Ordering Online with Credit Card or Paypal

The other day I opened a mailing from one of my credit companies, finding inside an 8 1/2" x 11" full multi-color beautifully printed and laid out catalogue describing my "ulitimate rewards". As I glanced at phrases like:

-"get what you want"

-"cash back and more"

-"If you really want it, chances are we have it"

I thought:

there must be a lot of money in this credit card processing business. And with all the rewards and overhead for these mailings and cash back, where is the money coming from? Then I remembered my merchant fees for credit card processing: last year this cost amounted to over $2200. I think that is more than what I spent on paper, pigments, and wood blocks all combined.

What to do? Using credit cards for purchasing in our time is an inevitablity, and we are will achieve online processing eventually (our goal is by the end of Feb, 2011.) But keep in mind a phone call, and (oh what a chore!) a check posted by mail, is that much less $ going to glossy catalogues that fill our recycle bins.