The Psychology behind the Crazy Coupon Queens

            From high school until the summer before my junior year, I have spent my summers working at Harris Teeter.  In my time, I came across an interesting assortment of customers – the hostile customer that curses at you for requesting an ID, the price-haggler that argues with you over the price of an item, and the shoplifter who tries to steal HBC items from the store.  I have come to acquire a keen eye and can easily identify these types of people just as they walk into the store.  These types of customers only make up about 5% of the people with whom I interacted.  Of course, 95% of customers were pleasant and entertaining, which is why I enjoyed my job and continued working there. 

Joining the 5% of my not-so-favorite customers are the crazy coupon queens.  I hate to make a generalization that the only coupon users are women, but 9 times out of 10, that is the case.  I am not talking about the soccer mom who brings a few coupons with her on a shopping trip.  I am talking about the coupon queens who bring binders of coupons with them – a collection from newspapers, websites, mail promotions, and bulk coupons bought through Amazon and eBay.  For these women, couponing is not just about saving money – it is a strategic game.  You can tell immediately who these women are just as they walk into the door – just a simple nod to the cashier next to you communicates your acknowledgement of a coupon queen pacing around in the store.

            My point in singling out these coupon queens isn’t that couponing is bad – you can save a ton of money.  I am a couponer myself, picking out a few from the Sunday paper and using them when an item is on sale, doubling the savings.  My point is that coupon queens are grouped into the most extreme, almost psychotic group of grocery store shoppers.  These coupon queens can spend in excess of one or two hours in the store, pacing up and down the aisles, going through their encyclopedia of coupons and clearing the shelves.  They have studied the sales and know exactly what coupons to pair with what items to get the maximum savings.   As they approach the checkout line with their carts full of groceries, the cashiers glance to their left and right, hoping someone will step up and check out the stereotypical coupon queen.  I always enjoyed the challenge and would tend to always step up and welcome the coupon queen to my line, just as I would any other customer.  However, a typical transaction could take on the order of 20, maybe even 30 minutes.  Of course, these coupon queens are price sensitive, neurotically checking their discounts on the screen and questioning the accuracy of their bill.  Harris Teeter has a strict coupon policy limiting transactions to 20 per VIC card per day.  Customers also can’t use more than 2 coupons for similar items in a single transaction.  Coupon queens know ways around this, and separate their groceries into 2, 3, maybe even 4 or 5 orders, using different VIC cards that they have acquired.  You can imagine how frustrating it can be dealing with these customers.  When the store is packed at 5pm “rush hour” and you are tied up with a coupon queen, 20 minutes is a bit too much time to spare. 

I always tend to ask the coupon queens how much time they spending couponing a week – 10 hours was not out of the question.  This always intrigued me.  Couldn’t that time be spent working and earning income?  That brings me back to my point that extreme couponing isn’t just about saving money – it’s all about the game.  If it were just about saving money, the opportunity cost of spending 10 hours working a job would greatly outweigh time spent couponing.  Of course, coupon queens can easily reduce a $200 bill down to $20 with the proper planning and execution.  Perhaps coupon queens should be strategy professors – though seemingly psychotic, they are smart, know how to work the system, and can find ways around the system if an issue arises.  I am almost envious of them, as some have spent months, even years perfecting there coupon skills.  I’ve even been able to take some hints from them, but I just can’t, and won’t put myself on their level.  So, coupon queens, keep enjoying what you’re doing, but please stay out of my checkout line. - Tom Looney