I am a waitress and sometimes I will receive a two dollar bill or a gold dollar coin as a tip. I never liked either one, and always sell them to the cash register for "regular" money. 

myjt, I am from Ohio and I was thinking about the little sales tax papers as I was reading this blog. I used to save them from my parents purchases and my girlfriend and I would use them for "cash" in our cash register when we would play store. Ahh, those old memories from the 50s! Also, does anyone remember Top Value stamps? Seems like I got more of those than the S&H stamps. It seemed to take forever to save up enough of them to make a purchase, but I did "buy" a few things at the redemption center with them when I was a new bride. 

I loved green stamps,and the 2 dollar bill is a wonderful way to tip,[dave ramsey] it promotes saving, makes people look and think twice[not on automat] and a great way to end a frugal meal also use the gold dollars for tiping.I never tip on the credit card,and write 0 with a line thru it, only because I knew a wait person who attered the tip to suite her needs[with the attuitude that most people leave them behind,toss them in the trash or just pay their bill with looking] and my finger will not be dueing this,Does this not bother anyone but me,this seem so wrong in so mony ways. what do some of you others thinkblessings

GOD BLESS YOU

Were there any Blue Chip Stamps in any other areas besides here in Calif. ?  I believe they were given at more locations than the S&H Green Stamps in the Inland Empire.

What a stroll down Memory Lane!! Thank you

In answer to your $2 bill question -- I don't remember them getting alot of use: not getting them as change at the store nor getting them from my parents when we wanted to buy something.  My guess is that the $2 bill is just too close to the $1 to stand on its own (just about as easy to pull out a couple of $1's as a $2) and it doesn't really make math in one's head any easier: "OK, $9 - that's $5 and two $2's" or "Hmm, $8 - a $5, a $2 & a $1"  Seems like $1's alone are just as easy.  I do have a $2 that I saved when I was a kid.

Green stamps were fun - ours would pile up in bags and then when somebody brought homw the little newsprint quality booklets, us kids would count & lick to get them all glued in.  It was 100 tiny 1 cent stamps per page.  We were happy when some major shoping had generated the 5 cent and 10 cent stamps because they filled up the books quicker!  We also lived places with yellow stamps - a less well know competetor.  It was great fun to "window shop" at the redemption center where you could take home something immediately if it was stocked, rather than waiting for it to be shipped to the center (kind of like picking up a catalog order at Sears).  Shortly after I moved to my first apartment I got a hand-cranked ice cream maker purchased with stamps as a present from my family.

We did savings bonds through school when we lived in California, but not when we moved to Ohio.  Does anyone remember the Ohio (and maybe other states??) tiny sales tax papers? They were about the height of a fingernail and twice the width.  Some (all?) were printed on green paper and I'm too young to remember clearly but maybe they were turned in with income tax or kept to prove sales tax deductions or something.

Walt Disney World uses a single finger ID system at the parks to ensure that just one person uses a multiday ticket.  Some folks get a little freaked by it, but it is certainly much faster than requiring everyone to sign their tickets and then pull out ID's to compare!  --Kay

Yes S & H green Stamps and another thing gone for quite sometime now is them Quarter book type holders you got from the bank to save Quarters in for your saving account or Christmas fund...

"Aspire to inspire before you expire"

Funny... yesterday my mom got her nails done, and it ended up costing more than she had planned.  Since they don't take debit cards, she was $5 short... and then she remembered she had $10 worth of $2 bills tucked in her wallet.  The $2 bill saves the day!

 And when I lived in Quincy, Hy-Vee was starting to do a finger-print scan payment.  I think it must have been a test market.  Anyway... I am not super-paranoid, but I did have my credit card # stolen once (we assume it was from an order placed over our cell phone) and someone tried to charge $10,000.  Luckily the CC company caught it as fraud!  So, I guess my comfort level stops with giving out my financial info ALONG with my fingerprint!  I'm not thinking it caught on in our area because I never saw ONE person use it.  And here at the Keokuk HyVee, it isn't even an option.  To me, I think it is just as fast/convienient to swipe my debit card.

I remember the stamps too. My mom would collect them in order to buy things that she consider 'luxuries.'  I still have the card table and chairs that she bought with them, can't find one of the quality now!

