Smart shopping and cash refund offer subversion

Philippe Odou
Université de Lille II

Souad Djelassi
Université de Lille II

Bertrand Belvaux
Université de Paris II

P. ODOU1
Assistant professor of Marketing at the Université de Lille II and affiliated researcher at Lille
School of Management Research Center: 1 Place Déliot – BP 381 59020 Lille Cedex France
tel : 00 33 3 20 90 77 02; e-mail: philippe.odou@univ-lille2.fr.

S. DJELASSI
Assistant professor of Marketing at the Université de Lille II and affiliated researcher at Lille
School of Management Research Center: 1 Place Déliot – BP 381 59020 Lille Cedex France
tel : 00 33 3 20 90 77 02; e-mail souad.djelassi@univ-lille2.fr
B. BELVAUX
Assistant professor of Marketing at the Université de Paris II and affiliated researcher at
LAGERPA; e-mail bbelvaux@yahoo.fr.

1
Corresponding author

1
 Smart shopping and cash refund offer subversion

Abstract:

The main objective of our research is to explore a particular group of smart shoppers: those

who use the refund offer actively. Semi directive interviews were conducted with 17

individuals. The analysis of the discourse of these individuals, based on an interpretative

method, shows other motivational urges than economic benefits. This activity is more

comparable to leisure, rich in experience, in social interaction but also in the assertion of

one’s self. Cash Refund Offers activity is lived by these individuals as an active and

responsible way of consumption enabling them to differentiate themselves from consumers

subjected to traditional marketing promotions. This refusal of traditional sales promotions

does not, however, bring them to question their logic of hyper-consumption.

Key Words: Cash Refund Offers, Smart Shopper, Consumer Culture Theory, Consumers’
coalition.

2
 For the last few years, the search for real bargains has become a full-fledged mode of

consumption. The development of low-cost offers, discount retailers and private offers on the

Internet testifies to the growing interest of consumers for this type of commercial

proposition. Moreover, the rise in the role of the Internet as a source of information leads the

consumer to become more an actor of his consumption choices. Consequently, it seems

interesting to study this current phenomenon, to understand the meaning the consumer gives

to this singular mode of consumption. We were interested in a particular group of bargain

hunters, those called the CRO consumers in this research, defined as consumers taking

systematically advantage of Cash Refund Offers (CRO), and finally considering these people

as a part of a more general category that Mano and Elliott (1997) defined as "smart

shoppers".

Companies propose consumers various offers consisting in the partial, or total, refund

of their purchase. These special deals aim at reducing the perceived risk and thus increasing

the chance for the product to be bought, with the hope that the consumer will continue to buy

it after the disappearance of the offer. However, there can be a gap between expected

consumers behavior and reality when those consumers are trying to divert these offers from

their initial objective. For example, opportunist customers may pounce on CRO offers at the

very start of the operation, quickly leaving a totally desolate and empty store shelve. To

counter such behavior, companies reinforce certain refund conditions (shorter times, text

giving the reasons for dissatisfaction, etc.). Despite such practices, the phenomenon is far

from being checked. Many consumers get organized using the Internet as a means of

disseminating information, by, for example, exchanging tips on Cash Refund Offers.

3
 From this observation, the global aim of this research is to better understand this

specific mode of consumption and determine its main motivation. Another dimension,

progressively discovered during the interview, is to observe how consumers collaborate,

share their resources and get organized thanks to the Internet in order to achieve their

consumption goals. In the first section, we will review the “smart shopping” literature. Then,

we will devote the second part to our qualitative study. Throughout the presentation of the

results, we will refer to the "Consumer Culture Theory” (Arnould and Thompson 2005;

Arnould 2005). Being interested in the socio-cultural, symbolic and ideological aspects of

consumption, this theory will enable us to clarify "smart shoppers’" behavior. We will

conclude by outlining the main implications of our work.

SMART SHOPPER BEHAVIOR

Mano and Elliott (1997) define "smart shopping" as "the tendency to invest

considerable time and effort in seeking and utilizing promotion-related information in order

to achieve price saving”. Nevertheless, price saving doesn’t seem to be the only explanatory

factor of the "smart shopping" tendency. Indeed, this definition disregards an important

aspect of "smart shopping": its hedonic side. Smart shopping is a behavior quite different

from utilitarian and even hedonic shopping, in a sense that these two aspects coexist

simultaneously in smart shopping.

