Looking at bare shelves and harried cashiers? It's possible that you've been visited by a disciple of TLC's Extreme Couponing, a cable television show that educates viewers about getting cartloads of goods for pennies on the dollar. To protect themselves from losses, some of the country's major food and drug retailers are changing their policies. Retail consultant Bob Phibbs, author of The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business, thinks independents should also revisit their policies.
"You don't want to encourage these people to shop with you," Phibbs says. "They're not the people who are going to make your business." To build as big a wall as possible between you and potential extreme couponing losses, he suggests a few simple policy changes.
No buy-one-get-one-free (BOGO) deals with other promotions. The cartfuls of free merchandise extreme coupon users score are often the result of BOGO promotions combined with BOGO coupons. By disallowing such combined promotions, you eliminate that risk, Phibbs says.
Cut the copycats. Limiting the number of identical coupons--perhaps two or four--per purchase or per customer can eliminate buyers walking off with all your inventory for free or at a deeply discounted price. If your point-of-sale system can track it, you may also consider limiting the number of identical coupons customers can use over a specific time period, such as no more than four in a month. However, Phibbs admits, that can be trickier to track.
Related: The Dark Side of Discounts
Accept others' coupons cautiously. If you accept other retailers' coupons, be sure that you apply your own limits to them to avoid paying for the mistakes of your competitors, Phibbs advises. Also, pay attention to expiration dates and other limitations.
Post policies clearly. Whether you're making changes to your policies or you're simply making them public for the first time, Phibbs says they should be posted near your cash register so customers are aware that extreme couponing practices are not welcome in your store.
Don't allow "coupon bullies." Some hard-core coupon users can be aggressive about getting what they want. This can be a drain on your staff, and may require your intervention. "Sometimes you may have a situation where someone is in line screaming that they want 50 of this for the price of one,"
Phibbs says. "Think about what that does to your employee. It ruins them for the rest of the day. Set your policies and back up your employees when they enforce them and you shouldn't have a problem."
Image from Shutterstock.com / Fotoline
This article was originally published in the November 2011 print edition of Entrepreneur with the headline: Death by Coupon.
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Comments:
Like most of the prior responses, I find this article aggressively biased against couponers. As both a coupon enthusiast and university business instructor, I can see the win-win from both sides. Smart store managers understand that product selling out the door is revenue coming in, no matter if through cash, credit, or coupon. And yes, coupons are reimbursed as well as added to through the handling fee, so in the long run the store is gaining additional revenue over even a cash sale. Compare that to a credit card sale in which Visa, Mastercard, etc., are actually taking a percentage of the sale, and coupons again are an even better idea.
yes yes yes trueth
Discounts and coupons lead to less loyalty to you and more to the discount that's why so many small businesses are hurting...
Thanks for adding your voice of reason Sandi
We're talking retailers in general here, not grocery stores. There is no manufacturer to get repaid.
They always offer these which is brilliant especially for young families.
Actually, the retail consultant who was interviewed for this piece does say, "You don't want to encourage these people to shop with you." I think that, along with the term "coupon bullies" used later in the article, is probably what chafes. But I'm curious about your comment about independent retailers sponsoring the discount. Why wouldn't they get the money back from the manufacturer?
You people who are blasting this author need to REREAD the first pararaph. This is geared towards independent merchants/businesses, NOT major grocery store chains. These businesses do not get the bonus of getting the money back from the manufacturer, they are sponsoring the discount themselves. Coupons hit smaller businesses harder, this is just giving examples of how to come out ahead when offering coupons...not suggesting anyone become prejudice against those who use coupons. Calm down.
It's a known fact that couponer's will bring in more money than a regular consumer because of the deals, plus the $0.08 handling fee per coupon. Next time do some research before you make assumptions and give couponer's a bad name. Thanks.
No where in this article does Mr Phibbs make it known that the retailer is repaid the amount of the manufacturer's coupon + more for processing... This man needs to do a bit of research before advising retailers to turn away valuable customers...
I think you need a reality check - for one it is not like the store are giving the merchandise away for free and getting screwed - they get the money back from the manufacture plus an 8 cent handeling fee - so they are making more money from us couponers than a person not using coupons - second the stores who do double coupons are the ones who made that decesion to get customers in the store - we are actually helping the economy and funneling money that would not normally be available - as for the BOGO - lets say and item was $3.99 - the non coupon customer would buy one so the store would get $3.99 + tax - a coupon customer would say 10 of this item that would be $3.99 x 10 = 39.90 plus the store make 0.08 x 10 = 0.80 which comes out to $40.70 - which sale would you rather have? And some stores are actually --- the consumer say we have a $5.00 coupon and we find a product on sale for $4.00 they adjust down the coupon and guess what their is no line on their for them to put what they took off - so in sense the store made a $1.00 more and we got --- so get your story straight before you try to blast something you know nothing about!
You need a good program to copy off of if you want to make real money online. check
I think it's real sad - cos some of the fools that "clear shelves" and all that make it hard on the rest of us..... Andrea http://www.couponblessingsnow.com