Save or Toss? Taming the Paper Monster

From the archives: This article was originally posted 1.24.11.
January is often the trigger for fresh resolve to get organized. I spent most of New Year's day driving my new vacuum cleaner and diving into cluttered closets. Do I know how to celebrate or what?


My resolution? Not become a reality TV star featured on Cops, SuperNanny or Hoarders.

Clutter kills.

My biggest challenge (and I know I'm not alone) is managing the paper. No matter how much I try to digitize my life, paper continues to stream in and accumulate like snow drifts. I want to be responsible and prepared, so I find myself agonizing over what to save, file or toss - so I ignore and pile instead.

As W2s and other tax documents begin to appear in my mailbox, it's time to review my strategy for staying on top of paper clutter - just in time for tax season!

Paper management should be a routine task on a schedule appropriate to your situation. For example, most businesses have daily SOPs to deal with receivables, payables, and all other sorts of documentation. Personally, a weekly sorting of the contents of my purse and mailbox is usually sufficient to keep a handle on things.

Here are just a couple of tips for dealing with receipts (of which I now have scads from Christmas shopping).

My general rule of thumb: keep anything that you may reference on a tax return, receipts for items under warranty, anything to be reimbursed, and proof of payment.

• I tuck anything that I think may be relevant to my tax returns in a big brown envelope labeled: Tax 20XX. I have everything handy come tax time, and anything it turns out I don't need, I can discard.
• For big (or medium) ticket items under warranty, I've found the easiest thing to do is attach the receipt to the product paperwork. Sometimes there's so much paper in the box, I just throw all of it - the owners manuals/assembly instructions/warranty info - in a zip lock bag with the receipt. It all goes in a "product info" file. Since we seem to accumulate more of these at Christmas time, I've even put a whole season's worth of new product info all in one bag, with a label on the bag listing the items referenced within. 
• Receipts for reimbursement usually go in my wallet until I request reimbursement. Makes sense, right? It always feels like found money when I get it back. (I know, completely irrational.)
• Everything else just hangs around long enough to be validated against a bill or statement, then assuming there are no discrepancies, it's headed for the trash.
• Go as paperless as possible. Obviously, the contents of my purse belie this maxim, but receipts are about all the paper I handle anymore, and for a very limited time. I get most of my bills and manage most of my accounts and banking online. Once I've seen a transaction posted, then I ditch the receipts. I know I can retrieve that info if I need it in the future, and I'm not moving piles of paper around for eternity (or until the statute of limitations runs out).  

Vmeals keeps receipts for all your orders for all eternity. What restaurant is going to do that for you? When you need a receipt for your expense report, all you need to do is log in to your account, click on your order detail and print your receipt. No digging required. (Hey, you knew a Vmeals plug was coming.)

So what are some of your best tips for keeping the paper monster tamed? I'd love to hear them.

Tip Tuesday: 3 Steps to Improve Your Productivity

I fancy myself a woman who can get things done. (This may be delusion, but for the sake of this post, let's just go with it.) Sometimes I find it remarkable that I get things done because I am not naturally organized, but just like people with dyslexia can learn to read and excel academically, those of us who were born with, ahem, a free spirit, can learn to be productive and appear all orderly and disciplined-like.

Step 1- The List

The most common tactic for getting it together, keeping it together, and getting things done is the list. We looove making lists. I need constant reminders and visual cues. I don't know if this is a product of age, hormones, over-commitment or inhabiting a world of 24/7 plugged-in, connected, information overload. I'll go with the latter.

At any rate, the list is only step one. I start my day making lists, but more importantly, I keep a notebook handy at all times. Important to-do items often occur to me while I'm in the shower, walking the dog, or driving. I try to catch all those random thoughts so I can return to them later and get on with my life.

Step 2-Prioritize

If you don't give a little thought to what's most important, your list becomes a way to game your own productivity. You cross things off and feel faux accomplishment. I've even written down to-do list items I've already done, just so I can cross them off. 

Some suggest you hit your high priority items first thing, other say knock out a few easy items for the quick win. I say, tackle your priorities when you are at your best. you know when that is. The key is to schedule the time and just do it. Starting is always the hardest part. So set aside some protected, uninterrupted time for the important stuff every day.

Step 3 - Put up Some Guardrails
Guardrails are designed to keep you from running off the road, so for me these look like deadlines and accountability. Write things down, schedule blocks of time for certain important but routine activities, and tell someone about that thing you want to get done. It's amazing what a little grown up peer pressure can do for you.

So what about you? How do you stay productive?

Monday Motivation Quote of the Week

"If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much." ~Jim Rohn

The idea here isn't simply about making your own way, but taking initiative. Have you ever blamed someone else for your own lack of knowledge, skills or direction? Well, whoever that someone is, you can bet they aren't thinking about you and your needs nearly as much as you are, so don't wait. 


Be curious. Be ambitious. Be bold. 

Tip Tuesday: Fast Gets Faster

There is a comedian I love who does a bit on Taco Bell Express - like how much faster does Taco Bell need to be? I want a taco - NOOOOOW!

Vmeals makes ordering quick and easy, so how much easier can we make it? In our most recent survey, a few frequent users left comments to this effect: I wish there was a way to remember what I ordered or where I ordered from last time.

Good news! This function is available, but maybe you just weren’t quite sure where to look or how it works.One of the advantages of using Vmeals is that you have access to you order history for eternity. (I don't know if that is true, strictly speaking, but it's there for the foreseeable future.)

Simply go to My Account and you will see all your Upcoming Orders. Below that you will see your Order History. If you have too many to see in this view, click on View All Order History to find the order you're looking for. Click on the order ID number to see the details of any order.

Notice next to each order you can either mark it as a favorite, making it easy to find and repeat a great meal, and you can duplicate an order.

