The trouble with coupons

If you've read anything else on this blog, you already know that I'm not normal.  I'm sure the title of this post is further proof of that.  You must be asking: what kind of person has a problem with coupons?  They save you money, after all!  And sometimes, you can even get free stuff!  You must be crazy to be bitching about coupons.  You must have had a shitty childhood; that's why you're so bitter. 

Actually, I have (what I think is) a perfectly reasonable explanation for my beef with coupons. You would think that my problem with them would be the many excluded products listed in fine print near the bottom of the coupon, those exclusions that make you walk all the way to the cashier, have her ring up your merchandise and then hear the words, "I'm sorry.  You can't use this coupon for that skirt.  Only the (fill in the blank with ugly skirts no one wants) are discounted with this coupon."  I hate that, don't you?  Of course you do.  But actually, that's not what widened the wedge between me and coupons over the years.

It was the fact that coupons are so successful at manipulating people.  Indeed, coupons can harm you with more than just a paper cut. Luckily, I don't let myself get conned by them, but other shoppers are vulnerable and fall victim to the coupon's ways.  A shopper will see a coupon for $2.00 off salsa and then will go buy salsa because she has a coupon--even if she doesn't need salsa or salsa was not on her grocery list.  Although she saves $2.00, she still ends up spending more than she would have if she hadn't seen the coupon and had just bought milk, eggs, bread, toilet paper, and cinnamon rolls--you know, the essentials that you use daily.

                        

My mom got upset with me once because she saw a coupon for me and saved it.  She called me on the phone, excited to deliver the news (my mother has been seduced by coupons for years), and she said she'd mail me the coupon.  I told her, politely, no thank you and that she could keep the coupon.  She was hurt and thought I was being ungrateful.  I told her that I wasn't planning on buying that item in the grocery store, and I didn't want to buy it just because I had a coupon for it.  It just doesn't make sense to me. To my mom's credit, it was definitely something I do eat every now and then; it's not like she was trying to give me a coupon for Spam or something.  But still, she didn't understand that even with using the coupon, I'd be spending more money than I would otherwise.  Sometimes, people hadn't even planned on going to that store, but because they have a coupon for Bath & Body Works/The Sunglass Hut/Wherever, they drive all the way there to "save" money.

I am not averse to using coupons but I only use them if I was planning on buying that item or visiting that store anyway.  Otherwise, I'm a sucker.  Sorry.