It’s like a Monty Python skit.
You buy something at CVS — batteries, say, or mouthwash or whatever.
The helpful cash register person says, “Did you find everything okay?” (Has anyone ever said, “No!”?)
You hand over cash, or put your credit card in the chip machine (which may or may not work).
Your transaction may eventually be done, but the register isn’t. Coupons for everything — combs, Reese’s pieces, suppositories — come spitting out, in a receipt longer than a human being is tall.
It won’t fit in your pocket, purse or wallet. You can’t possibly wade through all of those coupons, to find one you’d actually use. You’d hand it to the cashier to toss, but he or she is already printing out another receipt, for the next discontented customer.
I learned a while ago how to avoid this agonizing practice. I signed up for “digital receipts,” which means they’re sent to my email. For some reason the cyberspace version includes only 3 or 4 coupons, which I click on to send directly to my “card” on the CVS app.
I’m not the only one who likes the idea. CVS itself pushes digital receipts. Here’s their display, right inside the Compo Shopping Center front door:
This collage clearly did not come from corporate headquarters. It was put together — hopefully on company time — by an employee who probably got tired of putting in a new roll of register tape after every third customer.
I like the men and women who work at CVS. They probably think it’s absurd to ask if I found everything okay, and I’m sure they dislike these skyscraper-long receipts as much as we do.
So do them — and yourselves — a favor. Sign up for digital receipts.
The earth’s forests thank you.