The Baby Registry Perk That Saves You Money

Most people think of a baby registry as a wish list you can send to friends and family before a baby shower. While that’s not wrong (thank you to everyone who gave our family such generous gifts!), there’s a lesser-known reason to create baby registries: They can save you a ton of money, even apart from the gifts you receive. I personally saved more than $1,100 by creating registries with four different retailers. Here’s how I did it.

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Many registries have a completion discount, which can get you 15 to 20 percent off of anything you buy from your own registry.

The idea here is that if your friends and family don’t buy you everything you asked for, you can “complete” your registry after your baby shower without breaking the bank. The exact completion discount offered varies by retailer (and not all baby registries come with a completion discount). Here are the registries with completion discounts that I used:

Amazon - 15% discount starting 60 days before your due date
Target - 15% discount starting eight weeks before your due date
Buy Buy Baby - 15% discount starting six weeks before your due date
Pottery Barn Kids - 15% discount starting 60 days before your shower

Something I tell all expecting parents I know: You can still add items to your registries even after your completion discount is activated. That means that you could add more diapers or wipes to your Target registry in the weeks leading up to your due date, just for the extra 15 percent discount (which is exactly what I did).

You can also add items to your registry that aren’t even for your baby, just to save money on them. I moved from an apartment to a house shortly before my daughter was born, so I added a lot of things for our new home to my Amazon registry, then used my completion discount to get them all marked down 15 percent.

One other secret: If you want to be eligible for the completion discount sooner, you can fudge your baby’s due date when you sign up for your baby registry. Most completion discounts do come with some fine print here. For example, with Amazon and Target, your registry has to have been active at least 14 days to get your completion discount, even if you sign up within eight weeks of your due date. And on Amazon, you can’t become eligible for a new completion discount until at least eight months after your previous completion discount expires (which is 90 days after your due date).

Amazon completion discount tips

I used Amazon as my main registry, and I utilized my completion discount on everything that was still on my baby registry after my shower, including diapers. Here are the most important things to remember about Amazon’s completion discount:

The discount is 15 percent off, up to a combined value of $2,000. That means that you can save up to $300.
You can use the discount on as many orders as you’d like, as long as you’re within the completion discount window (starting 60 days before your due date and ending 90 days after your due date — that’s five months total).
Almost all items on Amazon are eligible, including upscale brands that are rarely discounted, like Uppababy and Britax. The only items that I noticed that weren’t eligible were a couple from very small brands (like a unique mobile made by a third-party seller).

After I was finished buying everything off of my baby registry (and about $500 worth of diapers), I started adding non-baby items to get more out of the completion discount. Since I buy everything on Amazon, this was a huge perk. I ended up saving around $75.

Target completion discount tips

Target was my secondary registry for people who I knew would want to shop in an actual store. I was glad to discover that the registry also came with a completion discount, which included the following fine print:

The discount is 15 percent off, and you can use it twice: Once for an online purchase, and once for an in-store purchase.
As with all completion discounts, you can only use it on items that are on your registry, so you’ll want to make sure you’ve added everything to your registry before you’re ready to check out. (This is especially important when you're making your in-store purchase!)
The coupon becomes available eight weeks before your due date and is good till six months after your due date. So you have eight total months to use it.

Unfortunately, not everything is eligible — some big exclusions to keep in mind are DockATot, Halo Baby and Infant Optics. But Target has plenty of non-baby stuff to add to your registry, and you can even combine your registry discount with other Target Circle offers, the five percent discount for RedCard holders or the team member discount if you’re an employee. I saved about $60 using my Target completion discount.

Buy Buy Baby completion discount tips

One of the big reasons I registered at Buy Buy Baby is because they often have 20 percent off coupons that my friends and family could use towards their gifts. Here are the pointers I’d keep in mind for the Buy Buy Baby completion discount:

You’ll get two 15 percent off coupons to use: One that’s mailed to you several weeks before your due date, and one that’s emailed to you six weeks before your due date. These are both one-time-use coupons.
While most products are eligible, you can’t use the coupons on diapers, wipes, formula and baby food — which is a bit of a bummer. You also can’t use them on portrait studio services or Pea in the Pod and Motherhood Maternity products.
The discount is good for three months after your due date, making it valid for about four and a half months total.

I know what you’re thinking: Buy Buy Baby gives out 20 percent coupons all the time, so a 15 percent off completion discount doesn’t sound that great. Here’s the thing: The completion discount is good on a lot of items that aren’t normally eligible for coupons, like Uppababy strollers and car seats.

So if you have something on your registry that you can use a 20 percent coupon for, you’ll want to do that because it’s the better deal. But if you’re getting something that wouldn’t be eligible for 20 percent off, you can use the 15 percent off coupon for a pretty good discount.

I also liked that Buy Buy Baby made returns so easy. I had registered for a 4moms Mamaroo baby swing, but when I tried it with my daughter, she didn’t like it. So after a few months, I took the Mamaroo without any of its packaging to a Buy Buy Baby near me. They took it back, no questions asked, and gave me store credit, which I then used on other baby products. I saved about $50 at Buy Buy Baby, thanks to its completion discount alone.

Pottery Barn Kids completion discount tips

I didn’t even tell most of my friends and family that I was registered at Pottery Barn Kids, but I knew that I wanted to get my daughter’s entire nursery set from there. So I went into a store to pick everything out, and the sales associate tipped me off to the trick of creating a registry to save 15 percent. Here’s what you need to know about the store’s completion discount:

The discount is 15 percent off, but there are a lot of exclusions — including sale items and baby gear. (Check out the full list.)
You can get discounts on a lot of the nursery furniture, and the savings add up quickly.
Pottery Barn Kids goes by the “event date” you enter while registering, and you can use your completion discount starting 60 days before the event, all the way until 180 days after the event, for a total of eight months.

I first got my crib, dresser and glider from Pottery Barn Kids. And after learning you can use the completion discount several times, I went back later for the matching nightstand, along with a few other smaller items, like sheets. I’d estimate that I saved about $925 at Pottery Barn Kids alone.

One final tip

I had to learn all of this by talking to store employees and reading the fine print myself, but What to Expect’s Registry Builder lays out all of the details on completion discounts (as well as other registry perks and freebies) for you. If I were pregnant currently, I’d also use Registry Builder to keep all of my registries organized in one place for easy sharing — I definitely recommend it if you’re looking to get the most out of your baby registries.