Pages

Saturday 25 May 2024

Green Shield Stamps



While wandering through an antiques centre today, I spotted a book of Green Shield Stamps. It brought back a few memories because they managed to become a significant part of our shopping lives for a while.

As I remember it, the whole thing eventually became rather tedious because of offers such as "quad stamps" at filling stations. We'd end up with reams of the things every time we filled up with petrol, then we had to stick them into little books like the one I saw. Once we'd filled enough books we'd go to the Green Shield store in Derby to exchange them for something we didn't really want.



Green Shield Stamps was a British sales promotion scheme that rewarded shoppers with stamps that could be used to buy gifts from a catalogue or from any affiliated retailer. The scheme was introduced in 1958 by Richard Tompkins, who had noticed the success of the long-established Sperry & Hutchinson Green Stamps in America.


8 comments:

dearieme said...

I like the antique "Bang up to date".

Sam Vega said...

I build up points when I shop at Tesco, and by some convoluted process they are transferred to my wife's account and help to get money off meals at Pizza Express. I've no idea how it works, and just hand over my phone to my family.

The more it changes, the more it stays the same.

A K Haart said...

dearieme - it reminds me of the times when "continental" meant chic and not available to everyone.

Sam - we build up Tesco points too, then Mrs H does something mysterious with them online and we end up with a large reduction on our annual RAC breakdown membership.

Doonhamer said...

When I was a teenager both parents of a good friend were smokers. A lot.
They smoked Kensitas cigarettes which included tokens which were collected and used to exchange for items listed in a catalogue. My friend's father first lost a leg and then died too young.

Scrobs. said...

Richard Tompkins' had two cars, one with the number '007', and another with '0077', (or similar...)

I only know this because his nephew was a great pal back in the sixties, and he lent them these cars for his wedding!

And, we still have several items in the house which we 'bought' with Green Shield stamps in the early seventies!

A K Haart said...

Doonhamer - I've never smoked so I'm an outsider in that respect, but I remember Kensitas cigarettes as one of the more upmarket brands. One or two smokers in our family died earlier than they might have done, but most weren't drastically affected by it health-wise.

Scrobs - I can't think of anything we bought with the stamps, although we still have some glasses we bought with petrol coupons.

Anonymous said...

As mentioned elsewhere, spent some of my military service in a tank transporter squadron in the UK. The Antar tractors each had two 100 Gallons tanks and it was great fun, especially in a convoy, filling up at those petrol stations offering double stamps on four gallons of more. The stamps were supposed to be handed in to the unit for welfare facilities for those living in barracks, though quite a few married personnel and their families enjoyed their new furniture.
Penseivat

A K Haart said...

Penseivat - I bet they didn't do many miles per gallon either, so that would be a new dining suite in no time.