<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by VibeGuy:
American Express frequently targets some market segments for better discount rates; we see this especially in grocery and hardware - I suspect there may be some logic there, as people who use their cards at grocery and hardware stores may tend to carry a balance and generate finance charges, which is where the real money is made.</font>
That, or getting into grocery/drug/hardware stores may be one of AMEX's last barriers into total acceptance everywhere. I think they're working very hard at trying to get to the point where you don't need to carry a VISA or MC as a backup in case someone doesn't take AMEX.