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What I do and don’t want to see in 2013~shopping, grocery shopping and coupons

January 1, 2013 by · 9 Comments

The other day I read this essay on PennLive about things that the author didn’t want to see in 2013. I’m mimicking her idea with my list of things I don’t want to see in 2013, as it pertains to coupons, deals and frugal living.

Go Away: The Extreme Couponing TV Show–Let’s face it, let’s call a spade a spade. “That TV show” is not a bunch of die-hard couponers who wheel and deal their way to free stuff like we do. A good bit of it is coupon fraud with fraudulent coupons. The other part, the part that is somewhat legit–they pre-arranged with the store ahead of time to forego their limits and ignore their store policies on things like overage. And, you have ruined it for the rest of us, those that do coupon legitimately. I’ve never liked that show, sigh.

Go Away!

Go Away!

Go Away: Restrictive wording on coupons-“This coupon can only be redeemed on the second Tuesday of each month….” It’s really getting that ridiculous, isn’t it? A word to marketers who put out the couponers–the cheats are always going to cheat, you’re just making it harder for the good shoppers and families who really want to buy your product and use coupons to save money. You’re not preventing fraud, you’re losing good customers.

piles of coupons, cut coupons, clipped coupons

Go Away: Employees that don’t know their own store’s policy-It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. No, the customer isn’t always right, but sometimes we actually do know your coupon policy better than you do. And that’s ok, you don’t have to be a jerk about it.

Go Away: Really lame offers disguised as great sales-10% off is not a great deal. Neither is a a good sale on an item if I have to pay $12 in S&H. And my favorite deal to dislike–Buy one, get one at 50% off (Pssst-we’re not idiots, we understand that’s only really 25% off, which isn’t anything to write home about). You’re not fooling anyone, so just put out a good deal and you’ll probably find yourself with more customers. Putting out lame offers disguised as good deals only makes your customers go away and trust you less, because we feel duped.

Go Away: Discussion over nexus laws-As my grandmother used to say-Pi$$ or get off the pot. Fish or cut bait. Make a freaking decision, either you’re going to keep us on as affiliates or you’re not. But make a decision. Bloggers are business people too and we need to do our own business plans.

Go Away: shrinking packaging-You’re not fooling us. We know that a box mac & cheese used to be 10 oz, now it’s down to 5.5. A “half gallon” of ice cream is not even close to that anymore.

I want to see: More real freebies-I miss the days of getting a good old-fashioned freebie from couponing. Want to get some internet buzz about your store or product? Then throw us a bone once in a while, it won’t bankrupt you–it creates excitement and business. I don’t want a free trial sized anything, pffft, what a huge disappointment. I want a good freebie.

for free, fun freebie, freebie

I want to see: More free and cheap shipping-Follow L.L.Bean’s lead of free shipping all the time. If you’re a small business that afford that, at least make it cheaper. Anything over $5 or so for shipping, and I’m out.

I want to see: More truth in labeling-from GMOs to regulation of what classifies as “healthy” or “nutritious,” I want to know what I’m buying. I don’t want to have to read all the fine print of every label while I’m shopping.

I want to see: More quality items-I really dislike this “disposable society” that we’ve become. It’s bad for the economy, bad for the environment, bad for teaching our kids values about appreciating what you have and taking care of things. I want small appliances and items that are worth repairing, clothes that I can wear for several years and it won’t be trashed and lose shape after two washes. I want toys that I can keep and clean and maintain and resell. I’m so tired of the crappy  Old Navy clothing and dollar store type crap that is floating around our world and taking up space in landfills.

I want to see: utility bills that make sense-We dropped Comcast earlier this year because our bill went up by a few bucks every other month. How about putting all bills in plain language? And tell us what the cost will be–not $79 a month for Fios, but then we’re going to tack on $30 worth of fees.

I want to see: more real food-the epitome (in my opinion) of how bad it’s gotten–Mio. Does anyone even drink that crap? Have you read the ingredients? Why not just drink motor oil or antifreeze or varnish? I want to feed my kids real food, not something that will mummify them into the next ice age.

