The Homa Files

TakeAway: Amid growing competition for consumer purchases, marketers are turning back the clock and resorting to increased couponing.

Now, with coupon values at all time highs, marketers are facing an should-be-expected challenge –  excessive promotion hurts brand image and trains consumers to hop from deal to deal.   

Old practices die hard.

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Excerpted from NYTimes, “A Clip-And-Save Renaissance,” By Stephanie Roosenbloom, September 24, 2009 

… It may be the digital age, but when it comes to pinching pennies, most consumers are opting for a method that is well over a 100 years old: the paper coupon. Thanks to the miserable economy, coupons … have made a comeback.

The recession has even made coupon clippers out of some groups that once avoided them, including well-to-do shoppers and young shoppers …

As the economy worsened and consumer sentiment plunged, coupon redemption ticked up 10 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008, compared with the period a year ago — the first jump in coupon redemption since the early 1990s. In the first half of this year, coupon redemption climbed 23 percent. Some 1.6 billion coupons were redeemed … it is forecast that more than three billion coupons will be redeemed this year …

Coupon redemption was also spurred on by marketers who dangled more valuable deals … there was a 9 percent increase last year in the face value of coupons …

Another way coupon clippers save is by shedding brand loyalty and buying whatever is on sale …

Edit by TJS

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Full Article
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/24/business/24coupon.html?em

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This entry was posted on October 13, 2009 at 7:30 am and is filed under Mktg - Promotion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.