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Amazon Thinks Every Penny Counts

By Ed Oswald, BetaNews

September 13, 2005, 11:00 AM

All those loose coins sitting around your house are music to Amazon's ears. The popular e-commerce site announced on Tuesday a program that will allow users of Coinstar counting machines to cash in their extra change for Amazon.com gift certificates.

Coinstar normally charges an 8.9 percent convenience fee for use of its machines. However, by selecting the option to receive an Amazon gift certificate, users would be able to bypass the charge.

While Coinstar is not making money through convenience fees, it is making money off of each gift certificate sold, as Amazon is selling them to the company at a discount.

Both companies feel that such a deal will help expand their reach. Amazon's customer base is largely made up of those with credit cards, and Coinstar's growth has been limited by reluctance by consumers to pay the fee. With the deal, Amazon could now target cash-carrying consumers and Coinstar may be able to broaden its user base.

The program will initially be made available on 3,500 machines, with up to 5,000 machines offering the service by the end of the year, according to Coinstar. Since some machines also accept bills, a user could also load up a gift certificate by inserting bills into the machine.

Amazon is not the first company to sell gift certificates through Coinstar. Popular coffee store chain Starbucks last year successfully ran a pilot program that worked much in the same way. The Starbucks program now is offered on most Coinstar machines, along with gift cards from Hollywood Video and Pier 1 Imports.

Add a Comment (9 Comments)

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By drumcat

posted Sep 13, 2005 - 5:41 PM

Maybe 5% of the population, but half the money. Don't forget that.

Score: 0

By Kramy

posted Sep 14, 2005 - 2:25 AM

Except that it's totally false, according to the US.

http://www.cia.gov/cia/p...rankorder/2001rank.html

Score: 0

By Tenoq

posted Sep 13, 2005 - 7:18 PM

And the worth of a person should obviously be judged by his monetary value. :P

Score: 0

By mjm01010101

posted Sep 13, 2005 - 2:58 PM

Coinstar was a darling on the dotcom boom. Take 9% of people's money based on a patent that they held that they can count people's change jars quicker than anyone.

Very very strange. But I guess it worked, as they are still around.

I just take my change and use it for parking around town. I'm sure the parking people love the 300-400 nickels I add to the U.S. economy every year.

Score: 0

By Mark Gillespie

edited Sep 13, 2005 - 11:48 AM

Never heard of Coinstar, is this another US based news item, not labelled as such?

Please Mr Ed Oswald, realise your country accounts for just 5% of the worlds population, and if your news stories apply to that small percentage, say so...

Score: 0

By Cerviperus

posted Sep 13, 2005 - 3:03 PM

Coinstar "machines" are simply terminals placed in places such as grocery stores, malls, etc., in which a person can dump in a bucket of change and it will give you cash (or check, not sure) back in the amount of your change, minus their whopping 8.9% "convenience" fee. It's basically the same thing as taking your change to the bank and having them dump it in a coin sorter/counter, but you don't get charged a percentage at the bank.

As far as it being US only (or Canada) I don't have a clue. But, as far as the other comment of this article not belonging here, I'm glad they posted it. I've never used Coinstar myself due to the fee, but if I could get gift certificates to retailers (online or otherwise) without a fee, I'd be tempted to start turning my loose change into something more useful.