S&H Green Stamps were trading stamp

Trading stamp

Trading stamps are small paper coupons given to customers by merchants in loyalty marketing programs that predate the modern loyalty card. These stamps had no value individually, but when a customer accumulated a number of them, they could be exchanged with the trading stamp company for premiums,...

s popular in the United States from the 1930s until the late 1980s. They were distributed as part of a rewards program operated by the Sperry and Hutchinson company (S&H), founded in 1896 by Thomas Sperry

Thomas Sperry

Thomas A. Sperry was the co-founder and the "S" of S&H Green Stamps, together with Shelly Hutchinson.-Biography:...

 and Shelly Hutchinson. During the 1960s, the rewards catalog printed by the company was the largest publication in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and the company issued three times as many stamps as the U.S. Postal Service. Customers would receive stamps at the checkout counter of supermarket

Supermarket

A supermarket, a form of grocery store, is a self-service store offering a wide variety of food and household merchandise, organized into departments...

s, department store

Department store

A department store is a retail establishment which satisfies a wide range of the consumer's personal and residential durable goods product needs; and at the same time offering the consumer a choice of multiple merchandise lines, at variable price points, in all product categories...

s, and gasoline stations among other retailers, which could be redeemed for products in the catalog.

S&H Green Stamps had several competitors, including Triple S Stamps (offered by Grand Union

Grand Union (stores)

Grand Union is a supermarket chain operated by C&S Wholesale Grocers of Brattleboro, Vermont. Originally based in Elmwood Park, New Jersey , the company operated mostly in the northeastern United States but at times its reach extended into the Midwest, Southeast, and the Caribbean...

 Supermarkets), Gold Bond Stamps

Carlson Companies

Carlson is a privately held international corporation in the hotel, restaurant, and travel industries. Headquartered in Minnetonka, Minnesota, near Minneapolis, Carlson brands and services, including franchised operations, employ more than 170,000 people in more than 150 countries and territories...

, Blue Chip Stamps

Blue Chip Stamps

Blue Chip Stamps started as a trading stamps company called "Blue Chip Stamp Co." They were a competitor to S&H Green Stamps. Blue Chip stamps was a loyalty program for customers, similar to discount cards issued by pharmacies and grocery stores in the digital era...

, and Plaid Stamps (a project of A&P

The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company

The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company, better known as A&P, is a supermarket and liquor store chain in the United States. Its supermarkets, which are under six different banners, are found in Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. A&P's liquor stores, known as...

 Supermarkets).

History

Sperry & Hutchinson began offering stamps to U.S. retailers in 1896. The retail organizations that distributed the stamps (primarily supermarkets, gasoline filling stations, and shops) bought the stamps from S&H and gave them as bonuses to shoppers based on the dollar amount of a purchase. The stamps—-issued in denominations of one, ten, and fifty "points"—-were perforated with a gummed reverse, and as shoppers accumulated the stamps they moistened the reverse and mounted them in collectors books, which were provided free by S&H. The books contained 24 pages and to fill a page required 50 "points", so each book contained 1200 "points". Shoppers could then exchange filled books for premiums, including housewares and other items, from the local Green Stamps store or catalog. Each premium was assigned a value expressed by the number of filled stamp books required to obtain that item.

Green Stamps were one of the first retail loyalty programs, retailers purchased the stamps from the operating company and then gave them away at a rate determined by the merchant. Some shoppers would choose one merchant over another because they gave out more stamps per dollar spent.

Some states equated the green stamps to gambling

Gambling

Gambling is the wagering of money or something of material value on an event with an uncertain outcome with the primary intent of winning additional money and/or material goods...

 and required merchants to obtain an expensive "trading stamp" license. Few did, however, making their popularity vary substantially from state to state. The company also traded overseas. During the early 1960s, it initiated S&H Pink Stamps in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

, having been beaten to their green shield trademark during 1958 by Richard Tompkins's Green Shield Trading Stamp Company.

Green Shield Stamps

Green Shield Stamps were a sales promotion or incentive loyalty scheme using trading stamps, designed and deployed in the United Kingdom and Ireland to encourage or reward shopping, by being able to buy gifts...