When you click on duplicate, you will find yourself back in the order process with all your previous selections pre-populated. You only need to update event details. (Keep in mind that changing the date and time of an order may impact the availability of that particular menu.)

You will also have the opportunity to make any other changes you wish. Don't worry, your credit card won't get charged until you have completed your order, selected and confirmed how you wish to pay.

See? It really is easy to order, eat and repeat!

Got questions or comments? Lay 'em on us!

Monday Motivation Quote of the Week

"All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence." ~Martin Luther King, Jr.


We honor the life of Dr. King today. Whether you are at work, enjoying a day off, or participating in  a day of service, we can all emulate the dignity, passion and excellence of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s work.

Restaurant Review: Vocelli's Delivers to Vmeals

I'm pushing aside my planned post for the day to bring you a real live restaurant review. We had a meeting scheduled with some business associates today, and they treated us to lunch, ordering through Vmeals, of course!

The food came from a restaurant partner that I have never tried before: Vocelli's Pizza. I like pizza, but I don't get too worked up about it because a pizza's a pizza right? (OK, I know that's not true - you pizza afficianados just settle down out there.) So I usually stick to the same old same old.

The meeting organizer chose Vocelli's and used email-a-menu. He modified the menu so that we had only individual boxed lunches from which to choose. There were panini, stromboli, or salad options. Narrowing the menu made it easy for guests to make a choice and RSVP in a timely fashion.

I am happy to say that our delivery arrived right on time. About half of us ordered paninis and the other half ordered strombolis. I had the club panini. It had the usual line up of turkey, ham, bacon, lettuce tomato, and onions - like any good Italian offering, included creamy mozzarella cheese. It was all piled on a sub roll and presumably pressed on a hot panini press. My sandwich was still warm when it got to me, and it was delicious!

The talk of the room, however, was the stromboli. They were huge! Stuffed with various meats and more of that creamy mozzarella and pizza toppings, they were large enough to feed the family for dinner. The men at the table did an admirable job of consuming them. I didn't taste any, but they met with hearty approval all around.

Dramatic recreation of today's stromboli.

All the lunches included drinks, but the paninis came with a cannoli. No matter how full I am (and trust me, I was full) there's always a little dessert space. I don' think I've ever had a cannoli before, but I think I made a spectacle of myself as I mooned and fawned over mine. Everyone else at the table quietly slid their's in my direction. The flaky pastry, the delicious filling with chocolate chips, and the gentle infusion of cinnamon was perfection - and I am still a little overcome with my over-indulgence.

Suffice it to say, I would strongly recommend Vocelli's and I'm pretty sure the outcome of our meeting was dramatically improved by the accompaniment of good food.

Vocelli's has locations in Vmeals' Charlottesville and Northern Virginia markets. Try them for your next lunch meeting.

Want People to Like You? Keep it Simple. (aka My Email Unsubscibe Saga)

It won't surprise you to learn that Vmeals uses email as a marketing channel. We know you get a lot of email, and we know that you aren’t going to read every word that comes into your inbox. We try to provide our email recipients with useful information, the occasional coupon or promotion, and maybe a little something that will make you smile. We hope seeing the name Vmeals in  your inbox will remind you that we're happy you're part of our community and maybe even serve as a cue when you need to place food orders for upcoming events.

What we don’t want is to pester, annoy, or harass you. That’s not very sociable, is it? So we abide by anti-SPAM regulations and email marketing best practices. If you don’t want to receive emails from us you simply click on the "unsubscribe" link found at the bottom of every email. It is instant and permanent (unless you choose to subscribe again). This is pretty standard practice – or at least I thought so.

Earlier this week we talked about triaging your email after returning from vacation. One tip I didn’t mention was what you can do in advance to help mitigate email overload – unsubscribe.

As I prepare to be out of the office and unable to access email for an extended period, I start by turning off notices and alerts that routinely come to my inbox every day. Next, I spend a few days unsubscribing to every marketing email or newsletter that comes into my inbox. Some I should have dropped long ago, but most I will subscribe to again when I am in daily contact with my inbox.

This exercise has been quite enlightening.

Go to the footer of any marketing email in your inbox and you should find an "unsubscribe" hyperlink. Ideally it will actually be the word “unsubscribe” that, when you click on it, takes you to a screen shot that says: Mary@bigcorp.com has been unsubscribed. End of story. What I’ve found has been quite varied.

Sometimes the unsubscribe link is obfuscated by microscopic font size, barely readable font color (light gray on white background – really?), or use of some oblique term like “Manage my Preferences”. It is unsporting to make it so hard to find.

Then if you do find the correct link, it shouldn't take more than two clicks to complete the job. A confirmation of email address or intent is fine, but presenting me with a list of check boxes that default in one  way only to make me carefully read the instructions so I know whether to check or uncheck them to  achieve the desired result is frustrating. Requiring me to tell you why I’m unsubscribing is not cool, and pretty much guarantees I will not be back. I understand the desire for data, but give me a multiple choice list and a comment box and make it optional.

I did appreciate that after jumping through the unsubscribe hoops on a couple of sites, I was rewarded with a sad sack photo of a company employee presumably sad to see me go. Funny is good.

Then there was this:

Oh, for the love of all that is good and holy, why would I have to provide an account number, PIN number and deed to my house in order to unsubscribe? I have never used my Hilton Honors account, so I certainly don’t know what the account number is, much less the super-secret PIN number. This is one of many travel rewards programs, not my bank account. Why make it so difficult to access? And 10 days to “process” my request. You have got to be kidding me.

All of this illustrates the value of simplicity (a core Vmeals value, by the way). Simplicity equals ease of use, and we believe, garners good will. We don’t want to lose either just for the sake of email marketing.