The utilitarian aspect includes the value of the money spent compared to planned

purchases (Mano and Elliott 1997; Schindler 1989), the utility of the products bought thanks

to the saving and finally the use of price as an indicator of product quality (Schindler 1989).

Smart shopping and utilitarian shopping have in common an effective use of resources

increasing the economic utility of the purchase. However, contrary to the utility shopper, who

4
considers shopping as a chore, work to be done (Stone 1954), the smart shopper invests time

and energy in the purchase activity. He can find pleasure carrying out this task, which is

something he shares with the hedonic shopper. Nevertheless, hedonic shoppers seek above all

pleasure without taking into account price, whereas smart shoppers find their pleasure in the

very act of bargain hunting.

The hedonic aspect refers to emotions and pleasure resulting from shopping

(Hirschman and Holbrook 1982). In this case, the hedonic benefit, stemming from obtaining

a good bargain, is linked with the self-concept and the feeling of achievement (Schindler

1989). Consumers paying a low price for a product and thus realizing savings, feel proud,

competent, clever and even victorious. Shimp and Kavas (1984), Babakus et al. (1988), Price

et al. (1988), highlight that the pride in being a smart shopper is a considerable motivation to

respond to promotional offers. It has been shown that this feeling exerts an influence more

important than the price saving on the promotional coupons used (Babakus et al. 1988).

According to Mano and Elliott (1997), Schindler (1989; 1998), utilitarian and hedonic

benefits as well as purchase satisfaction, are accentuated when these consumers feel

responsible for the bargain purchase.

According to the smart shopping literature, this behavior can have three types of

consequences:

1 Effects on market knowledge:

Smart shopping is significantly related to market knowledge (products, price...) (Price

et al. 1988; Mano and Elliott 1997). Smart shoppers are well informed on products and

brands (Price et al. 1988), they know when a product is the object of a promotion, and in

5
which store (Price et al. 1988; Mano and Elliott 1997) and often note scheduled promotion

dates (Mano and Elliott 1997). They also show greater cognitive skills in the price evaluation

of a product (Schindler 1989; Mano and Elliott 1997).

2 Effects on information search and the buying process:

Smart shoppers engage in an intensive search for promotions inside or outside the

store. Inside, smart shoppers don’t hesitate to ask sales clerks for price information, try to

locate promotions and engage more than other consumers in price negotiations. Outside the

shop, smart shoppers are very fond of advertising (Price et al. 1988; Mano and Elliott 1997),

read many consumers magazines and wander around the stores (Mano and Elliott 1997).

Moreover, these consumers proceed carefully, approach the buying process rigorously,

preparing a shopping list, budgeting purchases and checking products availability and prices

(Price and al. 1988; Mano and Elliott 1997).

3 Effects on information spreading:

Considering himself to be a good market expert, the "smart shopper" can be an

important source of information (Price et al. 1988). Indeed, he can initiate discussions over

shopping, share his experiences, provide information over products, prices, stores, etc....

Previous research explained the consequences of smart shopping for many aspects of

consumer behavior. Nevertheless, there is no clear explanation as to why these people engage

in such a time-consuming activity. The focal point of this research is not to better understand

the behavior of this type of “smart shopper”, but rather to determine the meaning of such

behavior for themselves, their family and more generally, the meaning of this kind of

consumption within today’s consumer society. In order to achieve this goal, we propose to

study in-depth behaviors.

6
 METHODOLOGY AND RESULTS

17 Individual interviews were carried out. People with at least a four years’

experience of cash refund offers were selected. These people were recruited using an

advertisement posted on an Internet site specializing in cash refund offer information. The

sample is rather heterogeneous: 12 women and 5 men, from 26 to 72 year’s old, living in

France. The interviews, one and a half hours long, were carried out via a web messenger.

This specific interviewing mode gives us the opportunity to increase geographical diversity.