Tell me again how this is a better alternative to a glass of water?

Tell me again how this is a better alternative to a glass of water?

So let’s hear it from you–what do you want to go away in 2013 and what do you want to see more of?

Filed Under: Grocery Store ads, deals, matchups, coupons and clearance finds Tagged With: , ,

Back to Basics Series: how to protect yourself against coupon fraud

July 15, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

 

 

Recently there was a ring of women in Phoenix busted for coupon fraud. Yay! I think it’s great, because those who commit fraud and counterfeit ruin it for the rest of us.

coupon fraud

Graphic courtesy of MultiChannelMerchant.

Even the casual couponer needs to protect themselves against fraud. Here are some tips.

1. When you find a printable source online, know the signs of what is legit and what isn’t. Familiarize yourself with what a coupon from a good site looks like, like Coupons.com, Red Plum and SmartSource. Notice they have bar codes, tracking information around the perimeter of the coupon and they are generally NOT PDFs. It’s ok to get them from blogs, but the blogs generally will redirect you to the original site. Be very wary of PDFs, unless you find them on a manufacturer’s website. Most manufacturers have learned the hard way that PDFs give you unlimited prints, which is why they don’t do them anymore. The legit sites generally only give you 1-2 prints per computer.

If the full image of the coupon is available on your computer screen, it’s probably a fake. Brands no longer put full images available (like you know the preview screen you see on Bricks?) because it opens them up to fraud.

2. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Did you find an offer to purchase a bunch of coupons for a free huge box of Pampers, or free $20 bottle of olive oil? If it’s a really high value coupon and there are a whole bunch of them available, chances are they are counterfeit. I go to many blogging events that are sponsored by manufacturers and brands, and they offer coupons for free items and generally each blogger is allowed to take only one or two. So it’s very unlikely that an ebay seller is going to find these honestly.

It is very, very difficult to get awesome coupons in high quantities, it just is. Coupons for free items are very hard to come by, especially in large quantities and never on the internet. Yes, I have occasionally seen a store coupon for $5 off a $5 purchase or even $10 off $10…….but never $25 or $50. $50 off $150-yes. $50 off $50, no.

3. It is NOT illegal to “sell” coupons. However, it is strongly discouraged by the manufacturers. This is why on most ebay listings or clipping websites, you’ll find a disclaimer that says “You’re not actually paying for the coupons, you’re paying for my time to clip them and mail them to you, blah blah blah.” Just remember that….I believe that more and more individuals are going to be arrested for coupon fraud, do you want to be the next one? And if I was going to look for couponers to prosecute, ebay would be the first place I’d start. That and private websites is where you will find the big quantities of high value coupons, most of which are fraudulent. I recently spoke with an Acme store manager and he said in recent workshops and manager meetings, they were being told that 75% of all coupons for FREE items are fraudulent.

In fact, if you look at the website of the women that were busted, you had to have a referral to even purchase coupons from them–they were trying to safeguard themselves from undercover cops I assume. Since when does any legitimate business require that you have to have a referral to be a customer?

But overall, know that buying, selling and trading coupons is legal–there is no law prohibiting it. The manufacturer always has the right to not honor the coupon or reimburse for it, according to whatever wording they have put on the coupon. And when manufacturers STOP reimbursing merchants for coupons, merchants stop taking them. This is why coupon fraud hurts everyone–stores begin to get very conservative and err on the side of caution, and thus refuse even legitimate coupons.

Ebay has partnered with manufacturers and Ebay to limit the number of coupons a seller can sell on Ebay, but I have no idea how well that is policed. And it has just pushed the scammers to their own private websites, like the ladies in Arizona.

4. Use trading forums instead, and I’ll recommend the one on HotCouponWorld. There is no way that any site can guarantee with 100% that no scammers will appear, but good trading forums are the next best thing. Trading is a great way to unload the coupons you don’t want while acquiring the ones you do want.  Those forums are closely moderated and scammers are quickly banned. Members rate each other and leave feedback, and you can’t even trade on there without going through a rookie process first–so a new user can’t get on there and start scamming right away. You can also join or start a local coupon trading group, they are commonly found at churches or libraries.

