I know that my wife tolerates a lot. Even though she'll say that I'm worlds different than when we first got married, I still occasionally work on increasing my troll level. You know — for trolling. I'm getting really close to Level 46.
Before we went to Costco for some hot and heavy unit pricing action, we went to Joann Fabrics and Crafts. (Well, my wife went there first, and my daughter and I went to get some Sweet Frog. We had a freebie coming, and she had her Sweet Frog T-Shirt on, so we got a discount on the one that wasn't free. Then my daughter and I joined her at Joann's.)
My wife was just about done with the shopping, and shortly after that we were in the checkout line. She had a number of coupons — paper coupons, and coupons on her phone.
She went through the purchases and strategically applied coupons to minimize the total cost — all the while peppering the cashier with questions about whether or not she could apply this coupons on that item, or whether she could stack the coupons, or whether she could apply the discount card to the whole purchase or not.
And the guy knew the answers cold. What amazed me, though, was how complicated the answers were. Flowchart-level complicated. Almost needing multi-variable calculus complicated.
Then I tried for a few more troll points: “Man, you need an engineering degree to follow these coupon rules!”
He wasn't amused.
Coupon early, coupon often … and coupon for a limited time only
Coupons are a lure to get customers into the store, or onto a website, with credit card in hand. They might buy something with the coupon,, but they also are likely to buy things that aren't discounted. The coupon has then done its job.
That works once. But it works often if you have coupons that are good only for a short window: three days, or one day, or even a few hours if you're talking Black Friday deals.
Even more effective: short-fuse coupons with lots of exceptions and complicated redemption rules. Once you've made the trek out to the store, you may find that fine print invalidates your coupon! Now sunk cost sets in: “Well, I'm already here …”
My wife has job-related reasons for going to Joann's. She's fixing up some costumes. For money. Which is awesome. So the fact that she has coupons there helps the bottom line of the job, which is even more awesome.
Under non-business circumstances, though, this is something we all need to watch. The coupons are put in front of us to tempt us. (We let them come in front of us, but that's another issue entirely.)
If we let the coupons tempt us, then we expend brain cycles on all of the wonderful things we could buy with those coupons. We plan to use them, and adjust our schedule so that we're able to use them. It's intoxicating, in a way.
And the more coupons we have — and the more different ways that we can use them together — the more powerful the lure is to use them.
No wonder techniques that take couponing to extreme levels is so addicting.
Just something to be aware of if you feel yourself playing with the coupon options and feel that it's affecting you.
Redeeming coupons is great but if you aren’t careful, yes you can get yourself stuck unable to use the coupon. I love how it says ‘save $1.00 now’. I’m all for that, until you read, buy 2 of these and 1 of these, oh and don’t forget that too, then you get the dollar off. If you know how to work them, they are great, if not, you get no sale.
But the SAVE $1 NOW is really big. The asterisk is small, and the fine print smaller.
Hi John, you’re one step ahead of me, last week on the K-Cups, now on coupons. I was writing a similar article to yours, on how CVS’ has a remarkably long coupon policy. And, without giving away the punchline, it seems to me that many store clerks at CVS aren’t fully aware of their Ts&Cs.
That was a nice article of yours on the coffee. Some days I can take the sludge; others I can’t.
I have snagged a number of coupons because I sent an email to companies when their product had a defect. The coupons never tell you the value. I contacted Gillette about a (2) shaving gel problem and they sent me 2 coupons valued at $11 each. It was agreat deal!
Well THAT worked out well. I guess they understand the value of lifetime customers.