Trading Stamps
Trading Stamps
Posted by: Kchi (---.dsl.chcgil.ameritech.net)
Date: June 14, 2011 01:46PM

I remember in the 60's getting trading stamps at many of the businesses my family did business with. I believe National gave out S&H and I remember Plaid stamps which may have been given out by A&P. Even my local butcher had their own trading stamps books where after filling up the books, you received $2 off. Stamps seemed to be at many businessses including the local gas stations we went to.

I also seem to remember that Weilboldts on Milwaukee Ave might have had a redemption Center.

Anybody wish to share any memories or info as to when they remember the stamps disappearing?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/14/2011 01:50PM by Kchi.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: BTRIPP (---.dsl.chcgil.sbcglobal.net)
Date: June 14, 2011 02:48PM

I think the stamps went away in the mid-70's ... I remember our local drugstore (Sol's Pharmacy at Clark & Fullerton) had them right up to when I got into highschool. I well remember the S&H Green Stamp books, where the pages had grids to fill with single stamps, one big stamp or a few middling-stamps (25 a page? 25x1, 5x5, and 1x25?).

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: BTRIPP (---.dsl.chcgil.sbcglobal.net)
Date: June 14, 2011 02:53PM

I was amazed to find that S&H is still in business, with an internet program of "green points"! ... http://www.greenpoints.com

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: WayOutWardell (63.226.79.---)
Date: June 14, 2011 11:20PM

S&H had a huge rotating sign that you could see from 294 at North Avenue. And as a kid, I remember there being a Gold Bell stamps sign on the building at Irving Park & Elston, above the liquor store.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: daveg (---.lightspeed.joltil.sbcglobal.net)
Date: June 15, 2011 10:16AM

Before hundreds of (mostly bad) TV channels, video games, hyper-communication, etc. there were things like; S&H Green Stamps.


One of my mom's favorite pastimes. And I'll go out on a limb and say she wasn't the only one.

Scene: Mom and the kids gathered around the kitchen table

Equipment: damp sponge, lots of stamps, stamp books


And I do recall a big S&B sign on a building around Roosevelt Rd just east of the Tollway. One of their warehouses?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/15/2011 10:32AM by daveg.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: fleurblue (---.proxy.aol.com)
Date: June 15, 2011 01:12PM

These are some of the items my mom obtained with S&H stamps: a large roasting pan with lid (turkey sized). We priced it at a store years later at well over $100 - these days everyone wants to used it because of the size and it has been passed around our family many times;

A cute kitchen clock; a french fry cutter; an electrice frying pan; a Sunbeam hand mixer which I still use; outdoor chairs and grill; and various other items which I can't remember.

I helped paste the stamps when my mom got behind. The books got thick and warped from all the water used to moisten the stamps.

I think there was a catalog of available items. When we saw something we wanted, it was fun to fill up the books and eventually go to Wiebolts to redeem them.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: Chipast (---.dsl.chcgil.ameritech.net)
Date: June 15, 2011 04:17PM

daveg Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Before hundreds of (mostly bad) TV channels, video
> games, hyper-communication, etc. there were things
> like; S&H Green Stamps.
>
>
> One of my mom's favorite pastimes. And I'll go
> out on a limb and say she wasn't the only one.
>
> Scene: Mom and the kids gathered around the
> kitchen table
>
> Equipment: damp sponge, lots of stamps, stamp
> books
>
>
> And I do recall a big S&B sign on a building
> around Roosevelt Rd just east of the Tollway. One
> of their warehouses?


It was The Sperry & Hutchinson Company, S & H's outfit. Probably their warehouse.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: querencia (---.dsl.chcgil.sbcglobal.net)
Date: June 15, 2011 11:42PM

I fondly remember saving stamps---got my pressure cooker with them, among other things. But as far as I know Chicago never had something that New York had, which was two big illuminated signs right next to each other so they looked like one sign---One said JESUS SAVES and the one next to it said GREEN STAMPS.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: fleurblue (---.proxy.aol.com)
Date: June 16, 2011 09:43AM

Good one "q"--Come to think of it, He was pretty big on Redemption.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: tomcat630 (---.hsd1.il.comcast.net)
Date: June 17, 2011 01:12AM

The S&H office building and warehouse was at 294 and 290 interchange in Hillside. The Office building was torn down in 90s, was only built in 1968 or so. The warehouse is subdivided. The rotating signs were gone by 1980 or so.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: Mornac (---.dsl.chcgil.sbcglobal.net)
Date: July 19, 2011 03:05PM

Our family shopped at A&P where we received Plaid Stamps. Interestingly there was lesser known stamp called King Korn. I don’t know where they were distributed but their headquarters was at the north east corner of Cark and Elmdale (Peterson) - a stone’s throw from our home. They’ve since disappeared, but the building is still there and currently houses the publishing offices of “La Raza”.

Here’s a photo of the founder, Peter Volid, standing in front of the building:



Volid was an interesting figure in his own right. I’ve just been reading about him [url=http://ourlocalhistory.wordpress.com/2010/04/25/gentleman-farmers-2-peter-volid-founder-of-king-korn-stamps/]here[/url].

