PREPARING FOR THE ADVENTURE

Our adventure begins in Denver, Colorado, and ending in Biddeford, Maine, a total of more than 2100 miles. Ms. Caviar began in Maine, securing a half-priced point buy on Southwest Airlines for a flight to Colorado where she and TunaGirl began to prepare for the trip ahead.

With enough time and experience, you could mystery shop hotels, but we decided that what we wanted was to see some sights. So we outlined where we wanted to go and began to prepare.

One of the things was to get in some early mystery shops for road food and family food. In this photo everything was free with Mystery shops.

Getting ready to go:

Bucket list items included Mount Rushmore and the Cathedral Spires, so a quick run to the bookstore produced an atlas, and the route planning began.

To start off, searching destination cities and the route was critical. We needed to find some valuable shops that would contribute to the overall funding. In Rapid City, South Dakota, a number of high-dollar options presented themselves, totaling $195 and this would be a great start to our funding.

All of this, however, requires some experience with the Mystery Shopping world because this experience allows a shopper to be accepted for these shops. Keep in mind that hotels want very experienced shoppers so it is best to start now.

Each of us keeps our shopper apps updated and can view shops available in real-time. Some we plan to scan regularly are aggregator apps such as Shopper Hub and Presto Shopper. Others you might want are Ipsos, GigSpot and iSecretShop. Don’t forget to download the GPS Verifier as some might need to verify your location. Another thing to do is to get on Job Slinger, which compiles many of the Sassie shops. The pro version will also offer a list of recommended shopping companies you can register with.

Making sure you have the right equipment is crucial. If you plan to do video shops, you will need a covert video recording device as they do not allow cellphone use for this purpose. Recommended equipment is the LawMate PV-500. Equipping yourself will equate to success. Another requirement is photos when shopping; it is recommended that a smartphone is used for this purpose.