The CVS ExtraCare program lets customers get Extra Bucks rewards, but instead of putting those rewards on your ExtraCare card, they are printed at the bottom of CVS’ infamously long checkout receipts. A year ago, the company’s chief marketing officer told L.A. Times reporter David Lazarus that this would soon change and Extra Bucks would be placed directly on your card. But now CVS is saying just the opposite — that it deliberately wants those Bucks on the receipt because it’s a real thrill to the consumer.

“When you give rewards, you want people to feel excited,” the head of marketing for parent company CVS Caremark tells Lazarus. “You want them to know that they’ve earned the reward.” She says that giving people a paper receipt long enough to wrap a fat mummy, “makes people ‘feel the reward.’ “

She tells Lazarus that he must have misunderstood when he was told a year ago that “the receipt won’t be the currency going forward” and that “the goal is to have the reward stored in the customer’s card.”

Because those words appear to be very open to interpretation.

Why do you think CVS wants to keep the rewards on the receipts? Is it truly for the thrill of it… or are they just betting that you’re less likely to cash in a reward that’s printed on a meter-long piece of receipt paper that might get accidentally thrown out when you get home?

Lazarus is encouraging any of the 67 million ExtraCare customers who would like rewards to be placed on their cards to e-mail CVS at extra@cvs.com.

 

CVS backs off from a more customer-friendly rewards practice [LA Times]

Thanks to Random Hookup for the tip!

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