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- JoAnn, The Container Store, and Boscov's are accepting Bed Bath & Beyond coupons.
- Kitchen supply store Sur La Table and Gardner-White Furniture are the latest retailers to say they'll honor the discounts.
- April 26 was the last day to use coupons at Bed Bath & Beyond stores following the company's bankruptcy filing.
The era of 20% off coupons at Bed Bath & Beyond may be over, but some of the bankrupt houseware giant's competitors will still accept them.
Kitchen and dining specialty retailer Sur La Table is the latest national brand to announce it will honor the big blue discount at its locations during the month of May. Michigan furniture and mattress seller Gardner-White also said it would accept BB&B coupons through June.
"We decided to offer our new and existing customers a small token of our appreciation by providing them the opportunity to purchase a product at our stores at a great value by using coupons they otherwise wouldn't have been able to use," Sur La Table CEO Jordan Voloshin said in a statement.
The companies follow the trend started by the Container Store, which said on April 26 that it will accept "a competitor's blue coupon" at any of its 97 US stores now through May 31. The coupon will be good for 20% off a single item, the company said.
"We're here for you. Welcome to the organization," The Container Store posted on Twitter.
Discount furniture and home decor retailer Big Lots said the following day it would also accept Bed Bath & Beyond's expired coupons through May 7. It offered customers 20% off purchases of $50 or more.
Pennsylvania-based Boscov's, which operates 50 department stores mostly on the East Coast, said that it, too, would accept Bed Bath & Beyond coupons. According to the company's website, customers can bring in mailed coupons and get $10 off in-store purchases of $50 or more. The offer runs through May 31.
They were soon followed by JoAnn Fabric & Craft, which tweeted "Got a Bed, Bath and Beyond blue coupon? Bring it in store and we'll help you save 20% off a single item." The company later clarified that the offer is for unexpired coupons only.
—JOANN Fabric & Craft (@JoAnn_Stores) April 29, 2023
Bed Bath & Beyond filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on April 23 after months of uncertainty over its survival. The company warned in January that a bankruptcy filing was on the horizon, writing in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that there was "substantial doubt" about its "ability to continue going."
Since then, the home goods retailer has grappled with declining sales and multiple failed turnaround plans, leading to waves of job cuts and store closures.
Bed Bath & Beyond's ubiquitous and oversized coupons — known as Big Blue — may have played a role in the company's slow demise. At one point in time, the company sent out hundreds of millions of 20%-off mailers every year, which fostered an "overreliance on the coupon" among its customers, Bed Bath's chief merchandising officer said in 2020. The brand started scaling back the coupons that same year after an internal study found them to be "ineffective."
Notably, the competitors now accepting Bed Bath & Beyond's discount are doing so with far more terms and conditions than the company itself did, with most restricting their use to unexpired coupons on a single item purchased in-store within the next few weeks.
Bed Bath & Beyond said it would stop accepting coupons by April 26, and is conducting liquidation sales at the remaining 360 Bed Bath & Beyond and 120 Buybuy Baby locations. The company plans to vacate its stores by the end of June, per filings with bankruptcy court.