We have seen a lot of mergers in the travel industry over the last couple of years and even one with office supply stores as Office Max and Office Depot had merged. Mergers can be difficult for those trying to earn miles and points or redeeming miles and points. Well, now, one merger is not happening!
One Merger Not Happening – Staples & Office Depot
As a federal judge ruled yesterday to block the merger of Staples and Office Depot, the office supply stores have said that they will not appeal the decision and they are walking away from the merger. This was the second ruling against the merger and now it appears that it was the nail in the coffin for it as well.
Why does this matter? For anyone with a Chase Ink card, the office supply stores are a great way to rack up points. That is because Chase gives 5X points per dollar at office supply stores and that gives a nice way to get more Ultimate Reward points. Match that with the fact that both chains sell gift cards and you can pretty much get 5X Ultimate Reward points for most things you buy just by purchasing gift cards to the places you frequent the most.
While a merger would not have guaranteed that problems would come for those of us who buy gift cards, it certainly is not good news when a merger takes place for things like this. That is because it takes a single rule to impact our point strategies. It also would not be good since each chain has sales and promos for gift cards as they compete. It is easy to take advantage of that to get some great deals.
So, at least one merger is not happening as Staples and Office Depot continue as separate stores.
Source: WSJ
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