The program had its greatest popularity during the mid 1960s, but a series of recessions during the 1970s decreased sales of green stamps and the stamp programs of their competitors.

Sperry and Hutchinson was sold by the founders' successors in 1981, and was purchased from a holding firm by a member of the founding Sperry family in 1999. At that time, only about 100 U.S. stores were offering Green Stamps. Eventually, the company modified its practices with the advent of the Internet and now offers "greenpoints" as rewards for online purchases.

S & H Solutions

The company operated Solutions a sales training and incentives program developed for its own sales force but run as a separate profit center offering services to other employers.

On December 7, 2006, it was announced that S&H Solutions was purchased by San Francisco based Pay By Touch

Pay By Touch

Pay By Touch was a company founded by John P Rogers. It was a privately held company which enabled consumers to pay for goods and services with a swipe of their finger on a biometric sensor...

. The purchase price was in excess of $100 million in cash and stock. Pay by Touch has since become bankrupt.

In popular culture

Stephen King attributes his first original short story idea to his mother's use of S&H Green Stamps. The unpublished "Happy Stamps" is about the counterfeiting of (the fictitious) Happy Stamps in order to purchase a house.

In the Beatles' 1964 film A Hard Day's Night

A Hard Day's Night (film)

A Hard Day's Night is a 1964 British black-and-white comedy film directed by Richard Lester and starring The Beatles—John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr—during the height of Beatlemania. It was written by Alun Owen and originally released by United Artists...

, John Lennon

John Lennon

John Winston Lennon, MBE was an English musician and singer-songwriter who rose to worldwide fame as one of the founding members of The Beatles, one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music...

 jokes to Wilfrid Brambell

Wilfrid Brambell

Henry Wilfrid Brambell was an Irish film and television actor best known for his role in the British television series Steptoe and Son. He also performed alongside The Beatles in their film A Hard Day's Night, playing Paul McCartney's fictional grandfather.- Early life :Brambell was born in Dublin...

's grandfather character, "We'll get you the best lawyer Green Stamps can buy."

In a 1987 episode of Night Court

Night Court

Night Court is an American television situation comedy that aired on NBC from January 4, 1984, to May 20, 1992. The setting was the night shift of a Manhattan court, presided over by the young, unorthodox Judge Harold T. "Harry" Stone...

titled "A Day in the Life", an elderly prostitute admits to the court that she did it for, among other things, Green Stamps. The bailiffs continue the joke, with Bull Shannon (Richard Moll

Richard Moll

Charles Richard Moll is an American actor and voice artist,best known for playing Bull Shannon, the bailiff on the NBC sitcom Night Court from 1983 to 1992...

) asking Marsha Warfield

Marsha Warfield

Marsha Warfield is an American actress and comedienne best known for her 1986–1992 role of Roz on the popular NBC sitcom Night Court. Roz, a tough, no-nonsense bailiff in Judge Stone's court, acted primarily as a straightwoman to the other bailiff character, Bull . She also starred in the sitcom...

 as Rosalind "Roz" Russell, "Can you imagine degrading yourself for Green Stamps?" Roz replies, "Sure. By now I would've had enough for that sailboat."

A Charles Addams

Charles Addams

Charles "Chas" Samuel Addams was an American cartoonist known for his particularly black humor and macabre characters...

 cartoon features a mortician offering Green Stamps.

The Wonder Years episode where they have a Christmas party. Norma says to Jack about a coffee maker, " With the green stamps."

On November 8, 1975, on Season 5, Episode 09 of Emergency!

Emergency!

Emergency! is an American television series that combines the medical drama and action-adventure genres. It was produced by Mark VII Limited and distributed by Universal Studios...

, Chester "Chet" Kelly (Timothy "Tim" Donnelly

Tim Donnelly

Timothy David Donnelly , not to be confused with California Republican politician Tim Donnelly, is an American actor and director, and is the younger brother of Jack Webb stock director Dennis Donnelly....

) and John Gage (Randolph Mantooth

Randolph Mantooth

Randolph Donald Mantooth is an American character actor of stage, film and television. Mantooth is best known for his work in the 1970s medical drama, Emergency!, as Johnny Gage, a Los Angeles County Fire Department paramedic...