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: West Town (---.elgin.edu)
Date: July 20, 2011 03:02PM

The Weiboldt's on Milwaukee Ave. did have an S & H Redemption Center. Boy when the S & H catolog came out it was almost like getting the Wards or Sears wishbooks but on a much smaller scale. My parents didn't drive or have a car, so we got all our stamps from our weekly grocery shopping at the National's at Superior & Ashland behind Goldblatts. I think Standard stations gave out S & H stamps too.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: Johnny Sauganash (216.55.11.---)
Date: July 22, 2011 04:30PM

Individual shopping districts in Chicago (and elsewhere, I am sure) had stamps programs, too. For example, Lincoln Square merchants banded together for a stamps program. As a kid, I can remember the family getting orange stamps with old Abe on them at Brumlik Shoes, Abrams Department store, etc.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: olafrance01 (---.hsd1.ma.comcast.net)
Date: July 22, 2011 06:58PM

I grew up in the western 'burbs where my Mom got TV (Top Value) stamps from the grocery store. She must have been shopping at Kroger at the time.

The stamps were yellow and red and came in 1, 10, and other larger denominations (20, 50, ...???). I remember because I desperately wanted my own .22, not to borrow Dad’s. There was one I coveted in the TV stamp catalog and my parents agreed that I could have it if I pasted the stamps in the book.

Slowly I built up the required number of books. I can’t remember how many but it seemed like a lot. Finally the big day arrived and Dad drove me to the redemption center. Coming home and taking it out of the box, admiring the gleaming chrome bolt, resisting the urge to dry fire it, positioning it carefully in the gun rack I’d put up in my room a few weeks ago when I knew I had almost enough books,... That was one of the biggest moments of my young life, marred only by having to wait till the weekend to go out to a family friend's farm near Elgin and empty a few boxes of LRs punch holes in targets.

I was 12, maybe 13, at the time. How the world has changed.



Edited 5 time(s). Last edit at 07/22/2011 07:09PM by olafrance01.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: daveg (---.lightspeed.joltil.sbcglobal.net)
Date: July 22, 2011 10:06PM

olafrance01 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I grew up in the western 'burbs where my Mom got
> TV (Top Value) stamps from the grocery store. She
> must have been shopping at Kroger at the time.
>
> The stamps were yellow and red and came in 1, 10,
> and other larger denominations (20, 50, ...???). I
> remember because I desperately wanted my own .22,
> not to borrow Dad’s. There was one I coveted in
> the TV stamp catalog and my parents agreed that I
> could have it if I pasted the stamps in the book.
>
> Slowly I built up the required number of books. I
> can’t remember how many but it seemed like a
> lot. Finally the big day arrived and Dad drove me
> to the redemption center. Coming home and taking
> it out of the box, admiring the gleaming chrome
> bolt, resisting the urge to dry fire it,
> positioning it carefully in the gun rack I’d put
> up in my room a few weeks ago when I knew I had
> almost enough books,... That was one of the
> biggest moments of my young life, marred only by
> having to wait till the weekend to go out to a
> family friend's farm near Elgin and empty a few
> boxes of LRs punch holes in targets.
>
> I was 12, maybe 13, at the time. How the world has
> changed.

You'll shoot your eye out.

Couldn't resist. ;-)

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: tomcat630 (---.hsd1.il.comcast.net)
Date: July 24, 2011 09:22PM

Tading stamps were valuable to working families back in 40's. Story in my family is when my aunt was 3 or 4, she took my grandmother's S&H stamps and stuck them on the fridge for fun. Gram was crying about it when my mom came home from school.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: Kchi (---.dsl.chcgil.ameritech.net)
Date: July 25, 2011 01:15PM

I looked up S&H on the web and was suprised to find a web site indicating that Sperry & Hutchinson may still in business in some form with somethig called greenpoints annd that if you had old stamps you can convert them to these greenpoints.

http://www.greenpoints.com/info/inf_help_faq.asp#STAMPS

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: celticjunker1 (---.hsd1.il.comcast.net)
Date: July 27, 2012 02:49AM

I seem to recall that the location of the CVS store on 110th and Western was a redemption center for one of the big trading stamp companies into the early seventies.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: ThenNowFuture (---.chi.clearwire-wmx.net)
Date: July 27, 2012 10:54AM

In the early 80's I worked in the travel industry, and both S&H and TV stamps had grown in the "premium" and "incentive" businesses, so much so that each had their own departments for fulfilling travel awards. I used to visit the S&H location in Hillside, I believe, to try to convince their department to use the supplier I worked for.

In fact, the Carlson brand, which owns Raddisson and other travel related companies, started in Minneapolis with a stamp program.

Both S&H and TV were collected and pasted into books that my mother kept in a kitchen drawer. This was in the 1960's.

Re: Trading Stamps
Posted by: querencia (---.c3-0.snb-ubr1.chi-snb.il.cable.rcn.com)
Date: July 30, 2012 02:29AM

It's breaking my heart to read in these threads tonight about stores featuring ten-cent grocery items and giving trading stamps---considering where grocery prices are in 2012 and doubtless heading higher because of the drought. A sweet nostalgic past to remember. As I write this I'm also remembering Askow's Bakery selling yeast kolachlys for five cents apiece--that was in about 1957, 1958.

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