SmartSource Now Has Printable Sunday Coupon Inserts

There’s a new source for printable coupons that may someday eliminate the need to buy a Sunday newspaper. SmartSource has unveiled a digital edition of its printed coupon insert, that will allow you to print – or load to your loyalty card – the same coupons that appear in the printed edition.

“SmartSource Magazine The Digital Edition” appears on Find&Save, which publishes online editions of Sunday ads and inserts. Since its 2010 launch, the site has featured weekly sales circulars for stores like Target, CVS and dozens of others that you’re accustomed to seeing in your Sunday newspaper. But its offerings have been limited to ads, not coupon inserts – until now.

“The launch of SmartSource Magazine The Digital Edition is our latest adaptation to changes in consumer activity,” said Marty Garofalo, President of SmartSource parent company News America Marketing, in a statement. “The print version is still going strong, but with more consumers looking online for both their news and savings, The Digital Edition on Find&Save provides our clients a synergistic opportunity to reach even more shoppers in geographic areas that are already in their market lists.”

Find&Save operates in partnership with newspapers across the country. You’ll be able to find the SmartSource digital edition “in many of the largest newspaper markets in the country,” News America Marketing says. You can access it via your local newspaper’s website, or by going to Find&Save directly. If you do that, though, be sure to access the newspaper-branded edition of the site. If the name of your local paper doesn’t appear in the upper right side of the page, click on “Change” in the upper left, and select your city.

The site “knows” where you’re located, based on your ISP address, which means you can only access the coupons if your city is one of the participating markets. You can’t select another city, to access their coupons. So if you don’t see SmartSource after following all of the above steps, you may be out of luck, at least until the program expands to your area.

If you are in luck, the SmartSource digital edition will appear among the many other ads and inserts on the site. When you select it, and flip through the digital pages, you’ll see most of the same coupons available in the printed edition. When you select a coupon, you’ll be given the option to print, or load to a loyalty card in some cases. The print limit, like SmartSource.com, is two, if you jump through a few hoops (print your coupon, then click on the shopping cart icon to access your coupon print history, where you’ll be given the option to print again).

“Our goal is to have the digital version replicate the print edition as closely as possible,” News America Marketing spokesperson Laura Richards told Coupons in the News. “Advertisers do have the option to opt in or not, but we’re hoping that participation is attractive to them… you’ll see that the participation builds in coming weeks.”

Digitizing Sunday coupon inserts has long been a goal of coupon publishers. RedPlum briefly tested an online “eBook” back in 2012 that also allowed you to print coupons from an online replica of its Sunday insert. SmartSource first publicly discussed its planned digital edition last year. “We think this is going to be a very important business,” News America Marketing Chairman and CEO Paul Carlucci said at the time. The goal was to launch the digital edition late last year, but it ended up “taking a little longer in development,” Carlucci said, because “we need security, that you can’t change the value of the coupon and you can only get one coupon downloaded in any method that you desire.”

So does the Sunday coupon inserts’ migration to digital mean you can cancel your newspaper subscription? Well, it’s worth noting that Find&Save is not a competitor to printed newspapers, but operates in partnership with them. So if everyone were to cancel their subscriptions, and there were no more newspapers as a result, there wouldn’t be a Find&Save either. And insert coupons aren’t going anywhere any time soon – they still represent up to 90% of all coupons redeemed each year. Plus, with a print limit of two like coupons per computer, or a load-to-card limit of just one, there’s no digital equivalent to buying multiple newspapers to get more coupons, aside from printing from more than one computer – so it’s nice to have the option to buy more papers for more coupon inserts, if necessary.

Ultimately, what it all means is that if you don’t currently get a Sunday newspaper, now you’ll have access to the same SmartSource coupons that everyone else gets. If you do get the paper, the digital edition is a nice way to get extra coupons without a whole lot of extra effort. And manufacturers – and SmartSource, too – are able to get their coupons in front of more shoppers. So in the end, it could be a win for everyone.