doozer.deals, local first and online honest (the plan)

decisions/doozer-deals.md · Decision · doozer-deals, deals, happenings, affiliate, local-commerce, experiences, tickets, gift-cards, local-loop, plan

status: plan · written by claude-opus-5-5 on 2026-10-25 · stale after 2027-04-01

October 2026 plan for doozer.deals as the best blend of real-world local deals and online commerce. What counts as a deal (six kinds), the house rules, the honest money math, the data model, the phases, and the decisions that are Jon's.

doozer.deals

"Real money spent in real businesses, saving real people money to spend at other local places.

Deals are not only discounts. Sometimes hard to find or exclusive experiences, or ideas that we

come up with ourselves, may be a deal." (Jon, Oct 25 2026)

The thesis

A deal is anything that gets a real person to a real place for a better time or a better price.

Groupon proved people love a reason to go out, then priced the merchant's margin away to buy one-time bargain hunters: half off, then half of what was left, with the busiest hours discounted as deeply as the empty ones. Merchants learned to hate it. Doozer's version:

• Costs the merchant nothing to be on the board. Most of it comes from what they already say

on their own website (happenings), or from what they choose to post.

• Fills slow hours instead of discounting busy ones. Doozer knows the hours, the check-ins and

the town; it can suggest the Tuesday 2 to 5pm offer, not 50% off Saturday night.

• Keeps the saving local. The signature idea is the Local Loop: spend at one place, get a perk

at the next. The money saved is spent down the street.

• Is true. Every deal says where it came from and when Doozer read it. Nothing is invented,

reworded or "starting at".

Six kinds of deal

1. Happenings (live): happy hours, nights out, specials, discounts, quoted word for word from

the place's own website (Happenings).

2. Tickets and experiences: shows at local venues (129 upcoming Ticketmaster events with

ticket links at 12 venues already in marquee_events), classes, tours, tastings, and the hard to find ones: the chef's counter, the brewery's back room, the first-Friday art walk.

3. Owner deals: posted by a claimed owner from the Owner's One. Free to post. Doozer suggests

the slow-hour offer and shows what it did (taps, check-ins), never who.

4. The Local Loop (Doozer-made): neighbor-to-neighbor perks. "Show your Luc's receipt at

Frazzleberries for 10% off." Brokered by Doozer, opt-in for both businesses, verified by an I'm-here check-in or a receipt (logfile.me), no account needed to use it.

5. Plans (Doozer-made): an idea is a deal. "A perfect Saturday in Warwick": a route of places

that are open, what is on, and where to eat after, composed by Alice from verified facts only.

6. Gift cards and online: local gift cards first (doozer.shop),

then online offers through affiliate programs, only where the thing is not sold locally or the link is the local business's own online store.

House rules

• Local first, online honest. An online link never outranks a local option for the same thing.
• Nobody pays for placement, and commission never enters the ranking (the same rule as

sponsorship and the Doozer Ranking). Order = value to the person, timing (tonight first), distance, freshness, how well it is verified, and a lift for independents over chains.

• Every deal shows its source and date; every affiliate link says Doozer earns from it.

Affiliate links carry rel="sponsored nofollow".

• No dark patterns. No countdown unless the deal truly ends, no fake scarcity, no

"only 3 left", no pre-checked boxes, no deal-of-the-day pressure.

• No account to use a deal. "Show this screen" with a live code; check-in optional.
• Businesses see counts, never people, unless a person chose to contact them.
• A business can pause or remove anything at once, and Report an issue is on every card.

The money, honestly

At last measure Doozer had a few hundred real people a day (re-measure: the Aug 2026 numbers included elks.club, retired Sept 15). Affiliate commissions at that volume are pocket change, so the order is usefulness, then traffic, then merchant value, then commissions:

1. Traffic first. doozer.deals is the most searchable thing Doozer has: "happy hour near me",

"trivia tonight in Raleigh", "things to do this weekend in Warwick". Town deal pages are indexable only when they hold enough real items (never a thin page).

2. Doozer+ for owners ($99/yr, already billable): post and schedule deals, slow-hour

suggestions, what each deal did, a place in the Local Loop. Deals give owners a reason to claim.

3. Tickets and experiences (high intent, inventory already here): affiliate programs for the

ticketing and experience platforms Jon has accounts with.

4. Local gift cards through Stripe Connect (shop S1), fee shown before anyone pays.
5. Partner inventory (Groupon-style networks) only to fill a thin town, labeled, below

independents.

6. Online affiliate (Amazon and the major networks) last, and only beside a local option.

The model

• deals: one row per deal. Source (happening | event | owner | loop | plan | giftcard | partner |

affiliate), business_id (null for online), title, terms, value (percent, amount, perk, free, none), schedule (days and times) or window (starts, ends), redeem (none | show | code | link), outbound url, program_id, provenance (quote + source + seen_at, or owner + at), status, score. Happenings and events are adapted into it rather than copied.

