So I’m at the grocery, buying among other things some delicious Boca products. On some of the boxes there were peel-off coupons good for money off any Boca product. The coupons don’t happen to be attached to the products I want to buy, so I peel off a couple for use with the products I do want to buy. A woman sees me and accuses me of stealing the coupons! Her argument is that since I’m not using the coupons for what they were attached to I’m stealing them. My argument is that the coupons are good for any Boca products so I’ve done nothing wrong (and by the way, get the hell away from me you crazy woman).
Well, I’ve done that with Boca products also. It seems to be prevalent; I have missed out on the coupons several times because people have beaten me to the freezer case, and I purchased the vareties that should have had the coupons to begin with.
Considering that the coupons are on the outside of the box, I would imagine Boca is aware that people will do this. I would guess that it’s an intended result – they get to distribute the coupons to interested parties in the grocery store, and they don’t have to pay the store anything to help promote the product.
From a practical standpoint, it’s probably a case of mixed stock or stock that the producer wants to move quickly so I’m assuming they meant for you to buy the product the coupon is attached to and get the associated discount. HOWEVER, they would restrict the coupon to just the product line they wanted to shill quickly and therefore not make it a general discount coupon. So technically, you are well within your right to use it as if you clipped it from a flyer. IMHO.
It’s not stealing and she should mind her own business. If Boca only wanted people who bought that particular item to have the coupon, they’d put it INSIDE the box.
Totally agree. Also, if the coupon was intended to be used only on the particular product it was attached to, it wouldn’t list other products as valid for redemption.
Most likely, Boca doesn’t give a $%^& which of their products get purchased, as long as they move more product.
TIFM tho that slapping the old lady and saying “#@$% off, bitch. Mind your own business” is going to ruin your day. Especially if the old lady is your Mom. :rolleyes:
Since your taking the coupons off boxes that have them to “put on” boxes that someone else has already removed the coupon from, then it’s not really stealing. If the boxes that you were going to use them on never had a coupon affixed in the first place, then it would be stealing.
To clarify, the coupons are for $1.25 off the purchase of any two Boca products. So to use the coupon I’d have to buy at least one thing that didn’t have a coupon already.
Or it might not have ocurred to them that people would take a coupon off a box of food they didn’t intend to purchase. One of my friends used to stock products for a vendor for a living, so I heard a lot about coupons and such. It might have been a quick promotion idea, and instead of printing up new boxes saying there were coupons inside, they put them on the outside. They’re not suprised when it happens, but it’s generally not the intent. I personally wouldn’t have done it, since I’m not buying the box of food, anything attached to the box isn’t mine. Hands off. Plus my friend would smack me, because she often had to take them back when they don’t sell.
If they’d intended people to go grabbing random coupons, they’d have their vendor install one of those little dispensers with coupons for everyone. Instead, they hoped someone would buy the box of product x, like it, and then be encouraged by the coupon to try other products in their line. Get them hooked by a coupon good for any product, you see. If you’ve got their coupon in hand as they go out the door, you’ve got them very focused on getting the product, even more so than with a coupon dispenser which depends partly on impulse buying. To remove a coupon from another box is reducing the value of the product by the amount of the coupon at the very least, sometimes the whole product is a loss because of it.
Like (accidently, I’m sure) pulling off a button on a blouse in a store. Now nobody wants it, they’ll all pass it over for one that’s intact. Finally someone is either desperate enough for a blouse, doesn’t care about the button, or the store eventually has to reduce the price to induce someone to purchase it. With food, the first two are fairly likely to happen eventually, but when it’s a product not stocked by a vendor, or the vendor agrees, it often goes into the dented can bin and everybody hopes to just break even.
Doesn’t matter, I still think what you said above applies. While you can use the attached coupon for any 2 products in their line, you have to buy that product in order to get the coupon in the first place, seeing as how it’s physically attached directly to it. You can either apply it instantly to both that and another item in the line, or use it later on 2 of something completely different in their line. Either way, you are only entitled to take the coupon if you take the product to which it’s attached – otherwise, why attach it to anything at all?
So no, not “stealing,” but crappy behavior nonetheless, as it denies the person who is willing to buy that product in order to get and use the coupon the opportunity to do so. Now there’s a product sitting there that has a missing coupon and the customer who wants it loses out on the deal because Otto decided to tear it off.