5. Never ever trade or giveaway a printable that you printed from your computer. Those printables are tracked to your ISP address, and if someone photocopies a whole bunch of them and it gets back to the company, they can ban your ISP address and you’ll never be able to print from that site again. I RAOK (random act of kindness) coupons all the time in the grocery store, leaving a few next to the product that they are for–but never printables.You just never know who will end up with them.

6. Only use coupons for the items specified on the coupon. Yes, we have, ahem, seen otherwise on a certain TV show. Regularly. That doesn’t make it ok. Just because the coupon doesn’t beep or have to be hand-keyed in to work, doesn’t mean it’s legitimate use of that coupon. Is it really worth it? If a store or company would choose to prosecute, they can find you via your shopper loyalty card, the form of payment you used (unless cash) or via store security cameras. Is a few free boxes of something really worth the embarrassment of it all, if you’re caught?

7. For all of your coupons, only get them from legitimate sources. If you are looking for multiple inserts, I did a post over 4 years ago on some ideas on where to find coupons. It is possible to get multiple coupons and multiple inserts honestly.

8. If you do think you are seeing coupon fraud, report it. It only takes a minute or two to send off an email to the CIC. And like I said, coupon fraud hurts all of us.

 

Always take the high road……it’s just not worth getting caught. And it’s not Smart Spending!

Filed Under: Back to Basics-extreme couponing for the beginners, Catalinas, Coupon Apps, E-Coupons, Coupons & Printable Coupons Tagged With:

It’s not my imagination! TLC is affecting us.

November 4, 2011 by · 2 Comments

 

Interesting article today in Entrepeneur Magazine–How to Stop Losing Money from Coupons.

If you’ve been following me for as long as “that show” has been on, you know I’m not a fan. And I’m prone to rant about it.

 

My existential couponing crisis

 

Anyone else sick of Extreme Couponing?

 

Retailers getting tougher on couponers

 

If TLC is The Learning Channel, What are we learning?

 

But, as shown in the Entrepeneur article, retailers have had enough. Also, if you’ve followed this blog, you’ve surely noticed I’ve cut way back on the amount of matchups I do.  Even promoting home delivery services like Peapod. Make no mistake, I’m still a serious couponer. In fact, just scored a nice haul of detergent today at Target, on clearance + coupons. But I also heard from a couponing friend that was hassled tonight at our local Acme, and they wouldn’t take her bogo printables.

 

Look, I am friends with several of the bloggers/couponers that have been on that show. They’re nice people and the ones that I know are honest, polite and to my knowledge don’t commit coupon fraud. But by and large, that show has been a disaster for us that have been doing this a long time. My hope is that this will blow over within a year or two, the economy will rebound more and people will lose interest. Couponing does take time and it’s not for everyone. Another one of the reasons why I don’t just bring you coupon deals. If you try to save money solely by clipping coupons, you’re not going to come out that much ahead. Grocery budgets are only 9-10% of your household budget–even if everything is free, you still have 90% of your household budget to look at, for ways to trim money.

 

 

If this is your lifestyle, we’ll evolve. If you are just in this for the freebies and think it’s easy to just walk into a store and walk out with four carts of crap for free………then you’ll probably fade away. The guidelines have gotten gradually stricter over the past 5 years, increasingly more strict over the past year. But, I’m still able to find very cheap and free stuff, and have no plans to stop. The difference is that most of us die-hards are reasonable about it, not demanding to cashiers, nor do I commit fraud to get there.

 

Thanks to one of my fellow mods on hcw for the heads up on the article!

Filed Under: Acme sales, deals and coupons, Catalinas, Coupon Apps, E-Coupons, Coupons & Printable Coupons, Extreme Couponing Tagged With: , , ,

My existential couponing crisis (aka complaining about *that tv show* again!)

September 5, 2011 by · 1 Comment

On Saturday morning, the couponing group that I regularly meet with met, for the first time in a couple of months. With vacations and stuff, we sort of took a break for summer.

