USA Today : Retailers, restaurants offer deals as more of us pinch pennies

Check out this article from USA Today on how coupons have grown on importance during the recesiion and will remail so as the American consumer mindset has undergone changes that will last past the recession.

Quotes from the article of particular importance to Coupon Marketing Professionals:

Three years ago, 48% of consumers bought most products on sale. Today, it's 53%, says NPD Group, a retail market researcher. Last year, nearly seven in 10 consumers shopped in a discount, big-volume or off-price store, compared with five in 10 three years ago, NPD says.

Coupon use at Whole Foods is up 325% over two years, Robb says. And same-store sales were up 2.5% last quarter from a the same quarter last year.

"Everyone looks at the money they spend very differently than they did three years ago," Denny's CEO Nelson Marchioli says. "This generation is forever changed."

"We said then — and we say now — this is not a speed bump in the economy," marketing chief [Starbucks] Terry Davenport says. "It's a fundamental shift in how consumers think about how they spend their money."

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Comments

[David Flash, Coupon Marketer]

This bodes well for the coupon business:

"We said then — and we say now — this is not a speed bump in the economy," marketing chief [Starbucks] Terry Davenport says. "It's a fundamental shift in how consumers think about how they spend their money."