Triangle Select Review

Canadian Tire is one of the most recognizable brands in Canada, and they just launched a rewards-rich, subscription-based version of their Triangle Rewards loyalty program called Triangle Select. While subscription-based loyalty programs are nothing new, the value of Triangle Select is impressive. Read my Triangle Select review now.

What is Triangle Select?

Triangle Select is a subscription-based enhancement of Triangle Rewards. For $89 a year, you’ll get an increased earn rate and additional benefits. For reference, Triangle Rewards is the loyalty program of Canadian Tire-owned stores. This includes brands such as:

• Canadian Tire
• SportChek
• Mark’s/L’Équipeur
• Party City
• Sports Experts
• Hockey Experts
• Pro Hockey Life

Joining the base program, Triangle Rewards is free and allows you to collect CT Money at participating stores. 

Triangle Select benefits

• $50 welcome gift 
• Limited time offer from Crave for a 6-month subscription 
• 10X the rewards on almost all in-store purchases at Canadian Tire, SportChek, Mark’s, and Party City
• 20X the rewards on in-store brands such as Denver Hayes, MotoMaster, Sherwood, Mastercraft, and more.
• 20X annual in-store top-up on your largest eligible purchase
• Shipping fee waived on all online purchases over $50 from SportChek, Mark’s and L’Équipeur (up to $20 in shipping fees per order)
• Shipping fees reimbursed in CT Money on your first give Canadian Tire ship-to-home purchases (up to $12 in shipping fees per order)

Right off the top, Triangle Select is throwing some incredible value at you. You get a $50 welcome gift to select brands (Canadian Tire, Sports Chek, and more). Plus, for a limited time, new subscribers get a 6 month Crave subscription. For reference, Crave normally costs $20 a month ($120 for six months). That’s a total instant value of $170, which is clearly more than the annual subscription fee of $89. In other words, Canadian Tire is paying you to try out Triangle Select.

The obvious major benefit of Triangle Select is the enhanced earn rate. You’ll get 10X the rewards on almost all in-store purchases at Canadian Tire, SportChek, Mark’s, and Party City. That works out to 4% back in CT Money. Non-eligible purchases would be things such as gift cards, lottery tickets, and tire disposal fees).

In addition, you’ll get 20X the rewards (or 8% in CT Money) on in-store brands such as Denver Hayes, MotoMaster, Sherwood, Mastercraft, and more. Note that this 20X the points STACKS with your regular 10X rewards earned. That means you’re actually earning 30X the rewards.

There’s no denying that this enhanced earn rate is incredible. That said, it only applies to in-store purchases. Any purchases made online and shipped to your home or to be picked up in-store do not count.

The 20X rewards annual top-up is interesting. At the end of your membership year, Triangle Select will give you a 20X bonus on your largest eligible purchase of the year. Remember, 20X the rewards is essentially 8% back in CT Money, so you could easily recoup a huge chunk of your annual fee.

Even though the extra rewards don’t apply to online shopping, you do get some perks for purchases made online. With Canadian Tire purchases made online, you’ll get up to $12 in shipping fees reimbursed in CT Money five times a year. If you’re making purchases from SportChek or Mark’s, all your shipping charges for online purchases over $50 are waived (up to $20 per order).

Earning extra rewards with Triangle Select

Like other loyalty programs, Triangle Select has weekly targeted and in-store offers. These offers can be highly lucrative since the extra rewards stack with Triangle Select. For example, the Triangle Select website has an excellent example of how much CT Money you can earn from purchasing a PADERNO pan with a pretax price of $149.99.

In this scenario, regular Triangle Rewards members can capitalize on a $10 offer, and the base earn rate of .4%. They would get $10.60 back in CT Money, which is quite good. However, those subscribed to Triangle Select would also benefit from the 10X rewards bonus, plus the 20X bonus since PADERNO is a qualifying in-house brand. In total, they’d earn $28.60 in CT Money or $18 more than the regular Triangle Rewards members.

As crazy as it sounds, you can further boost your earn rate if you pay for the same pan with either the Triangle Mastercard or the Triangle World Elite Mastercard. 

As you can see, when paying with one of the Triangle credit credit cards, and subscribed to Triangle Select, you’d get $34 back in CT Money on that one purchase. This obviously represents a huge value. I should also mention that the Triangle World Elite Mastercard is one of my favourite credit cards since it comes with free roadside assistance. 

How Triangle Select compares to others

Although it’s not an apples-to-apples comparison, PC Insiders, which is an enhanced subscription service of PC Insiders, is worth looking at.

With PC Insiders, it’ll cost you $119 a year ($30 more than Triangle Select). The big selling factors are Free PC Express grocery pickup with priority time slots and 10% back in PC Optimum points on PC and Joe Fresh products. You also get 5% back in points on PC Travel bookings.

Admittedly, I used to get a lot of value out of PC Insiders since I would take advantage of PC Express. However, these days I prefer to just grab things myself inside the supermarket. In addition, I found that I wasn’t buying as many PC Products as I thought I would.

With Triangle Select, I’d get 10X the rewards on just about every in-store purchase. There’s no need to worry about which products will give me a boost in rewards. Of course, if I choose specific products, I would get an additional 20X the rewards. Both programs have a credit card where you can earn additional points, so there’s some great value.

Final thoughts

My Triangle Select review is positive. Many consumers are looking to make smarter purchasing decisions these days, and Triangle Select presents an opportunity to put more money in your pocket. Admittedly, some people may not like the idea of paying $89 a year for enhanced benefits, but the first year’s value far exceeds what you’d pay. That said, Triangle Select is clearly aimed at consumers who shop regularly at Canadian Tire-owned stores. If you don’t shop at these stores, the value sell would be much lower.