle of water. At check
> out get the name of the cashier who is supposed to
> be wearing a nametag--but if they aren't you just
> report it. Then you go across the street or
> anyplace to get a good overall shot of the
> location, and a few shots of the main station
> sign. The report is all radio buttons and
> checkboxes and took me 15 minutes to complete.
>
> The only downside to this shop is that the MSC
> wants you to upload all photos you took and asks
> you in the report how many you have. Best to just
> have 3 overall shots and 2 of the main station
> sign because the editing of the photos takes a bit
> of time (but not much).
>
> Needed the gasoline so 2 gallons cost me $7.80 and
> the purchase in-store cost $2 so I'm out $10, but
> get $5 back, so the shop worked out to $20 fee and
> 10 reimbursement. Liked it because I could take my
> time and there was no pressure at all. First one I
> did I made the mistake of filling my car up the
> night before so I had to drive around for 50 miles
> to make room for the required 2 gallons. I've done
> five of these shops so far, all of them in the
> Houston/East-central Texas area.

Are you in Texas? I use to do these and felt the same way. I haven't seen them in a long time though. What MSC are you using. We should be okay since we haven't mentioned the clients name.



tanmanlovespool Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My favorite by far is a dinner at the bar shop at
> the steak house with peanuts on the floor. It
> usually does not pay a fee but it reimburses me
> for my meal up to $25. And the service at the bar
> is much quicker and friendlier than it is when
> sitting in the restaurant. I can order a large
> steak with two sides and a drink and include my
> 20% tip under or just slightly over the $25
> reimbursement limit.
>
> The report is easy to complete and takes about 20
> minutes to do. It is mostly checking to see if
> certain restaurant buzz words are mentioned during
> the meal and commenting on those that aren't. The
> only gripe I have is that I have to wait 90 days
> before I can do the same location again. The good
> thing is that there are about six locations in my
> metro area and several in other metropolitan areas
> that I also shop on long routes.