) are seen licking stamps. Kelly tells Gage as they are about to leave the station, "Four, five, six, seven, eight--hey, hey, wait a minute, fellas! We got enough for that barbecue, so on your way back why don't you just bring it back?" But the Station Fifty-One personnel do not get a barbecue grill; instead, Gage gets diapers for a little baby girl he and Roy DeSoto {Kevin Tighe

Kevin Tighe

Kevin Tighe is an American character actor primarily known for his roles on television. Tighe is best known for his role as Roy DeSoto, a senior paramedic, on the NBC series Emergency! . He and Randolph Mantooth, his partner in the series, have remained close friends...

} had delivered at the start of the show. However, Gage does tell Kelly that they brought back half a book of stamps.

In "54-40 and Fight," episode 15 of the TV sitcom The Brady Bunch

The Brady Bunch

The Brady Bunch is an American sitcom created by Sherwood Schwartz and starring Robert Reed, Florence Henderson, and Ann B. Davis. The series revolved around a large blended family...

that originally aired January 9, 1970, the girls and boys fight over 94 books of trading stamps, each wanting to trade them in for different premiums

Premium (marketing)

Premiums are promotional items—toys, collectables, souvenirs and household products—that are linked to a product, and often require box tops, tokens or proofs of purchase to acquire. The consumer generally has to pay at least the shipping and handling costs to receive the premium...

. Furthermore, they must decide in short order since the trading stamp company is going out of business. After attempts to reach a compromise fail (the boys want a rowboat, the girls want a sewing machine), neither side will give in. Carol and Mike allow their children to compete to build a house of cards with the winner to decide. The girls win, but their sense of compromise eventually prevails when they buy a portable color television set. Although this episode did not specifically reference S&H Green Stamps, the episode did exemplify a common response at the time to mass closures of trading stamp redemption centers.

In March 1969, Don L. Lee published a poem on Ebony magazine that finished with the sentence "Jesus saves, Jesus saves, Jesus saves — S&H Green Stamps."

The 1965 Canadian play Les Belles-soeurs

Les Belles-soeurs

Les Belles-soeurs is a two-act play written by Michel Tremblay in 1965. It was Tremblay's first professionally produced work and remains his most popular and most translated work. The play has had a profound effect on Quebec language, culture and theatre. Les Belles-soeurs premiered at Théâtre...

is about a group of women who get together one evening to help organize the trading stamp collection (the fictitious Gold Star Stamps of Quebec) of a friend, Germaine. As time passes, Germaine realizes that the women are, in fact, jealous of her windfall, and are stealing the stamps instead of pasting them into the booklets.

In 1964, comedian Allan Sherman

Allan Sherman

Allan Sherman was an American comedy writer and television producer who became famous as a song parodist in the early 1960s. His first album, My Son, the Folk Singer , became the fastest-selling record album up to that time...

 released the album "Allan in Wonderland

Allan in Wonderland

Allan In Wonderland is an album by Allan Sherman, released by Warner Brothers Records.-Side One:# "Skin" # "Lotsa Luck"# "Green Stamps" # "Holiday For States"...

" that contained a parody of the song "Green Eyes

Green Eyes (Aquellos Ojos Verdes)

"Green Eyes" is a popular song, originally written in Spanish under the title "Aquellos Ojos Verdes" by Adolfo Utrera and Nilo Menéndez. The English translation was made by Eddie Rivera and Eddie Woods in 1929....

" called "Green Stamps".

In the 1962 hit "Speedy Gonzales"

Speedy Gonzales (song)

"Speedy Gonzales" is a 1961 David Dante song about Speedy Gonzales, "the fastest mouse in all Mexico". It was written by Buddy Kaye, Ethel Lee and David Hess...

 by Pat Boone

Pat Boone

Charles Eugene "Pat" Boone is an American singer, actor and writer who has been a successful pop singer in the United States during the 1950s and early 1960s. He covered black artists' songs and sold more copies than his black counterparts...

, the final words of the song, in the Speedy Gonzales voice, say, "Hey Rosita, come queeck, down at the cantina they're giving green stamps with tequila!"

