So far, I am up to 11 packs of Tyrrells chips - I figure that's about a six week supply at our place (as long as the kids don't find where I have stashed them!)
Expensive? Yes, but not so bad when it is for product that you would have purchased regardless.
Each pack is costing me $1.99 more than I would usually pay but the chips are better and 400 WWR points for that price works out at 2 cents a point if you follow my line of reasoning
Converted to QFF points it works out to 174 QFF points for my additional $1.99 spend per bag of chips and at that rate it works out far cheaper than buying points from AA or Alaska etc.
As for tracking credit cards - the answer is yes to anything that has a number, chip or barcode on it, wherever the card or account number is used. When aggregated with the data from a rewards program such as Flybuys or WWR it is an absolute gold mine of data for the merchant and the card provider.
The flip side is earning reward points.
If you don't want to be tracked to that extent than cash is always the answer (from an ATM or bank in a different location).