AOL's Shortcuts.com coupon service goes mobile

What's even better than getting grocery store coupons online? Getting them from your cell phone. AOL has released a version of its online coupons service, Shortcuts.com, that's now optimized for viewing from the mobile phone.

Cellfire and Shortcuts.com want your Ralph's Club Card number.

(Credit: CNET)

Coupons for popular cereal and a jumbo pack of Pull-Ups Training Pants greet you when you navigate to Shortcuts.com from the mobile browser. After you've registered your savings club card with Shortcuts.com, you'll be able to add vouchers like these directly to your account, and redeem them in-store without a paper receipt.

The new mobile focus on Shortcuts.com's service puts some heat on Cellfire (coverage), a native coupons application built for a variety of mobile phones. While Cellfire branches out beyond grocery stores to get you coupons to local and national chain restaurants and other retail shops, Cellfire is also gunning for the supermarket tie-in. On Ralph's supermarket Web site, for instance, Cellfire and Shortcuts.com are neck-and-neck for advertising space.

The competition between mobile coupon purveyors is, of course, wonderful for the consumer, who could link their savings card with both services and possibly double the number of coupons to whittle down a bill. That is, so long as the savings arrive for grocery items you'd actually use, and for stores that are already on your warpath. Shortcuts.com has some coupons I would want to use, but none of its 14 partner markets is within a 60 mile radius of where I shop for food. Here's hoping that the undisclosed grocery store AOL says it will partner with this spring is the one situated just down the street.

[Via Geek.com]