• deal_programs: the affiliate and partner registry. Network (impact, cj, awin, rakuten,

amazon, partnerize, direct), merchant, link template, the api_keys name holding the account id (Jon enters it; never in chat or code), disclosure text, active.

• /go/<id> on doozer.deals: the one outbound door for commerce links. Logs the click as a

LeadBuilder event (no personal data), adds the program's parameters, 302s. robots.txt disallows /go/. The source links on happenings stay direct: they are proof, not commerce.

• dealScore(): documented weights, commission absent by construction.

Where deals show

doozer.deals (the board, Near me, town pages), Doozer Town ("What's on"), The One ("What's on" + At a glance), Alice ("anything on tonight?"), the Doozer Digest, API v1, and the App (a push only for a place the person saved: "Trivia at Luc's tonight").

Phases

• D0, done Oct 25: happenings read from 3,595 websites; the board (week, today first, Near

me, filters); Town and The One sections; doozer.deals live and in Search Console.

• D1, next: tickets and experiences shelf (the 129 events); gift cards shelf (from the shop);

the /go door and click ledger, affiliate-ready with no program active; town deal pages for towns with enough items.

• D2 (owner deals shipped Oct 25, free, 5 live per place, 25 with Doozer+): next, slow-hour

suggestions and show-this-screen codes.

• D3: the Local Loop pilot in one town (West Milford proposed: Doozer's home), 5 to 10

businesses, check-in verified; outreach through Machi (all outbound through one strategist).

• D4: affiliate programs live, local inventory first (tickets, experiences, reservations),

then online.

• D5: Plans by Alice from verified facts; game nights at venues with Doozer Games.

Offers at many places (shipped Oct 26, 2026)

includes/partner-offers.php, Admin -> Deals, dz partneroffers. A program is one offer in its sponsor's own words (checked on its own page, dated) and the places it covers: by a rule (a name pattern plus a kind of place), a published list (matched by the place's own website, then by name in the same state; a shared website must also share a word of the name), or a hand mapping (a single-business offer). Every program has its own switch; one master switch turns them all off; a "fill" program (partner inventory such as a deals network) shows only where a town has fewer than deals_partner_fill_min local deals. Shows on doozer.deals ("Offers at many places"), The One ("What's on", src p) and API v1.

Starting five (Oct 26): AMC Stubs half-price Tuesdays and Wednesdays; Cinemark Discount Tuesdays; Bank of America Museums on Us (free general admission the first full weekend of every month, 250 listed institutions); National Park Service fee-free days (Oct 27, Nov 11); Ticketmaster tickets at venues with shows (Impact, pending approval).

Partner lists are lists of real places. Museums on Us: 250 institutions, 0 on Doozer. A list entry with no page is a page to build (dz partneroffers build=museums_on_us state=NJ,NY live=1, the Directory Harvest path with its state guard). Blocked Oct 26: Google Cloud billing for the Maps key has been off since Oct 8, so no build can resolve a place until it is restored.

Networks to join (Jon to sign in or register): Impact (Ticketmaster, SeatGeek), CJ (Groupon, since 2022), Awin (Viator at 4%, GetYourGuide), Fever (its own program).

The Local Loop pilot: West Milford (Jon, Oct 26)

Shortlist from Doozer's own data (independent, open, rated 4.3+ with 100+ reviews): The Vreeland Store, J&S Roadhouse, Prime 374, Macopin Pizza (emails on file), Apulia Risto-Pizza, Country Cottage, Bagel Town Cafe, Old School Pub & Grill, Mario's Deli, Cibo e Vino, Pequannock Feed & Pet; Apshawa Preserve and Bubbling Springs Park as the places a loop starts. Three loops to propose: a morning (Bagel Town Cafe, The Vreeland Store, Pequannock Feed & Pet), a Saturday (Apshawa Preserve hike, Country Cottage lunch, The Vreeland Store), an evening (Cibo e Vino or Prime 374, then J&S Roadhouse or Old School Pub). Each perk is opt-in for both businesses and verified by an "I'm here" check-in; outreach through Machi and Jon, who knows these owners.

Decisions that are Jon's

• The account inventory: which affiliate networks and merchant programs exist. Account ids go

into api_keys through the admin, never into chat.

• ~~Owner deals~~: decided Oct 25, free for every owner ("I welcome it for free for sure");

Doozer+ raises limits and adds enhancements.

• ~~The Local Loop pilot town~~: West Milford (decided Oct 26).
• ~~Partner inventory~~: yes, to fill thin towns, every source switchable (decided Oct 26).
• Disclosure wording for affiliate links (proposed: "Doozer earns a commission on this link").

Related: Happenings, Doozer Games and Shop, The One Page, No Dark Patterns.