Comments on: Stores Profit On Customers Bad Math Skills

By: savila

savila — Sun, 08 Aug 2010 22:42:09 +0000

On May 17th 2007, David brought up the old $.99 instead of a dollar pricing scheme. I know that that theory was taught in college marketing classes as late as 1978. But please, you cannot convince me that the store marketers still think that us ‘sheep’ still believe that, do you? Unless all of their customers just got off the wagon from some place like backwoods Mexico, for goodness sakes!
There is just no way that anybody at any level is believing that! Having said that, the fact that they still use that pricing acts only as an aggravation. And you cannot even choose to shop where they don’t dump alot of change in your pocket. The theory there being, once a bill is ‘broken’ the customer (more like “the mark”) is more likely to spend the change but not the bill.
It’s such a shame that retailers, marketers and all still feel like they have to squeeze and trick every last penny out of us. I can’t blame them in a sense, our fine politcal leaders make such great examples, don’t they…the lack of social morality is so low its embarrassing to realize we’ve actually regressed in that respect-we’re doomed!Maybe I’m nieve but the frustration of being “handled” that way is degrading, demonstates such arrogance that it becomes intolerable! And I’m sure to a minor degree that added to citizen revolts in Europe at the time the revolutions started lopping off heads!
Oops! I guess I digressed quite a bit there, sorry.

By: Alexa

Alexa — Wed, 23 May 2007 15:11:19 +0000

I remember a math teacher pointing out this same common mistake by asking the class to figure out (100 – 25%) + 25%. Most people assumed the answer was 100. It is 93.75.

By: Become's Pocket Change

Become's Pocket Change — Tue, 22 May 2007 23:29:08 +0000

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By: Stores Attempt To Fools Customers

Stores Attempt To Fools Customers — Tue, 22 May 2007 17:03:48 +0000

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By: ToothCutter

ToothCutter — Fri, 18 May 2007 18:40:50 +0000

I’ve heard of these kinds of activities in the furniture and home-renovation stores. Especially the self-proclaimed ‘luxury’ stores.

I’ve also seen people line up at recent CompUSA closure sales to buy duble-discounted items that still end up being more expensive than something you can pick up at Amazon or Newegg.

By: livingplanet

livingplanet — Fri, 18 May 2007 15:28:28 +0000

a possibility, but don’t people use the calculator in their cellphone? the wifey and i usually do. we’ve actually become mentally lazy and so use the cellphone calculator…

By: David

David — Fri, 18 May 2007 05:57:55 +0000

Although I agree with your general conclusion, I believe your premise is wrong. As Michael said, no store does it that way. The key point is most people will take a mental shortcut and add the two discounts before multiplying the sum against the price, rather than multiplying the price against the discounts (which always results in a higher number). It’s like pricing something at 99 cents instead of a dollar; the psychological effect is thinking you’re getting a better deal than you really are. In other words, the store has to a) give up less money on every item in a sale to b) sway those people on the margin (and who also can’t, or can’t be bothered, to do the correct math) and boost sales volume.

By: Traciatim

Traciatim — Fri, 18 May 2007 00:18:21 +0000

What he was pointing out would be applied if two stores had the same item and one had a 45% off sticker and the other had a 25% off sticker, and a big sign on the counter “EVERYTHING 25% OFF AT THE REGISTER!!!111!One!”

You may be inclined to shop at the 25+25 store because doing quick math in your head it would seem like you are getting 50% off vs 45% off when in fact you are not.

If more stores start doing this and it works, then the idea will catch on.

By: Michael

Michael — Thu, 17 May 2007 20:58:21 +0000

It may be true that one discount is better than another, but I have yet to see a store that does it that way. No store I know of offers a choice of discounts, it’s just there, and that’s the discount.

I know that I’m not getting as good a deal, but what am I going to do about it if I need the product?