In the 1961 first episode of Mister Ed

Mister Ed

Originally produced in late 1960, Mister Ed is an American television situation comedy produced by Filmways that first aired in syndication from January 5 to July 2, 1961, and then on CBS from October 1, 1961, to February 6, 1966....

, Ed the talking horse instructs his new owner Wilbur to get him some oats at the feed store, reminding him that "they give green stamps" to loud laughter by the laugh track

Laugh track

A laugh track is a separate soundtrack invented by Charles "Charley" Douglass, with the artificial sound of audience laughter, made to be inserted into television programming of comedy shows and sitcoms.The term "laugh track" does not apply to the genuine audience laughter on shows that shoot in...

.

In an episode of Get Smart

Get Smart

Get Smart is an American comedy television series that satirizes the secret agent genre. Created by Mel Brooks with Buck Henry, the show starred Don Adams , Barbara Feldon , and Edward Platt...

titled "The Day They Raided The Knights", air date 01/11/1969. Control is experiencing budget cuts and must temporarily lay off Agent 99, Barbara Feldon, who finds a job with the Knights Stamp Redemption Center similar in layout and operation to a Green Stamps Store.

The Genesis

Genesis (band)

Genesis are an English rock band that formed in 1967. The band currently comprises the longest-tenured members Tony Banks , Mike Rutherford and Phil Collins . Past members Peter Gabriel , Steve Hackett and Anthony Phillips , also played major roles in the band in its early years...

 song "Dancing With The Moonlit Knight"

Dancing with the Moonlit Knight

"Dancing with the Moonlit Knight" is the first track on the Genesis album Selling England by the Pound, released in 1973.The a cappella voice of Peter Gabriel opens the track. Then, the song progressively gets louder and more upbeat, becoming a powerful rock number...

 contains the line, "Knights of the Green Shield stamp and shout!"

The poem by Nikki Giovanni "Our Detroit Conference (For Don L. Lee)" references "trading green stamps for brownie points".

In the 1982 movie, Grease 2

Grease 2

Grease 2 is a 1982 American musical film and sequel to Grease, which is based upon the musical of the same name by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey. Grease 2 was produced by Allan Carr and Robert Stigwood, and directed and choreographed by Patricia Birch, who also choreographed the first film...

, Michelle Pfeiffer

Michelle Pfeiffer

Michelle Marie Pfeiffer is an American actress. She made her film debut in 1980 in The Hollywood Knights, but first garnered mainstream attention with her performance in Brian De Palma's Scarface . Pfeiffer has won numerous awards for her work...

 as Stephanie Zinone is attending cars at a gas station, a mystery motorcycle driver shows up, in background a lady is shouting for her green stamps.

Lessons in pyramid schemes

In the early 1960s, "chain" (actually pyramid) letters were common, and offering a bonanza in S&H Green Stamps was one of the schemes that would surface from time to time. The basic idea for any such scheme was simple: A victim received a letter with 5 names on it. The victim was then supposed to send the person on the top of the list, or send each person on the list, a book of S&H Green Stamps. The victim then removed the top name, wrote his or her name and address on the bottom, and sent the list to five friends, who (unbeknownst to the original victim) also became victims. The mathematics were seemingly simple--if each recipient played along, then an individual could receive 3125, or 3905, books in return. This was the first introduction of the baby boomers to the sort of pyramid scheme

Pyramid scheme

A pyramid scheme is a non-sustainable business model that involves promising participants payment or services, primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme, rather than supplying any real investment or sale of products or services to the public...

 swindle that unscrupulous people could set up if the victims did not understand the limits to growth of such schemes posed by the finite population of possible payors.

External links

• S&H greenpoints
• YOU Technology company website
• S&H Solutions
• Federal Trade Commission v. Sperry & Hutchinson Trading Stamp Co.
  Federal Trade Commission v. Sperry & Hutchinson Trading Stamp Co.
  Federal Trade Commission v. Sperry & Hutchinson Trading Stamp Co., , is a 1972 decision of the United States Supreme Court holding that the Federal Trade Commission may act against a company’s “unfair” business practices even though the practice is none of the following: an antitrust violation, an...
  
  
• Google Books Ebony magazine.