One of the moms asked “where are all the peanut butter deals?” and we really can’t find one. It used to be, that this time of year, peanut butter is free all over the place (by stacking deals) and then we’d all get 10-20 jars to last us until next back-to-school season. Not this year.

Then we started reminiscing about great deals we’ve encountered in the past that we just can’t find anymore. I’ve had to readjust my stockpile prices for items in my head. Not trying to sound like a jerk–but there are things I never thought I’d have to pay for–spaghetti sauce, peanut butter, granola bars, shampoo, razors–because I got so many of them free for so long, and now I find myself barely saving 20%-30% on those things. It’s crazy. The deals are disappearing. Supercouponers like myself have noticed much less traffic on the various deal boards. Sure, part of the reason is that people are too lazy to post a deal, but there just aren’t that many deals to post.

Coupon inserts these days–they suck, plain and simple. So many coupons are now $1 off 3, $1 off 4, no good values anymore. Lots of stores have tightened their coupon policies–Dollar General, Kmart, CVS, Rite Aid. So many have stopped doing the super promos they used to do. I don’t think Kmart has done a real superdoubles in two years. Shop Rite–haven’t heard about triples or superdoubles, in what, six months? Superfresh hasn’t done triples in at least two years. Many grocery stores are no longer letting you stack e-coupons with paper coupons. Wording on catalinas is stricter in many deals, and the catalina deals themselves suck almost as much as the coupons. The BTFE deals used to be $5 back in BTFE, then it went down to $2.50–the deal at Acme that started yesterday is down to $1.50.

I always thought I was one of those people who would always clip coupons. After all, I’ve been doing it for about 20 years. But now I’m starting to wonder. It just seems like so often, it’s not even worth it, like should I just try to save money in other areas?

I’ve done several posts surrounding the Extreme Couponing phenomena, and all along I’ve said that I don’t believe that all of this is due to just one stupid tv show. Now, I’m not so sure. They did a marathon of reruns on Saturday night, and I got sucked in. As usual, it left me rolling my eyes and disappointed that a popular show is regularly portraying fraud. They showed this one woman, she was getting 180 of something (I don’t want to say what it was) for free. First of all, as she’s clearing the shelf and filling her cart, she exclaims “Gee, I sure hope we like this product, we’ve never had it!” How stupid is that? And then, to get it free, she was using printable coupons.

Please tell me where someone has access to 180 printables? That would mean that you’d need 90 computers because the sites only let you print two per computer. My guess–she photocopied them.  Fraud, plain and simple.

Sure, as a deal blogger, I know that the deal blogs and websites have contributed to making the deals more accessible to everyone. But, you still have to seek out the information yourself and find it. With tv–it’s just handed to you, you just have to be clicking around, and there it is. Delivered right to you and you didn’t even know you were looking for it. As someone who has taught coupon classes and is friends with moms all over the country who do so–I can tell you, it’s the tv show. People are contacting us saying “I want to do that! Like on tv!”

What can we do? I don’t know. I know that I’m getting tired of hearing negative stories surrounding the show–the fraud, the moms stealing newspapers, stores making it tougher on all of us. I’m not ready to hang up my scissors just yet, but I know that as far as the amount of time I spend clipping coupons and matching to deals–I’m definitely going to be paying attention to my ROI on my time. And I’ll start pursuing other ways to save money. Because with coupoing, I’m just not saving as much as I used to.

And fwiw, no, this is not sour grapes. I, and many of my friends have been asked to be on the show and we declined. I’m not just sour because I’m not on tv. If I’m going to be on tv, it’s not going to be reality tv. Extreme Couponing has done nothing positive. Nothing. Other than that some of the show’s participants have an increased traffic on their blogs and websites, that’s it. They were portrayed as freaks on tv and didn’t even get paid for it. Blog hits–that’s all they get.

You might also like:

One supercouponer’s opinion of Extreme Couponing

If TLC is the learning channel, what are we learning?

Retailers getting tougher on couponers

Anyone else sick of extreme couponing?

Slow death of supercouponing?

Filed Under: Extreme Couponing Tagged With: ,
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