This startup has quietly made 1,000,000 email receipts actually useful

Practically every time you buy something online, you get an email receipt. That’s handy for keeping track of your spending or quickly sorting our work expenses, but the actual text is rarely useful in itself.

Receiptful is a startup that’s been quietly working away to change that. It began in November 2014 and, as of this week, has sent over 1 million receipts using its API.

The point is to add extra value to those communications for buyers and sellers. That includes things like delivering discounts, showing recommendations and adding referral incentives so you tell a friend.

Last year, Jack Dorsey went into raptures discussing the receipt’s potential:

What if we see the receipt more as a publishing medium – a product unto itself that people actually want to take home, that they want to engage with, be fully interactive with?

He was pretty widely mocked for the comments, but Receiptful seems to have taken them to heart and positively run with the idea.

The company’s founder, Adii Pienarr previously co-founded WooThemes/WooCommerce, which was acquired by WordPress parent Automattic in May.

Investors in Receiptful’s $500k angel round unsurprisingly included Automattic’s founder Matt Mullenweg, as well as Joel Gascoigne, the co-founder of Buffer, and Andrew Wilkinson of Metalab.

Pienarr obviously has major competition from players like Square, but his knowledge of the eCommerce world and his product’s integration with the major platforms in the space bode well for the startup.

Now let’s get on with killing the paper receipt for good.

➤ Receiptful

Read next: Jack Dorsey says “If you have a great idea, get it out of your head and started working on it.”