PennyFreeBiz.com© is a grassroots effort for retailers and merchants all over
the US to, at the very least, stop the use of pennies in their businesses.
The one cent coin (aka the Penny) made sense for more than two hundred years, but we believe, no longer. Depending on
a variety of factors (such as metal and minting costs), it can cost our US Mint upwards of .9¢ to perhaps
1.65¢ to make each penny. Heck, perhaps even double that. System wide cost
for merchants to account for each penny is absurdly expensive ... far more than the penny is worth.
Add in the new global warming issues of carbon footprint to mine, smelter and manufacture the penny
and .. AND .. the fact that roughly half of all minted pennies are in jars, drawers, piggy banks and
the like. This means the government is minting 2 pennies (~ .05 cents) to keep 1 in circulation.
Maybe you will arrive at the same point we are at here.
We believe it is time to end the arguably senseless use of this soon to be obsolete coin. Since the
government can't seem to legislate the removal of pennies from circulation, it is time that retailers
and merchants take up the challenge and start the process of weaning our economy of at least this coin.
Members, may at their discretion, take this further to remove nickels, dimes, quarters and perhaps the half
dollar coins. There are retailers out there who have no coins in their change drawer at all, their smallest
change denomination is the dollar.
Members of PennyFreeBiz.com can be merchants, retailers, hotels, restaurants, point of sale software companies
and others. Members pledge to ...
- remove, at the very minimum, pennies from their cash drawer(s)
- round all cash transaction totals (after tax) to a denomination other than penny (example: nickel)
- not give any pennies as change.
In the instance of a penny, cash transaction totals (after tax) ending with ".x1" or ".x2" will be rounded down
to ".x0" and all the rest will be rounded up to ".x5". Accepting pennies in trade as
payment is optional and up to the individual merchant member.
Rounding Examples:
|
Purchase Total (before rounding)
|
Penny Economy
|
Nickel Economy
|
| |
$38.2235
|
|
rounded to $38.22
|
rounded to $38.20
|
| |
$121.2415
|
|
rounded to $121.24
|
rounded to $121.25
|
| |
$64.3892
|
|
rounded to $64.39
|
rounded to $64.40
|
|
Come on folks.. if our friends in Australia can stop the use of their pennies, why can't we?
|
Please support those merchants and retailers that have taken this action.
Look who has joined the movement.
[Washington, D.C.]
Bowing to growing public pressure and the gradual but dramatic
adoption of the popular grass roots
PennyFreeBiz movement by so many merchants and retailers, the ubiquitous Penny
will cease to be circulated by the U.S.Mint on January 1st 2020. As in other
currency changes in the past, the Penny will probably continue to be traded for
a period until coin collectors snap up ... yada yada yada ...
