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COUPON CLIPPERS, PREPARE TO DOWNLOAD 'N SAVECONSUMER GIANTS SUCH AS Procter & Gamble Co. and General Mills Inc. spend millions printing coupons and stuffing them into Sunday newspapers. Distributing the coupons electronically over the Internet eliminates most of those costs--but it also invites risks. With some creative editing, for example, crafty consumers can turn a digital 10% discount coupon into savings of 90%. That's why most existing Web sites--such as H.O.T.! Coupons, Val-Pak Direct Marketing, and Kooponz--stick primarily to coupons for inexpensive items, such as cereals and shampoo. Cool Savings, a recently launched Web service, aims to broaden the use of cybercoupons. To improve security, Cool Savings has set up a Web site, www.coolsavings.com, in which consumers must provide basic demographic information and then install free proprietary software that allows them to print out coupons. The site, which is operated by Chicago-based Interactive Coupon Network (ICN), has attracted the likes of Toys 'R' Us, J.C. Penney, and Boston Market. ICN President Hillel Levin says he expects 20 more companies to participate within the next month. For the time being, the pickings are slim: The travel category has only one item from Alamo Rent-a-Car, and the section on food and beverages offers just Chuck E. Cheese's.
EDITED BY PAUL M. ENG
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Updated June 15, 1997 by bwwebmaster
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