Coupons Gone Wild and their Unintended Consequences!

So a not-so-new thing that's becoming more and more popular in the retail world is coupons. Lord & Taylor really started the trend a few years ago. I remember it because I thought it was peculiar that a high-end store like that would use the things. (I also remember feeling I was getting away with something pretty good when I used one to buy a new raincoat.)

But they must work pretty well because this year, I'm noticing more and more retailers using coupons more and more. A quick leafing through of the daily paper netted the following coupons:

> $10 off on $50 (Gaylan's sporting goods)
> 15% off (Border's)
> 10% off (American Mattress)
> 25% off (Cassim Rug Imports)
> 25% off any one item (Sportmart)
> 25% off any one item (Sports Authority)

And coupons arrive almost daily in the mail for cleaning services, closet organizers, oil changes, pizzas, etc. I haven't bought a pizza without a coupon in years!

So once you realize something it's hard to forget it. And there's this one store - Best Buy - that sends me discount coupons on a fairly regular basis. Except here's the thing: I'm finding that if I don't have the coupon with me, I don't buy anything. I mean why pay more?

Same thing with the pizza guy. If I don't have a coupon for one place, I buy from a different place. It's crazy, but this coupon frenzy is actually changing my buying patterns in the exact opposite way that the retailers are hoping for. Instead of buying more, I'm buying less.

The coaching spin on this is this: What might you be doing that results in others reacting in ways exactly opposite from how you want them to?

> If you're a manager and you want people to give you honest, accurate feedback, what might you be doing to discourage them from that?
> If you want your customers to treat you better, how might you actually be encouraging them to turn their requests into crises?
> if your boss is not sharing enough important information with you, how might you be misusing (or not using at all) important information s/he DOES give you?

It's worth thinking about. So my advice is to grab a few coupons, go get a pizza, maybe buy a nice new music CD and look at your Unintended Consequences.

-----Category: _fun