Shopping used to be an event, a symphony of smells, feels, and sights. We’d fondle the produce, check the seams of the garment. We'd stare into the vendor’s beady eyes, trying to decide if they looked trustworthy enough to hand over our hard earned cash. The worst thing you could expect in the days of yesteryear was some old farmer giving you the stink-eye for bruising their tomatoes.
Then came the pandemic, turning us all into hermits and online shopping junkies. That year of toilet paper shortages and quests for those illusive cans of Lysol made doorstep delivery more necessity than luxury. But convenience comes with a price well beyond the cost of delivery fees.
The price we pay for convenience is the pestering, and the pestering is a high price indeed.
Every online store now demands a profile, holding your personal info hostage for a one-time measly discount. “Give us your email for 10% off your first order!” they say. I’m a sucker for a bargain, so I’ve fallen for that dirty trick more times than I’d care to admit. At first, I’m ecstatic, patting myself on the back for saving a few bucks. But then, after the dopamine rush subsides, it dawns on me what I’ve gotten myself into.
Emails and texts start rolling in on the regular, “Come back! We’ve missed you!”, “Look what we’ve chosen especially for you!”, “New Arrivals! You won’t want to miss this one!” Really? I think to myself, “I just spent $100 on your site yesterday. You have an awfully unrealistic expectation of my bank account.”
Some vendors have taken pestering to an art form. One sends me an email every other day with a blog post about the business owner's deep thoughts, van life adventures, and the philosophical implications of organic quinoa. Dude, I admire your passion, really I do but I just wanted a pair of socks.
Another, a spice company, uses every marketing email to rant about a political party they particularly despise. Spicy indeed. Look, I don’t need a side of political commentary with your delicious curry powder. I’m looking to make dinner, not start a civil war.
Somewhere along the line, companies have confused the words customer and captive audience.
But as targets, I mean customers, we’re not entirely helpless. There are tools at our disposal. You can check out as a guest, but then you miss those sweet 25% off deals. You can unsubscribe or mark emails as spam, but some brands are like a determined ex—they just keep showing up. Apple’s “Hide My Email” feature works sometimes, but some sites are too savvy for that. Like digital vampires, they lust for your data, craving the chance to keep on pestering you.
A few weeks ago, a thought struck me like a bolt of common sense. I decided to flip these pesky vendors the proverbial bird.
I created a special email address just for them…
iWillNeverReadTheseFreakingEmails@gmail.com. Voilà!
Feeling smug, I strutted down to my mailroom today, jiggled open the mailbox, and found a colorful postcard that cheerily read, “We’ve missed you!”
There's no escaping it—whether in your inbox or your mailbox, they're just going to keep coming for you. Now if you'll excuse me, I have an email to read from the sock company about the existential crisis of cotton blends. I’m now pretty well resigned to that fact that they have us exactly where they want us and the pestering, it will never end.
All for now.
Be well and make the most of this day. Thank you for reading.
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