This blog brings into mind the 'Brady Bunch' episode where both the girls and boys were saving the stamps, the store was going out of business and they had a contest to see who got all of the stamps in order to buy what they were saving for.....  

As for the two dollar bills, I've seen them but rarely.  I remember when they came out, my family had gone to Mt. Vernon, Thomas Jefferson's home.  Well they gave you back two dollar bills as your change so if you were due back 10 dollars, you got 5 two dollar bills.  When teaching money to students, the text books don't show, mention two dollar bills or the one dollar coin (and these are new math programs).

Meijers uses the finger print devices as a way for the cashiers to log onto the registers.  Noticed when I went shopping Friday, that the one had trouble logging on.  He kept wiping his hand on his pants to try to get it such that the 'reader' would recognize his finger.  Took him about four attempts before it let him on. 

Grocery stores used to have stamps.   There were other colors, as well, including blue & gold----same purpose.   Each store had its color stamp to save in a little booklet, plus a tempting [thin] catelog of items which could be ordered with them.  Women used them to buy gifts or home items, such as towels, or a kitchen stool [took a few books for that].  They were measured in books & half books, so that when you looked at the wishbook, it might list the price of an item as being 2 1/2 books, or 7books, etc.  At one shower before our wedding, I rec'd some items which had been purchased with them-----among them, a small toss pillow.   They were used to build customer loyalty, & since prices were so low then [as were wages & everything else], it took quite a while to save up enough of the accepted color  for the desired catalog. 

Later, S & H green stamps became available at other types of stores, usually gas, dry cleaners, 'drugstores,' & the sort of places where you got the same small goods/services over & over.  I guess by then, they had carved out a niche for themselves in the stamp world.  There may have been a couple of big ticket items in the catalog, but it would have taken a group effort to get them------a very large group.  Also, the 'value' of the 'free' items was usually higher than the actual purchase price. 

I also remember my mother saving stamps when I was a kid----given for  dept. store cash purchases, I think, back in the days when the only credit cards available were store cards-----& by paying the bill before the 30 days was up , one had no interest, plus the stamps.   This also included free delivery from the main  Cleveland stores [May Co., Higbees, & Sterling/Lindner/Davis], even to the suburbs, but I'm thinking the one with stamps might not have had this, since it was more the budget type [Baileys].  Anyway, this came during/after WWII.  One saw those trucks in the neighborhood the way one sees UPS, etc. today.   

Two other, quite different uses of stamps were these:  During the war, there were also ration stamps, which were part of the wartime ration token system----blue & red tokens, with stamps being part of a red token.  Also, there were stamps to save up toward a War Bond----kids took 10c a week to school if they were saving for a $10 bond, or 25c, if a $25 one.  After the war, these became known as Savings Bonds.  I think the whole stamp idea in this system was to break things up into small enough parts that anyone could afford them-----perhaps a holdover from depression days, which were just 'yesterday' at that time.   

Another thing food stores did to build customer loyalty was to 'sell' dishes.  I built a lovely set of Bavarian china at 22c per item w/ each $5 of purchase.  Whatever was the 22c special of the week, I got.  Never got the extra serving pieces or additional cups, etc. that might be needed to fill out the set.  They went several times thru the cycle.  I have seen this all thru the years, but not the same quality of goods.  Our first kitchen dishes were purchased that way, & then, later, the china-----13 of 1 item, 5 of another, etc.  I still use those plates when there are a lot of us at the table, as I have more than a dozen.  They are what I would have chosen elsewhere, since they have a small blue flower, with a narrow silver, rather than gold band.  There are also small cups, saucers [remember them?], bread & butter plates [perfect for dessert], small bowls [good for other types of dessert].  You can tell that I shopped at that local IGA for a long time. 

I do also remember teaching my kids to skip, using the wide frozen food aisle  there, when it wasn't crowded.  Also used the side wall [outside of the frozen food aisle] for tennis exercise-----when 2 or 3 balls ended up on the flat roof of that low building, I had to go inside & they were glad to honor my request.  Could only do that when Himself was home to kidsit.   

"In the midst of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer."                                             

 CS                                                                       

The green stamps were awards for purchases. You got Ten stamps for every dollar you spent. They were worth a tenth of a cent each. You put them in a book and when filled you could take them to a redemption center for purchases of almost anything. They were great while they lasted.