Once upon a time, your mom made the decision about which grocery store to shop at based on a simple factor: what brand of trading stamps did they offer?
Mom was a Top Value fan, hence my using them for the illustration rather than the much more popular S&H Green Stamp. The IGA in my hometown gave away Top Value, hence the reason mom never, ever shopped at the Safeway right across the street.
I grew up licking those stamps and pasting them in books. I loved it. That was big stuff to a six-year-old. And our modest house would periodically be enhanced by the purchase of a lamp, toaster, or the like gained in exchange for those books full of pasted legal tender. We had a Top Value store in town, no waiting for a package in the mail!
The whole idea behind trading stamps was simple and effective: stores would purchase the stamps in quantity. They had a cash value that the trading stamp company would recognize. You could even trade in your books for cash, but you would make out better getting merchandise. Other businesses, such as bowling alleys and service stations, also got in on it.
The store's or business's payoff? Customers like my mom, who would never dream of patronizing any grocery store but Farrier's IGA.
Every town with a population of, say, 7500 or more had a redemption center for at least one brand of stamps. In fact, my memories of the trading stamp program coincide with the peak of the industry. In the mid 1960's, S&H alone was printing three times as many stamps as the US Postal Service! An estimated 80% of US households were saving at least one brand of stamp.
The Recession of the 70's is what ended trading stamps. Redemption centers started closing as the economy floundered. By 1981, there was just a fraction of the original S&H stores left. S&H sold out to another company at that time, and they still survive as a get-paid-while-you-surf-and-shop outfit at http://www.greenpoints.com/. In fact, if you have any old books of stamps laying around, you can give them a holler at 1-800-435-5674 and get $1.20 for each of them!
Comments (7)
Great post. I remember my Mom kept the book up in the cabinet next to the stove. They were S&H stamps.
Posted by Rhea | January 17, 2007 10:20 AM
Posted on January 17, 2007 10:20
We had a Top Value redemption store not too far away, so mom collected those things like crazy. We had books and stamps in drawers all over the kitchen!
Posted by Rhonda | April 12, 2007 7:18 PM
Posted on April 12, 2007 19:18
I recall we didn't live too far away from our IGA store(a hop, skip and jump's distance)in our little town and I recall my mom had sheets and strips of the S&H green stamps which she collected. I don't know if she ever used them, but I think she must have used a few. I also recall how I would go into IGA and use my money(which was either given to me by my mom, or I got from bottles and cans I would find, or from my newspaper delivery job after school)to buy packs of Star Wars cards, or Charlie's Angels cards, or Incredible Hulk(tv show) cards, or Elvis cards, etc. I still recall how the store looked on the inside and can clearly see the candy/trading card stand right across from the check out counter. *sigh*. those were the good old days of my youth. I miss them. but I have fond memories of them, and I hope I always will. I wish I had a time machine. but for now, I have my memories and I can always "travel" back to that time this way.
Posted by Rob | April 27, 2007 2:39 AM
Posted on April 27, 2007 02:39
I remember the cashier had a cool aparatus that would spit out the exact amount of stamps. They entered an amount,
and out it would spit.
It looked like a giant
reel of film covered with plastic....don't forget that the cashiers loathed passing
out the stamps. Thats prob why the lines crawled, but who cares,
housewives had time to burn and read the scandal sheets while waiting.
Posted by scott | July 20, 2007 6:45 AM
Posted on July 20, 2007 06:45
My husband and I do non profit work and maintain a warehouse of donated items. Through sales,we doante all of the money raised to an organization that does home repair for owner occupied homes in need of some repair, a new roof, handicap entrance or maybe a paint job. I just had items donated after an estate sale and has several books of green stamps and S&H stamps.
Posted by Judy Smith | March 19, 2008 6:09 PM
Posted on March 19, 2008 18:09
The Green and Yellow stamps definately were in our kitchen drawers! I remember the books too! I don't remember what our parents bought with them if any? I do remember these stamps all over the place. You can find some of these books of stamps in antique stores occassionally? Do any of you boomers also remember the stamps that you could purchase at school to fill up a book. These weren't S&H stamps, but a blue and a red stamp of with different values on it. When you filled these books up with stamps, they could be turned in for a brand new savings bond? I got several savins bonds from those days in the 60s. Do you all remember the stamps that would come with some cigarette packs? Wasn't their also a red S&H stamps too?
Posted by Rivers End | May 29, 2009 8:48 PM
Posted on May 29, 2009 20:48
my mother had S&H and PLAID STAMPS. i remember when she used to send me with her full books to those centers and we got beautiful gifts. they need to bring those back withj the economy the way it is now.
Posted by vera | January 30, 2010 5:12 PM
Posted on January 30, 2010 17:12