Google Coupons

But will they quit sending me value-paks in the mail? If so, many trees will be able to breathe a sigh of relief.

From the AP here:

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – Google Inc. is enabling users to find and print coupons from merchants listed in the online search leader’s index of local businesses, adding to a slew of free features designed to attract more traffic to its Web site.

More than 20,000 coupons are expected to be available Tuesday when the service debuts on Google’s popular mapping service. The initial coupon supply is being provided by Cox Enterprises Inc.’s Valpak Direct Marketing Systems.

Valpak, which has been mailing envelops stuffed with coupons and discount offers for nearly 40 years, plans to provide Google with nightly updates to expand the supply of coupons from a list of neighborhood merchants that will include pizzerias, auto shops, dry cleaners and handymen.

Google also is inviting businesses to submit their coupons directly to the search engine index. Links to the available discounts will automatically appear when Google’s users are looking for local business information on the mapping service.

This will be a helpful service when I use the Google Map to locate a business or a service. In fact, I need a chimneysweep, and it would be cool to find one that is offering a discount.

I typically throw away the valuepak envelopes I get in my mail. The only thing I pay attention to is the Advos that show missing kids. If Google really wanted to do something cool, they would offer to put missing kids advertisements on some of their more popular pages.