The objective of this research is not to identify variables likely to explain the

particular behavior of the CRO hunter, but rather to focus on the meaning which the latter

invests in such behavior. For this reason, we are initially interested in the way these

consumers talk about themselves through their various experiences, how they interpret their

own behavior (Thompson 1997). We thus locate our research within an interpretative

framework where three levels of data amalgamate: experiences described by CRO

consumers, the meaning they give to this experience and finally the interpretation of the

transcriptions by the authors.

The interpretation carried out in this research is based on three main theoretical

presuppositions. The first theoretical reference is related to Consumer Culture Theory

(Arnould and Thompson 2005). At the heart of our work is the idea that consumers seek, by

mobilizing their own resources, to adapt companies’ offers in order to fulfil their personal

agendas. This is why we will try to identify consumer resources in this treasure hunt, as

described by the CRO consumers themselves. Likewise, we will try to better understand

projects towards which all this energy is mobilized. Holt (1995) constitutes our second

7
theoretical pillar. In this article, he proposes four categories, or rather four consumption

metaphors: consumption as an experience, i.e. its capacity to generate emotions, consumption

as an integration where the consumer appropriates meanings of the consumed object,

consumption as a classification which enables the consumer to be identified as different from

other people, and finally consumption as a game which represents communication

opportunities relating to the consumed object. These four categories will be used as the basis

for the benefits analysis of this practice. Lastly, since CRO consumers divert special offers,

we will question them about the way they interpret their practice in terms of consumption. Is

it to be considered as a form of consumer agency or is it just a way to optimize their

consumption power without actually challenging it (Lipovetsky 2006)?

Three topics emerge from the interpretive work: first, the way CRO consumers organize

their treasure hunt (special attention was given to temporal and intellectual consumers

resources); second, the benefits resulting from this hunting (using Holt’s four metaphors

framework); and lastly, how these CRO consumers interpret their own behavior, trying to set

their behavior within the broader consumer society.

- Treasure hunt and resource mobilization.

To take the most of refunds, CRO consumers have to organize themselves in a rigorous

way before and after the purchase. To do so they must mobilize intellectual resources to

obtain and select information about Cash Refund Offers, buy the products and follow the

guidelines concerning any refund. Various sources of information are used to obtain

information: promotional leaflets, new products advertising, packaging modifications, etc.

However, for the last few years, the Internet appears to be the main source of information:

8
 "For 4 years I have consulted the site madstef.com... I connect myself daily to see

whether new offers are present" (Philippe).

CRO consumers want to be efficient and organize themselves to waste as little time as

possible in superstores:

"I walk through the shelves quickly, moreover the product picture allows me to

target it quickly in each shelve" (Vincent), "in the stores, I go to those shelves

most likely to offer Cash Refunds, I take a look, no need to search for hours. I

recognize the products by a slight difference in colour or a small label. In short,

observation is needed "(Sandrine).

Like Mano and Elliott (1997) and Price et al. (1988), our results reveal that CRO

consumers adopt a rigorous approach to the purchase task:

«I have a list with the products to look for in store" (Ciorane), "I make my

purchases knowing in which store the product was on sale thanks to the local

cards filled out by the members of the site" (Valerie).

Refund request proves to be the most difficult task. They comply with many rules under

penalty of being refused a refund, especially after the hardening of the conditions (a

handwritten request, more reasons for dissatisfaction to find). To confront these new rules,

CRO consumers are organized:

"I manage all on a key USB" (Martin), "I have my bank account identification

number already printed. Thus after each purchase everything is sent the same

day"(Philippe).

9
 The task is even more complicated when consumers possess several accounts in order to

increase their profits and avoid being identified by companies. Organization and vigilance in

this case become a key requirement:

"I have a book with the offers and 4 columns for the 4 accounts to know if I have

sent the mail" (Ciorane), "I note all my purchases with the various names which I

use so as not to repeat the same offer with the same name" (Martin), "at home I

have by account 150 sheets pre-photocopied with my name, address, and the

words : please refund the postal costs via my bank account details of which you

will find below, when I return the only thing I do is to insert the till receipt as

well as the bar code and that’s all. For myself, I note the bank account number

because I do 8 Cash Refund Offers at the same time "(Elisabeth).

