16,000 Quarters Become Advertisements

A new publicity stunt will turn the back side of 16,000 U.S. quarters into peel-off ads from coupon marketer Boodle. The $4,000 worth of quarters will be distributed through various vending machine change dispensers, pay telephone slots and on the streets in Minneapolis. The text reads, "Money acquired in unconventional ways" and points people to the Minneapolis Star Tribune's Web site. Boodle provides online coupon services to 245 newspapers with Web sites.

This is only the second time U.S. currency has been used as an advertisement. USA Networks created peel off ads for 50,000 one dollar bills to promote its Traffic miniseries in January 2004.