If you've been thinking there have been more coupons in the Sunday paper lately, you are correct. This Financial Times story details how major manufacturers are stepping up their efforts to offer more coupons to consumers who are watching their wallets.

P&G has been offering two of its Brandsaver inserts each month recently instead of the normal one. And companies like Hain Celestial, maker of Celestial Seasonings tea, have also been offering more coupons. We've had like three or four Celestial Seasonings coupons in the last two months. But it seems to be paying off. Hain Celestial says it has seen an 8 percent increase in sales following its renewed interest in coupons.

Let's hope other manufacturers follow suit... 

I was totally fascinated by this ABC news story about how Target tracks and catches thieves. The company has its own CSI lab (two, actually) and has some pretty sophisticated surveillance in place. I thought it was really interesting, anyway. But as you all know, I'm kind of a dork when it comes to the inner-workings of retailers...

I thought some of you might be interested in this Q&A on boston.com with Jeff Yeager, who bills himself as "the ultimate cheapskate," runs a blog by the same name and has written a book about frugal living...

I got an interesting e-mail from ConAgra foods yesterday. The company wanted me to know that its products, including Peter Pan peanut butter, have not been affected by the recent recall related to peanut butter. I thought this was pretty proactive, but not a bad thing. The way I see it, there's nothing wrong with letting customers know your products are safe. But I do think it's unfortunate that companies have to do that nowadays...

The Wall Street Journal had an interesting story about a new breed of "info shoppers," or people who won't buy anything without first researching the purchase online. I, of course, am an info shopper. How about you? How much research do you put into something before you buy it?

Many retailers are releasing their sales figures for December this week, and as predicted, many of them are just dismal. Even Wal-Mart, which was clearly a "winner" this holiday season, only saw a 1.7 percent increase in same-store sales (sales at stores open more than a year) and missed analysts' estimates.

What does that mean for you? Well, it probably means more deals. Wal-Mart said yesterday that it would continue the price-cutting initiative it began before Christmas, this time slashing prices on a number of health-related items. For instance, Wal-Mart dropped the price on an Weslo Cadence G40 treadmill from $297 to $277 and Kellogg's Special K waffles from $2.45 to $2.

But I'm still not sure how much those new price cuts will motivate people to buy...

After Wal-Mart introduced its $4 prescriptions in 2006, it was not surprising that other retailers followed suit. But now some are upping the ante even more and offering FREE prescriptions for certain medications. According to this story, New York-based Wegman's will begin offering free generic oral antibiotics. That's similar to a program being offered by the Giant food store chain.

The reason, of course, is the same reason you'd discount anything: to get folks into your store. But still, using drugs as a loss-leader seems like something really odd to see at a grocery store. What do you think? 

I thought this was a really fascinating story from Forbes about how some clothing manufacturers are asking department stores to absorb a bigger chunk of the discounts they offer. This, of course, follows the record slashing of prices we saw this holiday shopping season, when many stores cut prices by 50, 60 and 70 percent before the holiday to move merchandise. I guess in the end, someone has to pay, even if it's not the consumer...

I thought some of you might be interested in this post about saving money on produce and organic items, since that's a topic that seems to come up an awful lot nowadays... The author of the post is named Beeb, who lives in Oregon and also writes her own blog called Super Coupon Girl.

I know... you all are shocked that I would read the blog of someone who calls herself Super Coupon Girl.

I was really intrigued by the story of a San Antonio restaurant called the Water Street Oyster Bar, which has started a promotion in which it gives random customers "bailouts" and picks up the check for their table. The restaurant gives away one bailout at lunch and a one at dinner each day, and it's turned into quite a great marketing idea. Word of mouth is spreading and the restaurant is seeing more traffic. The owner says it costs abot $1,500 a week but is way more effective than some other forms of marketing.

I'll bet those bailouts are a lot less controversial than the ones in the news lately...