Once the refund request has been sent, the next stage is the follow-up. To this end, the

vast majority of CRO consumers develop a computerized refund control system:

"I have an Excel table to follow my requests and my returns. I function with

several accounts and that avoids mixing up my requests "(Jano)," as I buy many

products and they are not all refunded at the same time, I have made a small

Excel table which I supplements as I am refunded"(Veronique).

Thanks to this meticulous follow-up system, CRO hunters are able to calculate the

refunds accrued since the beginning of the year, the month or the beginning of their activity:

"my files go back to February 2004... 395.31 euros to date since the beginning of

the year "(Athos)," more than 1500 euros each year "(Christophe)," this year I

have already earned 4852 euros... last year I earned 5300euros "(Martin).

10
 CRO consumers devote much time to the various tasks implied by this activity: offer

identification, product purchase and administrative follow-up. When one asks about the time

devoted to this activity, CRO hunters experience certain difficulties. Their answers remain

vague and evasive. In addition to the economic benefit, all CRO consumers insist on the

experiential benefit, the pleasure this activity affords them. They have a clear tendency to

measure correctly the benefit, but also to minimize temporal costs:

"I must admit I’ve never counted because only the result matters" (Chantal), "...

If I count the time spent on the Internet, mails, stores, it must be surely more than

2 hours per day, I’ve never counted" (Valerie).

This suggests that CRO consumers do not function according to traditional economic

time (Becker 1965) or linear time. Rather, their behavior can be explained by the experiential

time orientation (Dapkus 1985; Hirschman 1987). In addition to the temporal resources, CRO

consumers resort to the Internet which proves to be a useful tool with two main

consequences, first in terms of the time saved, and secondly by the extent to which

consumers share knowledge.

Many Internet sites are specific to Cash Refund Offers (madstef.com,

achatgratuit.com...). They help consumers to identify offers (Offer, dates, city, store...). They

also give clear information on the sometimes complex refund procedures and give advice on

how to write letters of complaint. For the most part, blogs and forums of these Internet sites

are devoted to information exchanges on Cash Refund Offers. Even if we can talk about a

virtual community emerging around such sites, when one looks at the frequency of visits, it’s

simply a question for the time being of sharing experiences:

"I take part in forums, I write product criticisms... there is also an exchange of

information, assistances concerning letter writing…" (Ciorane), "I attend the

11
 CRO consumers’ sites regularly to find Cash Refund Offers, to know what to say

in order to obtain a refund, and also to recommend to others offers I’ve found"

(Martin).

As we can see, there is a significant change in the kind of activity. Cash Refund is no

longer an individual activity. These consumers realize they have everything to gain from

working together, and the Internet enables them to do so. What we have found seems to

suggest that this kind of resources mutualisation should enrich the CCT theory as a third type

of resource, after company resources and consumers’ resources.

- CRO hunting benefits. Using Holt’s 4 metaphors on consumption, we found

benefits far beyond the economic ones.

The economic benefit appears obvious. Like Shindler (1989), our results confirm an

important aspect of the economic benefit related to the amount of money saved with Cash

Refund offers. It is also obvious, however, that the significance of these profits will depend

on the financial standing of the CRO hunters. For some of our interviewees (3 people), these

profits constitute an essential part of their income:

"... one of my principal sources... when the money goes on a card, I keep it in

case of economic difficulties, when it is a reduction voucher I use it next time to

buy food" (Sandrine), "I am very happy. Without this, I would have difficulties to

get over... I have a tight budget, so I’m very careful with money" (Athos).

A second group (5 individuals) considers profits generated as a complementary income

used to please the family

12
 "I can thank Coke and Nestle which enable me to buy my kitchen" (Christophe),

"the money thus collected and saved with the reduction vouchers, all put

together, is always used for small pleasures, a meal in a restaurant, small gifts

for the family, etc. I never include this money in the family budget. It’s for "little

pleasures" "(Michele).

The remaining nine interviewees fall between these two positions. The profits achieved

thanks to the CRO go towards food expenditure, leisure or savings:

"I put money to one side but I also use a part of these economies to carry out

purchases I didn’t consider buying (a piece of furniture, small household

appliances, clothing)" (Philippe), "it is a way of saving without using the family

budget... 1/3 to buy products and 2/3 saved... auxiliary wages for leisure and

family pleasures" (Sucrette).

