That's a standard coupon from Macy*s

If it's NOT unethical, it certainly is not consumer friendly. My family has been loyal Hechts customers for the past 10 years. Now they are Macy's. We tried using one of these coupons last weekend on some children's clothing and were told that it wouldn't work on it. The sales rep agreed that the coupon was nearly worthless and that Hechts was never that bad with the fine print.

I wonder if someone were to successfully use one of these if confetti and ballons would drop from the ceiling.

I stand by my comment that it was not unethical. It's certainly not as consumer-friendly as it could be, but that is not the same thing. As others have pointed out, Macy's does not have a choice when it comes to discounting certain brand-name products. And as I said before, a responsible consumer reads the fine print before they go to to store and end up buying crap they don't need at full price. The sheer size of the exclusions paragraph is immediately apparent, and a good indicator that it is worth reading. The exceptions are not buried in unrelated text or lumped into one tiny line that says "does not apply to products with an 'e' in the name." That would be unethical.

The agency I work at does a lot of stuff for Macy's Star Rewards program. We have to place, replace and otherwise jam this stuff into everything we do, and we always laugh about the exclusions; it would be easier to just say what people CAN buy. My favorite? The fact that we have to change "area rugs" to "floor coverings" based on what part of the country the coupon is being sent to.

Cosmetics and fragrance companies like The Estee Lauder Companies, L'Oreal's Lancome and fragrance divisions, Coty, Groupe Clarins (who also owns Thierry Mugler Parfums), Shiseido (including Beaute Prestige International and ZIRH), etc. are really bad when it comes to not having their products on sale. Hell, their use of retail price maintenance in contracts is worse than Apple's! At least Apple allows for Best Buy to offer stuff like a free iTunes card or third-party iPod accessory with the purchase of an iPod nano... whereas Shiseido/B.P.I. won't allow Macy's to throw in much else besides product samples with a bottle of Issey Miyake. What's with that? (And this is coming from a loyal Mac user who also knows someone who works for B.P.I. as well.)

@wring: maybe its just protecting them from manufacturers when they don't really care what you buy. in this day in age of computers, if they were that hard up about it, they would have made sure nothing could slip through the cracks.

One of the problems with doing a simple coupon like this lies in their retail model: they use concessions to service things like cosmetics, furniture, and jewelry...and those concessions typically do not want to participate in store-wide discount promotions. Certain brands, like Dooney and Bourke, never go on sale and have contracts with their stores that specifically state that they cannot be included in such promotions. Thus the proliferation of mouseprint.

An ethical way to go about this would be to print the list at a size that is easily readable -- then it would just be a confusing coupon, and not a deceptive one. Of course, I realize that printing a list like that at a readable level would make the coupon take an entire page, but if Macy's honestly cannot issue a coupon like this without all these riders, maybe they shouldn't be issuing coupons like this. Maybe they should stick to discounts on individual items that they KNOW they could discount. Of course, none of those have quite the appeal of the items they already know they can't discount -- and therein lies the reason for the deception.

maybe macy's puts all that fine print in there to protect themselves from the manufacturers, but intend to give you the discount reguardless. one could only hope. i'm going in there today to give it a try.

maybe there might be other brands women could buy, but those exclusions limit mens choices for sure. maybe we can hope there are more underpaid employee's who could care less if you get the discount on one of the excluded items. or maybe try the "customer is always right". i'd like to see a post where a consumer made a scene and ended up getting the discount. either way, macy's is aware that most people will just cough up more dough by the time they are at register. after youve tried it on, and pictured wearing it to that party, got your hopes up, you'll probably cave and they know that.

The guy in the cubicle next to me at work was commenting on this yesterday. We couldn't think of anything you could actually end up buying. Pretty damned funny.

The brand exclusions don't apply if you are buying stuff on clearance...so it's really easy to get name brand stuff for ten bucks there when they have 75 percent off and either the $10 off coupon or a further percent off coupon. Is it a good place to buy regular price stuff? Not so much. But in terms of buying stuff off the clearance racks w/coupon...it's great.

More information please... lol

@Whoa: I know it's not unethical but it's just plain ridiculous. I know what i've bought from Macy's over the years and every single thing is exempt from this coupon. it's just frustrating and it's to a point that I think Macy's only puts it out there just to get some suckers into the store, walk up to the register only to realize they can't use a coupon yet still buy the stuff anyway.

thats just crazy though, to exculde so many brands like that, im not even sure what i could buy at macys lol.

Poof on the coupon- if I buy anything there I wait until it is 50-65% off and than 40% off of that. At that point, the prices are pretty reasonable... and being apparently hard to fit, buying clothes online rarely works...

I tried to use a similar coupon last time for a George Foreman Grill and I was told it was excluded. That's when I decided to never shop at Macy's anymore. This kind of poor promotion is so deceiving.

They added Coach, because about 3 years ago, I was able to use a discount coupon,(like 25%off) to buy a discounted Coach bag- the retail came down from $168 to $75! It has never happened again though, but me and the Coach bag are still happy :)

Uh, how is clearly disclosing what you can't use it for unethical? This website is about encouraging people to be responsible consumers and READ THE FINE PRINT as much as it exists to bring unscrupulous business practices to attention.

Holo@holocron: me too :(

I don't ever shop at Macy's on principle, but most people I know who do shop there have tried the Macy's coupon thingy exactly ONCE and then given up in frustration. They say it's like a scavenger hunt to find something to buy that the coupon is actually good on. Don't you honestly have to wonder if Macy's doesn't tick off more potential customers with this coupon scam than they make happy by offering ten bucks off?

i'm with you on this. I get macy's coupons in the mail all the time yet I keep falling for it. OOOHHH...25% off...oh wait, I can't use it on anything. and then throw it straight into the trash. it just seems unethical of macy's to always throw these coupons out there to get unwitting shoppers into the store only to tell them they can't use it on ANYTHING.

Either they think the general public is blind or stupid (don't answer that)

Macy's is famous for exluding the ENTIRE store. Frango's, food, and that's about all left to buy.