IncBizNet
Resource Centers
Special Sections
is your arsenal for developing and maintaining sound financial plans and business strategy.
Inside: Budgeting | Compensation | Valuation
Free Trial: Intuit QuickBooks
Simple Start Free Edition 2009 for Windows
Departments
Newsletters
Click below to preview:
Help Me...
- Build a Business Plan
- Search for Software
- View Product Gallery
- View Product Guides
- Search Classifieds
Sponsored Links
Fresh Inc. - The Inc.com Weblog
Staff Blog Menu
Regular Features
Recent Entries
22-Year-Old Tumblr Founder Raises $4.5 Million
News: Employee Alumni Networks and More
Aeron chair discounts, cheap shipping & more
A Danish scam, deflation, and letdown at Macworld
Deflation, Facebook and Scrabulous
Neeleman's New Venture Takes Flight
Joel Was Wrong, Arrington Gets Uninvited, and This Wink Will Cost You
A great $3 gift for your employees
Inc. Recommends
Archives
December 16, 2003
The End of the Price Tag
Posted by Carole Matthews at 1:29 PM
New Massachusetts state regulations taking effect tomorrow will allow stores to stop stamping prices on their products. Instead, stores can set up price check scanners for consumers to check the prices of products themselves.
A convenience or a pain in the butt? I think deciding on a purchase is often just as much about the product as it is about the price. My guess is that many of those impulse buys might just fly out the door.
Not surprisingly, big chains like Wal-Mart are jumping at this, installing the scanners in every 5,000 square feet of their stores. Retailers say the new regulations will save them money in labor costs, even though the scanners can cost as much as $1200. Will smaller retailers be jumping at the chance to install these scanners to reduce labor costs? Are the scanners really worth the inconvenience to consumers?
Try a RISK-FREE Issue of Inc. Today!
As you so rightly say ... I think the small retailers would’nt quite like it & personally am not for the idea. But from the point of view of the retailers I think it is a good move, and as in all new initiatives there will be come initial resistance but then they would all follow suite. After all they too are profit driven businesses!
The idea sounds like a good way to reduce labor costs for large retailers. However, will they get hit on the back end of the deal in labor needed to restock items left by the scanners when customers decide to fill thier cart, go to the scanner and drop what might be too much?
I have no problem with this as long a the price is marked on the shelf or display. However, if there is going to be no price marked at all, I would expect a loss of customers to competitors who are willing to mark prices.
-Pete
Thankfully, I no longer live in MA. On the other hand, if this proves to be successful for retailers, it will probably spread to other parts of the country. Hopefully, others will agree and follow pdalv's comments and if the price is not marked on the shelf, or in some other way, made obvious, customers will go elsewhere.
Personally, if I can not find the price, easilly (and a scanner located down the ilse would not be "easilly") I would not bother going back to the store. I would not care if it is a WalMart, where I might expect the price to be less, or the local, smaller, retailer. The State may give them the right to not put the prices out, but it is still their choice to do it or not.
Time will tell.
This is an amazing opportunity for retailers to compete more effectively with internet shops. They can change prices faster as most of it will be electronic. For example:
1. Putting up sale will involve just changing fewer big signs.
2. For customers who want to look at price there can be just one electronic sign for a whole stack of same product.
3. They can also increase price if they see there is demand for a product at a particular time or place.
I think this is a double edge sword. On one hand you have big businesses that have the possibility to reduce labor costs, however this has to be weighed with the large fix costs of the machine scanners. This will most likely drive customers away and reduce impulse buys as this should prove to me a major inconvenience to many, especially those who are in a hurry. I say keep on marking prices on products, but we'll have to see what happens.
I put myself in a situation where I would be required to price shop items of comparable features by carrying them to a communal scanner. I had to ask myself whether I would be willing to put everything back properly on the shelves, and answered "NO". I would just leave the unwanted stuff at the scanner location to build up for someone who is payed to restock items to do so.
The bottom line is that I find it annoying to have to hunt for a price on anything, and even more so to discover computer mis-priced and re-priced items.
A remote possibility would be an item whose priced changes on the way to the checkout counter, which might work either for or against the customer.
I like this idea; I love the price checkers.
I am in Arizona. In Arizona, regardless of what the price sticker says, the Bar Code is law, and occasionally they do not match. It is a pain in the butt to have to keep an eye on the check-out person, to ensure the price rung up matches the price on the little sticker. Believe it or not, I am buying the product at the sticker price and expect the Bar Code to conform; retailers are the backwards ones. The price scanners allow me to see what the price at the check-out stand will be, ahhhh bliss!
The next hurdle...having the price scanners and the check-out stands match by being on the same system or reading from the same table.
Lee
I am in Texas. I do not remember ever seeing prices stamped on each individual item unless the manufacturer made the tag with the price on it. The shelves usually have the prices marked. I thought it was cool when Wal-Mart installed the price checkers. If I could not find the shelf tag, I could scan it and decide before I got to the register. That way I would not hold up a long line of other customers with price checks. I do try to put the thing back where I found it if I decide I do not want it. If I were in a hurry, I would probably just leave it at the scanner, though.
I live in Arizona. My perspective on this issue is that, especially at Walmart, where I have seen this already in effect is: The prices are rarely if ever marked on the product or the shelf or otherwise. By the time I locate a price checker, I have lost all desire for what I came into the store for in the first place, and would just rather proceed home. Long live the price sticker.
I think that the price stickers just make more work for the retailer. They have to have stockers but a tag on every item. What if the item is on sale? Does the stocker need to change every price tag on each item? I think putting the price below the item on the rack is good enough for me. I also like the price checkers but I think there should be more of them. Maybe at the end of every other aisle.
Justin
It's probably not that bad provided there are signs on the shelves or some sort of notification -- in fact for many, many goods and services the prices are not marked on the package, but on the shelf, so if this continues (and expands) I don't see a huge deal.
However, if the retailers are looking to reduce costs by shifting the burden onto the consumer and keep rather specious records about prices and turn the shopping experience into 'Blues Clues the Adult Version', then I'd probably be pretty upset. In the day and age of self-check out and now self-pricing, I'd almost expect the retailer to start asking for a cover charge for the privledge of shopping with them.
Post Your Own Comments