As Arnould and Thompson (2005) and Arnould (2005) suggest, economic resources build

up thanks to CRO contribute to the realization of consumers’ projects. Indeed, consumers use

Cash Refund Offers to carry out their own projects concerning savings, purchasing power

improvement or to have additional income. Some of them even consider this money as a full-

fledged wage, relieving them of the need to work. Cash Refund offers could thus be

considered as operand resources, diverted from initial brand goals, facilitating the

achievement of consumers’ economic projects. In addition to these economic benefits, these

offers generate significant hedonic benefits - a point which our interviewees were keen to

stress.

13
Hedonic benefit: Two terms are frequently repeated in the consumers’ comments: play and

treasure hunt. In addition to economic benefits, our research underlines the pleasure these

consumers find in unearthing refund offers. For all of them, it’s not a chore but rather a

game, an entertainment assimilated to a real treasure hunt where one seeks the wonder

product:

"It is a game to go through the shelves and find the refunded product, it is also a

treasure hunting" (Sandrine), "it is as a treasure hunt which I enjoy a lot"

(Athos), "for me, it’s a real game to seek the various offers... I find a kind of

excitement nosing around the store" (Martin).

CRO hunters are also proud to consume free products. They don’t loose any

opportunity to express what they are able to achieve with Cash Refund Offers. For them, it’s

like a game; Martin even speaks about the "score":

"I never pay for my shampoos, my shower gel, my razors, my shaving foams, my

deodorants, I test all the convenience food I can find, pasta, rice, soups, cakes,

milk for some time and I forget some... but I don’t know, when I give my scores,

people find it’s a lot and give me lower results" (Martin).

We concur with Shindler (1989; 1998) who claims that this pride is felt all the more

keenly when the CRO hunter is active in its consumption:

"I have a particular marital status..., I’m rather glad to find by myself modest

ways to save money such as the CRO" (Athos), "I speak about it to show that I’m

able to have 1/3 of my budget refunded, to be resourceful enough to get free

products" (Cecile). Lastly, CRO hunters are delighted with the possibility to

consume, thanks to Cash Refund Offers, new products and quality brands: "That

14
 makes it possible to consume quality products in a non expensive way" (Martin),

"Some products are of excellent quality or very good to taste or both, when one

cannot usually afford them, that adds an improvement to some extent to our

social status" (Cecile).

Here too, CR Offers seem to function as operands resources for the brand, contributing

to the personal identity of the consumer thanks to the pride and the enthusiasm generated.

This pride is all the more accentuated by the feeling of responsibility and merit.

-Social benefit: As we already underlined, the vast majority of CRO consumers take

an active part in forums in order to exchange information, and divulge CRO locations in their

area. For some, the social dimension goes beyond a simple information exchange since this

practice enables them to feel useful and valuable:

"I write on the forum" I like-I do not like "to help those who don’t have

imagination or aren’t critical" (Ciorane), "On the site I note when and where I

found the product" (Athos).

Others join CRO consumer networks:

"We are a small group of people, in the city where I reside, who give each other

good tips, it’s rather friendly... we meet in stores or communicate by e-mail"

(Martin), "I know many people who do that and we telephone each other to give

information and good tips" (Elisabeth).

CRO consumers play a very important part in the word of mouth communication on

the CRO but also on new product launches, trying to convert people:

"I helped 5 people discover CRO" (Amandine).

15
 Consuming new products, they deliver their opinion over these products to CRO

consumers but also their own family:

"I write criticisms on the products" (Ciorane), "I buy it once even 2 or 3 times

while cheating a little bit but at least I will be able to give my opinion on this new

product" (Sandrine), "always up-to-date on innovations and I let several people

know, therefore it’s a topic of conversation" (Amandine).

Some CRO hunters go as far as to redistribute to the family and friends a part of the

refunded goods:

"I sometimes give something to the family" (Martin), "I talk around me and I even

help close contacts take advantage of it" (Sandrine), "I often talk around me,

especially when it concerns a rather expensive product that I find it very good. In

fact when I test a new product which I get with a CRO, I talk to my friends about it

so that they can benefit from it too"(Marie-Christine).

