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StitcherSelf-care and wellness have become buzzwords on social media, but along with healthcare, most of the costs can feel sky-high. But trust us to spill the beans on how you can pamper yourself and stay healthy without emptying your wallet, or even better, without having to spend anything at all! Jen and Jill will tell you all the tips and juiciest secrets on getting self-care and healthcare treatments at a low cost or for free.
Failures are sometimes best educators so you don’t need to avoid them. Lean in and learn.
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Check out some relevant episodes
The Secret to Getting Free (Or Seriously Cheap) Beauty Services
StyleCaster listed ways to acquire free and cheaper beauty services such as facials, hairstyling, waxing, manicures and pedicures, and more.
What Jen + Jill have to say:
Look into the beauty salons or barber shops near you and see if they offer a discount or a free service. Jill bounced around her area and tried out a bunch of places where she was offered discounted prices, bonuses, and free service. Check out European Wax Centers that offer free waxing services (bikini line, eyebrow, or underarm) for first-time visitors. Also, in any Merle Norman‘s studio branch, they give you a free 20-minute facial. You can join daily deal sites such as Groupon, Lifebooker, and Gilt City. On Groupon, you can constantly find discounted promos on massages, hair cuts, waxing, laser hair removal, etc. at places near you. You can use Rakuten while booking on Groupon to get extra cashback. Rakuten offers $30 in bonus cash to new users; don’t miss your chance and head over to frugalfriendspodcast.com/rakuten to sign up and get your bonus!
Have you recently purchased a beauty product at Macy’s, Ulta, or your local department store? Bring it over and ask them for a demonstration on how to use it or achieve a certain look you want to go for. But please remember that although some would be willing to do it for you, we want to be respectful of other people’s time as well. Jen has been on the B2B side of Instagram, and she found out that if there is a place you love, see if you can go all out on social media and engage with their pages–try to partner with them to get free services. Some salons will offer discounts when you donate your hair to them (e.g., locks of love, wigs for kids, or Pantene beautiful lengths). Also, one secret tip we want to share is that when hairstylists are in training, they will certainly need models, and these models are given free or discounted services.
Free Medical Care Services
Jill got her free medical care services, such as dental cleaning, x-rays, and more, in St. Petersburg College’s Dental Hygiene Clinic. But there are other schools near you that may be offering the same services or more.
What Jen + Jill have to say:
There was a time in Jen’s life where she exclusively had everything done at school, such as her hair, waxing, manicure, and pedicure. Even her husband, Travis, got his hair and beard trimmed at a barber school for years. School salons such as Aveda and Paul Mitchell offer these free salon services. You can also check out Salonapprentice.com and Salonguineapig.co.uk. Jen went to an acupuncture school, and they had a student clinic where people got low-cost acupuncture.
When Jill worked in a counseling office, they took both insurance and private pay clients depending on their income levels to offer them counseling sessions at reduced costs. You would then be willing to pay stubs and prove your income bracket to be eligible for reduced-cost counseling services. NAMI is a great site for discovering mental health support in your area as well as searching for counseling offices that also consider your insurance or operate on a sliding scale fee like Jill’s previous counseling office. For students, look into your university’s counseling services. There are also a lot of free support groups in your area, even in your local churches.
What's the worst discount school service "fail" you've experienced?
Jen was sitting on a chair for hours, but the person who was doing her hair realized she forgot to put the perm activator in. Thankfully, nothing terrible happened to her hair, but she did wait for hours for nothing.
Jill hasn’t had a bad experience with school services, but when she’s trying to hack her own medical care using only home remedies, we could say that a lot of the things she saw on the internet did not go well.
Bill of The Week
Thank you Kim for sharing your bill about lowering your internet bill by $30/month and making an extra payment on your CC (AND for listening to ALL of our episodes!)
Thanks so Much for Listening!
Thanks so much for listening. We love love love reading your kind reviews AND emails. We especially loved this very sweet email:
Congratulations!!
Your podcast has been a continual source of motivation for me over the past 4 years here in my little corner of Australia, getting the opportunity to support you, even if only a little, by buying a copy [of your book] will be a joy for me. My wife, three kids and I live in a fairly high cost of living city in Australia and through your podcasts I feel I have found some kindred spirits, we would typically have been advised against some of the decisions we made such as purchasing a house mortgage free or avoiding credit entirely but your philosophy around values based spending, the radical middle has been invaluable in giving a bit of a community feel despite being the odd one out. Thank you for everything 🙂
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