Ridiculous Receipt

I went to K-Mart today to buy some Airborne. I paid and the cashier handed me a 22″ long receipt – 22 inches for one item. What?!?!?!? Only about an inch and a half has anything to do with my purchase.

So besides my amazement to the length of the receipt, I did notice a portion on the receipt about making donations to St Jude Research Hospital. I think instead of wasting all this paper, K-Mart should take the savings in printing me a 3″ receipt and donate that.

I know, it sounds ridiculous, but think about it. A quick search of the cost for a roll of cash register tape said for 50 rolls of 98′ feet, it’s $20.

Cost per inch of receipt:

$20 / ( 50 (rolls) x 98′ (feet/roll) x 12 (inches/foot) ) = .00034 cents per inch.

3″ * .0034 (cents/inch) = .001 OR 1/10 of a cent per receipt

22″ * .0034 (cents/inch) = .0078 or 7/10 of a cent

Costco, the only numbers I could find, average between 2900 and 3100 transactions per day per store. Assume that average and you’re generating $18 a day in donations per store and Kmart has, as of Jan 2006, 1,416 stores. Thats about $25,500 per day just by shortening the stupid receipt. Oh yea, I also didn’t count any of the cost of the ink needed to print the receipt so for the sake of the argument, lets just put that at another $5,000 that could be saved.

K-Mart, please donate my $30,000 to St. Jude. Thanks

See the original receipt in all it’s glory below