Coupon Cunning
Local News
by
Brittany Scheck
last edited on
Monday, September 06, 2010
When every dollar counts, one way a family can cut costs is by using coupons. This month those coupon clippers have a reason to celebrate that extra cash in their wallet. That's because September is being recognized as national coupon month.
Traditionally, coupons were clipped from the newspaper, but these days they're in your mailbox, your inbox, and on your smart phone. And more people are using coupons than ever before, in 2009 coupon use increased by seventeen percent over the previous year.
So we went out to see how people are using coupons to save some cash.
Mary Ellen Newman said, "I subscribe to a certain website on Facebook so everyday I get like an update."
Ray Faczan said, "In my area they double the coupons so if you look and wait for an item to be on sale and you can double the coupon, then your paying sometimes less than a half for the item."
Marilyn Shelton said, "We use them a lot when we go out to eat because like if you get two for ones or half off it really helps a lot."
The most valuable coupon deals can be found in the automotive and home improvement industries but the majority of coupons are used for food purchases. Target tracks customers past purchases to provide them with the most useful coupons.
The Executive Team Leader at Target, Lee Bauer, said, "It's tied to what they purchased and what they have purchased in the past so that it is meeting the Target guest and so its printing a coupon for what they normally purchase."
Target management says only about one in 1,000 coupons do not print at the register but even that one coupon leads to a dollar's worth of lost revenue to the store.