This early poster appeared in the 1890s, just a few years after Asa Candler passed out the first Coca-Cola coupons

In 1886, an Atlanta, Georgia, pharmacist served his customers a new medicinal drink that he'd developed in his home kitchen. John Pemberton cooked a mixture of water, sugar, coca leaves, cola nuts and other ingredients to make a syrup. He combined the sweet mixture with cold, carbonated water and called the drink Coca-Cola. He sold it at the pharmacy's counter for 5 cents a glass.

Coke, as it also came to be known, was an instant hit - and not just because of its refreshing recipe. Asa Candler, a local businessman who bought the Coca-Cola enterprise just two years after its debut - created a sensation all over Atlanta, and then the nation, by passing out handwritten tickets, called coupons, offering customers a free glass of Coca-Cola.

This photo, circa 1930, was titled, Nation's Business: Cutting Coupons. A decade later Americans were snipping a different sort of coupon from World War II rationing booklets

Soon cereal companies printed coupons as well. America was hooked, not just on these products, but also on coupons. Newspapers began printing coupons that knocked a few cents, or even a few dollars, off store prices. People by the millions clipped, saved and redeemed them - especially avidly during the Great Depression of the 1930s.

And not just grocers but also restaurants, car-rental chains and coffee bars are offering coupons to lure new customers in today's lean economic times. A coupon industry publication estimates that 89 percent of American households redeem coupons as a way to economize.

Nowadays you can find coupons everywhere: in newspapers, in mailings, handed to you on the street and on products themselves, right in the store

The scissor industry might have experienced a boom of its own from all this clipping, but alas for it, these days many times more coupons - including those that wipe away shipping charges on their purchases - are being offered online.  

Read more of Ted's personal reflections and stories from the road on his blog, Ted Landphair's America.