Given this, we deduce that the CRO consumer can become an adviser for his circle of

acquaintances. He becomes to some extent an expert of consumption thanks to his knowledge

of new products.

CRO hunting and marketing: Since the CRO consumer takes advantage of the

promotional techniques for his own sake, it seemed to us interesting to question him on

marketing practices and consumption in general. The aim was to know if some of them could

give a more political meaning to their actions, to see whether they were engaged in a kind of

resistance to consumer society. All in all, we could not find any attempt to question

marketing or consumer society. On the contrary, our interviewees legitimate practices such as

advertising, and brand management...:

16
 "It is a necessity for brands to promote their products" (Martin), "the system uses the

means necessary for its survival" (Ciorane).

CRO consumers even express a very positive attitude towards brands, praising their

quality:

"I feel myself near to brands. I like to follow their latest innovations. Moreover I

buy famous brands... I also like to receive advertising from these brands

"(Philippe)," I love brands because of their diversity, their innovation, their

longevity... I love new products, I like testing... I love advertising where one can

see several different products "(Sandrine)," the majority of brands offer quality

products; you just have to test or to taste sub-brand products which most of the

time don’t equal the real brand ones "(Michele).

Our analysis highlights the fact that CRO consumers obey “hyper-consumption” logic

(Lipovetsky 2006). They try to take advantage of the possibilities offered by a system which

enables them to increase their purchasing power. It’s a very individualistic way of thinking

which aims at improving their own pleasure, but also that of their family, even if we assume

that this is nothing more than an attempt to win other people’s esteem. CRO consumers can

be considered as active consumers by the way in which they adapt promotional techniques

and subvert them:

"We use marketing techniques designed to make us consume and we subvert them

for our own profit" (Ciorane), "it’s necessary to circumvent the system and to

benefit from Cash Refund Offers, reduction vouchers and the Net" (Christophe).

Thus, they are not against the system but can profit from it by seeking all the faults

which will enable them to increase their profit. For many of them, the hedonic element is

related to the treasury hunting but also to the cat and mouse game between sales promotion

17
specialists and CRO consumers. The former unceasingly develop new constraints to decrease

the requests for refunding, whereas the latter are organized in networks to be able to respond

in the most effective possible way. CRO consumers are very lucid with respect to the

techniques employed by brands:

"It is as if I was playing a game with these brands... I think that the refunding of

the product does not cost them a lot because many people buy and never take

advantage of the offer" (Martin), "if they manage to survive by giving us a free

product for one bought, this means that the product margin at the beginning is

HUGE" (Sandrine), "the refunding conditions are getting worse and worse... in

order to refund as little as possible... the manager makes the process complicated,

it’s obvious... it’s not a very expensive system of advertising for brands"

(Amandine)

In this game, and like all smart shoppers, (Mano and Elliott 1997; Schindler 1989;

1998), the CRO consumer feels a sense of victory over the brands and a certain pride by

circumventing the system:

"It is rather brilliant fun to have trapped big brands, it is stupid, but making these

huge companies lose money, it’s quite cool" (Sandrine).

CRO consumers feel smart when they are mastering their consumption. In their

comments, they insist on their active role, their responsibility in the consumption process. In

addition, they address their criticisms to those who are conned by marketing practices:

"People complain a lot but they don’t pay attention to what they buy. The

advertising, it’s all very well but they fill the shopping trolley by themselves,

nobody forces them... We live in a country of persons on benefits. You think I‘m

hard?... I don’t believe in resisting the consumer society, I just respect my desires,

18
 I’m not a sheep who copies what everybody else does"(Athos)," people buy

anything and everything, even if they can’t afford it, and that annoys me. When

we speak about consumer society, we refer to people who must have the latest

innovation, whatever the price. As for me, I want the latest innovation at price

zero "(Martin)," The French are like cows to be milked. Who will point out to

Carrefour2 that there is a 2 cent error in their price? Nobody - except me,

because thanks to those 2 cents of error, you will have a 3 euros voucher offered

by Carrefour "(Christophe).

