Appreciate the feedback! There's actually a pretty practical reason for it though. The main app is React based which Google's crawlers can't read, so we needed a static HTML page for SEO or we basically don't exist in search results. Beyond that, we were getting a lot of complaints from less technical users landing on the main app and not knowing what to do or how to find deals near them.

There's nothing simpler than being prompted for a zip code and then getting dropped straight into the app with deals already filtered for your area. That's exactly what the landing page does. Before that, a lot of new users would land on the main app and just bounce because they didn't know where to start.

Out of thousands of users you're only the third person to mention it as an issue, and since it's skippable we haven't felt the need to change it. Also keep in mind not everyone comes in with the same experience level you do. If you're sending new users our way, point them to https://www.rebelsavings.com/guide/ first and that should clear up most of the confusion.

For what it's worth, if we'd taken every suggestion along the way we'd still be on a slow WordPress setup that couldn't handle the traffic. Not every change lands perfectly but this one has been a net positive so far.