Churning Life Podcast

Episode 55: August Recap - What's Left in Churning?

In this episode, I talk about the current state of churning and what's still left for buying groups, gift cards, and award travel. While many big plays have come and gone

Episode 54: July Recap - Meetup Learnings & What to Scale Next

I was around for the PNW Travel Festival and the MEAB meetup this month and share some of my learnings from that. I am also thinking about what's next for Pokemon and whe

Episode 53: June Recap - Prime Day & A Trip To Portugal

Prime day wasn't as good as last year's but there was still a decent opportunity to get some spending in, while Pokemon continues to be profitable. We also went on a week

Episode 52: May Recap - More Walmart Scaling & Japan + Guam Trip Report

This month I continued to scale Pokémon at Walmart, but it feels like it may be nearing a breaking point due to the massive quantities of accounts that have been created

Episode 51: April Recap - Bank of America Shutdown & Preparing for Prime Day

This month Bank of America decided to close some of my accounts for doing something I should have known better not to do. I've also been working on getting a secondary wa

Episode 50: March Recap - Meetup Recaps, Hawaii, & More Walmart

This month I went to two different meetups including one in New Orleans, as well as a week-long trip to Kauai for our final Wyndham/Vacasa redemption. I've also been work

Episode 49: February Recap - More iPads, Scaling Walmart, & A Trip to Asia

This month continued to be good at Best Buy for iPads, and there was some big drops at Walmart for Pokemon. On the travel side, I went on a two-week trip to Kyoto, Taiwan

Episode 48: January Recap - iPads, Apple Watches, Mexico City & Europe Skiing

Best Buy spending continued to be strong with the annual business gold cap reset and good sales on iPads and Apple watches. I also have been making good progress on the P

Episode 47: December Recap - End of Q4 Sales & A Trip To Norway W/Bryan M

December had a lot of great deals on Apple products, with the main items being the S11 Apple Watches and iPad 11s. I also talk with Bryan M about his recent trip to Norwa

Episode 46: November Recap - WA Maldives, Black Friday & Cyber Monday

Black Friday was a bit disappointing on Best Buy because the best Airpod sale never went live, but there were still plenty of lower margin deals. On the travel side, we v

Episode 45: October Recap - More iPhones, Hermitage Bay, Chicago Seminars, & Miami

This month, iPhones continued to go strong and are still going through November. There was also a good sale on iPads and Airpods at Best Buy with another round of coupons

Episode 41: June Recap - More Airpods and a Trip to Peru

Best Buy had another good sale on Airpods this month that I was able to scale pretty well. I also recap a 1.5 week trip to Peru where we saw Machu Picchu and the Inti Ray

Episode 39: April Recap - Airline News, $300k of Best Buy Spend, & More Gold

I discuss the latest Amex shutdowns along with the upcoming changes with Southwest Airlines and Emirates. It was another solid month at Best Buy where I was able to get a

Episode 38: March Recap - ATX Meetup Recap, Airtags & Fitbits

The meetup was a success, and thanks to everyone who came out! In this episode I dive into my churning and buying group activities for this month, including some Bank of

Episode 36: January Recap - Taiwan, Bali, & Japan Trip Report

This episode covers a 3 week trip that we did to Taiwan, Bali, Niseko & Kyoto, as well as the usual buying group activities. Niseko Hotel: https://nisekohakuunso.com/

Episode 35: "Hobby" Churning & Award Travel Basics

This is the 2nd beginner-focused episode and is about the mindset of churning as a hobby and how to get started with award travel. I also talk about some tips for Qatar A

Episode 33: Morocco & Paris Trip Report

Starting with a layover in Vegas, we spent a week traveling around Marrakesh, Morocco and ended in Paris. This was my first time on Air France & KLM (booked with Virgin A

Episode 30: Italy & Kauai Trip Reports

In this episode I talk about two trips I did in September in central Italy and Kauai. Both were really amazing trips! Highlights include Turkish, ITA, and Hawaiian busine

Episode 28: Churning & Taxes

This is the long awaited tax episode! In this episode I have a special guest Tonei Glavinic, who is a tax professional and long-time churner. We do a deep dive into taxes

Episode 25: Back To The Basics Part 1

This is a beginner focused episode and is part one of a two part series: Part one is focused on the making money side of churning and part two will be more geared towards