CONCLUSION

CRO hunt appears demanding in terms of efforts and the sheer time it demands. To

this end, these consumers mobilize their own intellectual resources to be organized

throughout the various phases of the purchase (offer research, store frequentation, refund

request and administrative follow-up). In addition to rigour and organizational competences,

CRO consumers devote much time to this activity but they are not a good at calculating how

they spend their time. The intellectual and temporal resources of the individual are combined

with more collective ones. We noticed that they are organized in a collective way, forming a

network to collaborate and share their resources. These networks can act locally, be focused

on the family or other CRO hunters encountered in the stores, but they can also be national

ones using Internet sites specialized in CRO detection. More usually, they take the majority

of operand resources coming from brands and retailers. Advertising, packaging

modifications, special deals in stores or leaflets are just some of the many different sources of

information used by them.

2
Famous french retailer

19
 The purpose of this research was to analyze the behavior of a particular category of

"smart shoppers": the CRO hunters. We confirm results from previous research on smart

shopping but we try to supplement them by using an interpretative framework stemming

from theoretical contributions of the "Consumer Culture Theory". By diverting Cash Refund

Offers from their initial objective, these consumers take an active part in their consumption.

This practice enables them to carry out their personal projects in a way that goes beyond the

economic benefit. As this research shows, CRO hunters are not good at calculating the

amount of time they spend in this activity. If for some, this activity is a lucrative alternative

to working, for the majority, it would appear to act rather as leisure where the utilitarian

aspects combine with more hedonistic ones. The benefit analysis inspired by Holt’s work

(1995) allows us to widen the field of investigation. The four metaphors of consumption

(Holt 1995) are pertinent. The activity is lived as a true treasure hunt (experience) but also

enables the consumer to feel different from traditional shoppers, whom he considers as

passive. This consumption generates social interaction inside the family or on Internet

forums (play) and gives the consumer the impression of cleverness, the feeling that he is a

kind of consumption expert (integration not of the object but in the manner of consuming).

Moreover, another underlying question arises: the activism of the consumer. This

study shows how these consumers become active in their consumption using and developing

consumer networks in order to collaborate, exchange mutually beneficial information, and

become more efficient. Several other prospects stem from our research. First of all, it might

be interesting to analyze the role of the Internet in spreading smart shopping behavior. With

the spread of the Internet as a useful bargain-hunting tool, this kind of smart shopping

behavior may generalize across the consumer society, especially with young people trying to

20
make the most of a lowering purchasing power. Another prospect related to the last one is the

development of consumer coalitions through the Internet. This suggests that the Internet may

not be a brand panacea. This useful tool could also have some secondary effect on relations

between consumers, enabling them to efficiently subvert brands’ marketing techniques, as

Muniz and Schau notice in the specific case of the Apple Newton community (2007).

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Appendix 1

Socio-demographic Profile Time use of Cash

Refund Offers
Sandrine 31 years, Temporary worker, not married, no 7 years
children, East of France
Philippe 26 years, student, single, no children, East 8 years
Martin 47 years, nurse, married, 3 children, North 10 years
Ciorane 45 years, without employment, divorced, 1 kid, 4 years
North
Christophe 35 years, groom, married,2 children, North 5 years
Amandine 35 years, housewife, married, two children, East 10 years
Vincent 42 years, teacher, married child, 4 years
Athos 36 years, nurse, divorced, 1 child, Blaye, South- 3 years
West
Valérie 33 years, nurse's aide, unmarried, without children, 8 years
West
Bernadette 72 years, pensioner, married, 2 children not with 8 years
load, North
Michèle 57 years, pensioner, married, 3 children not with 20 years
load, Noisy le Sec
Véronique 33 years, student, single person, without children, 5 years
North
Marie- 52 years, administrative assistant , divorced, 3 12 years
Christine children not at home, North
Jano 50 years, pensioner, married, without children, 30 years
South West
Elisabeth 40 years, commercial assistant, married, 3 children, 6 years
North
Chantal 49 years, divorced, 2 children not at home, Paris 20 years
Cécile 33 years, teacher, married, 3 children, Center of 7 years
France

23