Cooking club of America

[Maybelle]

I signed up for the free trial of this club, and got my intro packet today along with the magazine. Has anyone done this offer in the past and stayed a member. It is only $12, and I am wondering if people like it. Just looking for input.

Thanks!

BTW, in case anyone is interested, many of the recipes look really good and easy too. There also looks to be quite a few recipes that are "diet" oriented, and lots of veggie ideas. I am liking the looks of the magazine.

 

[Wilsonfamily4]

I never recieved the magazine before I had to send the card back in. I was thinking about keeping it but how would I if I had never seen the magazine!! So frustrating. Good luck. It is a good price.

 

[spockearss@yahoo.com]

There seems to be a few people out there that don't like the cooking club of America. Most of them just didn't read the entire thing and then thought they were being taken advantage of. When you get your subscription bill, it will be for 2 years which is mentioned in the letter. I went back and double checked and yes it was written that it was billed in 2 year increments.

I have enjoyed my subscription and have been with them for close to 10 years. I received a great sliding measuring spoon and cup to test as well as as a couple of snap on lid containers. After that you are supposed to go in and do another profile for testers and I have not done that. Just keep forgetting to go in and do it.

I also received a few months later the special letter telling me that I was one of the few people that were invited to join the life time membership for the cooking club of America . At that time the price for the life membership was about $230.00, and for that I received more prizes. There were a few little nick nacks, a really nice full apron with my name on it and a very nice set of knifes that were worth the $230.00 themselves.

I have since then joined a number of other clubs from the same mother company and have enjoyed the same benefits. I am curious now as to how many different clubs this company owns.

But for me I enjoy the magazine and other benefits from these clubs.

Spock

 

[katdocnorf]

I pay my $12 every year and get my magazines. I have been a member for about 3-4 years. I enjoy the recipes. I have just been debating on if the lifetime membership is worth it with all the free goodies you supposedly get. Has anyone done the lifetime membership. The Free stuff looks worth it but sometimes pictures and lists look better than actually is.

Oh yeah and I signed up to be a tester and have received 1 item from them for free to test. It was an enclosed sifter measuring cup combo. It was nice and I enjoy using it. Best of all it was free...

 

[barbeml]

I signed up for the free trial of this club, and got my intro packet today along with the magazine. Has anyone done this offer in the past and stayed a member. It is only $12, and I am wondering if people like it. Just looking for input.

Thanks!

BTW, in case anyone is interested, many of the recipes look really good and easy too. There also looks to be quite a few recipes that are "diet" oriented, and lots of veggie ideas. I am liking the looks of the magazine.

You might want to google them and check out the lengthy list of horror stories on epinions.

 

[M 'n C]

I signed up for it with SR when it was on the site. I finally got a magazine and I was disappointed. It was mainly ads and no real interesting receipes in my issue so I cancelled.

 

[spockearss@yahoo.com]

I pay my $12 every year and get my magazines. I have been a member for about 3-4 years. I enjoy the recipes. I have just been debating on if the lifetime membership is worth it with all the free goodies you supposedly get. Has anyone done the lifetime membership. The Free stuff looks worth it but sometimes pictures and lists look better than actually is.

Oh yeah and I signed up to be a tester and have received 1 item from them for free to test. It was an enclosed sifter measuring cup combo. It was nice and I enjoy using it. Best of all it was free...

The amount that you will pay is about equal to a little over ten years of paying for the magazine itself. So if you plan on paying for the magazine for a while, then it is a really good deal. The items that you most likely will receive will be about the same amount that you would pay for if you bought the items separately. They are of a good quality, in fact my apron is still in such good shape that you can still read the emblem and my name. Considering that I was looking for a good apron since I had injured myself at work and didn't have the access to aprons any more and that I became a life member about a year and half after I became a member. I became a member in 1999 and a life member in 2000. The club itself started around 1998 and is celebrating it's 10 anniversary this year.

Spock

 

[spockearss@yahoo.com]

Sorry about the delay, I didn't notice the reply notice in my inbox.

The test products now for the first time are simple products because they are basically testing you to make sure that you are a good tester and not just some one that is trying to get free products. My first product to test were a pair of storage containers that actually were not out yet. I tried to look for them in the store to see what the actual store price would be and could not find them. They showed up about 6 months later which was about 2 months after the results were in the magazine.

After you receive your test product and return the results (which you have to return your analysis in order to receive any other tests products in the future.) you must again turn in another test profile that you can do online if you wish to. The other rule when it comes to product testing that they had to implement is that you can only test once a year if they need you to test a product. This allows them to skip you once in a while if they so not get enough products to send out to everyone that has joined up. But boy I would have loved being able to test the home soda maker and a few other things that I envy others that are lucky enough to get to test. I think there was a real convectional oven that was tested last year. I was given a while back some of Chef's Paul seasoning that I had a friend test out for me. My body doesn't like hot spicy things like that so I couldn't do it myself and they do allow you to have others help in testing out the item just for that reason. In fact I was sent a letter explaining that when they sent the seasoning.

The main reason why there are the horror stories (yes I have rad a lot of them) is because they didn't like the product test items that were sent to them. Which is (I think) one of the reason that they first send out simple inexpensive items to test out the testers. If the people were just in it to get the free products then most likely they would be the ones that would not be happy about getting something other then an expensive item. That is what I read in a lot of those stories is something like "I signed up for a product test and all I got was a stupid seasoning/gadget that was worthless". If you are not willing to test out the small stuff, then why should they trust you to test out something expensive?

I am happy with the clubs and just as happy to test out something small. The company making the item doesn't know until it is too late. Without testing they spend millions of dollars that could be a waste when they find out that the public didn't like the item. Yes there are a lot of ads in the magazine, but what magazine isn't. They give away wonderful items every other month. Such as a wall unit convectional/microwave oven in the February and March issue. (Still waiting for them to tell me that I won. LOL) Not every issue is going to have the type of recipe that you may not want, but the next issue may. The cooking club tends to be more into the gourmet cooking then ordinary every day cooking. If you don't enjoy gourmet cooking, then you maybe better off with a different cooking magazine.

Have fun
Spock