You’re familiar with the pitch: “Take 50% Off everything in the store! . Come in for the Savings! Prices Slashed! Seniors take an Extra 15% Off! Sale ends Wednesday!”
And if you are like most of us, you’ve saved plenty of money over the years buying lots of items on “sale.” So, the logical question we need to put to ourselves as consumers: “Where is it?” All the money we saved.
Can you point to a bank account, a mutual fund, a piece of property, perhaps a stock portfolio, where all of this retailer munificence resides? You aren’t having any trouble putting your hands on it, are you? As we ponder our replies consider this: Is there ever a day when mattresses aren’t on sale?’
The opportunities consumers have to amass wealth taking advantage of all the sales’ are truly infinite, including: Columbus Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Memorial Day, ML King Day, New Year’s Day, Thanksgiving Day, Veteran’s Day, and don’t forget George’s Birthday. Each of these work free, hallowed days is cause for observation, and no one observes them with quite the vigor of the retailer.
Don’t let me neglect the consumer hoarding at all the celebration sale’ days like Easter, Father’s Day, Halloween, Mother’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, and Valentine’s Day. Retailers are among the biggest celebrants of these events. Why if it wasn’t for retailers, some of these days might pass without most of us noticing. And if this weren’t enough, some retailers hold a before, and an after, event sale’ as well.
In recent years we’ve even seen that four letter word applied to the prime Christmas selling season under the guise of the Holiday Sale.’ Don’t fret; we can count on at least four more savings opportunities at the seasonal sales. How about the Sizzling Summer Sale, the Falling Prices Sale, the Spring into Savings Sale, the Winter White Sale. Do any of these ring a bell? We’re also fortunate to advantage all the Clearance’ sales, along with the Annual’ sale.
With all of these opportunities to save cash, why don’t we all have more of it? And just how do retailers manage to survive financially with these continual massive cuts to their revenue? Or, could it be? Is it possible that we never saved anything at all; that we were deliberately ushered to equate: Sale = Savings?
Originally, the sale’ was intended as a tool to correct mistakes; the inevitable imbalances occurring in supply and demand. That has changed!
Every auto retailer suggests we don’t have our best deal until we’ve obtained
their specific offer. They can’t all be telling the truth. The latest TV gadget I don’t care what it is sells for $19.95, plus shipping & handling. And if I call within the next 10 minutes, they’ll double the offer; I get two gadgets. And if that isn’t enough, there’s a free gift – mine to keep – just for trying the gadget. Now I am told the offer is a $70 value.
Why is this TV retailer willing to accept only $19.95, plus shipping and handling, for items that are worth $70.00? Do these broadcast retailers convey value and integrity to you? Do claims of a “sale” from brick and mortar retailers do any more?
The use of the “sale” campaign by retailers has been so over used, so misused, that it constitutes abuse. Consumers have been so hardened to claims of a “sale” as to render its reception weak at best. How have retailers responded to this glut of sales campaigns, to this shopper indifference; with more sales! Aggressive retailers have developed even more sale gimmicks such as the One Day sale which includes a preview day, creating a misnomer two day sale.
The synonyms of addiction are: dependence, compulsion, craving, infatuation, and need. Look at the daily evidence of the retail advertising assault. Sale’ circulars accompanying the Sunday papers now weigh more than the paper. Retailers are addicted to the “sale!”
As professional merchants, is this all we have to offer? Can’t we differentiate ourselves from the competition by any other means? Pricing claims don’t differentiate us at all. And when offers of truly exceptional value are presented, how do we distinguish its communication from all the other sale’ noise?
No one thought claims could be made that one commodity was superior to another: my sugar sweeter than your sugar, my steel stronger than your steel, until Frank Perdue. By feeding his flock a yellow diet marigold flowers and corn the pigment of his chicks’ skin was yellow and clearly different from all the other chicken in my grocer’s case. Retailers have so much more to work with! Why don’t more of them try? The vast majority of retailers concentrates on Price and utilizes their Promotion efforts to reinforce that singular price point focus.
Astute retailers don’t run with the pack. It’s too hard to stand out from them all when you act just like them. Rather, they concentrate efforts on the other aspects of their public offerings. Consider just store personnel; how they’re dressed and groomed, where they stand, how they greet customers, their product knowledge, their eagerness to help, the scripts they’ve been armed with, their attitude; each of these can be utilized to make my store different, to make it stand out from the rest. And that’s just the people.
How about the audio my customers are treated to, this is part of my offering, and can be a vital ingredient of the overall experience in my store. Music has a powerful effect on emotion and can be selected to put customers into a happy, upbeat mood; conducive to purchasing.
The way my store is designed, decorated, and laid out; all have an effect on my customer. Does it really appeal to the age, sex, and other demographics of my ideal customer? Along with the audio and the personnel, each of these options for differentiation is still restricted solely to the brick and mortar location. We haven’t even begun to discuss how all my products differ from all my competitors out there. Countless opportunities exist within the product offerings to show how different my store really is from all the others.
Pricing claims don’t set a retailer apart from the pack. They establish it firmly in the middle, where its message is disguised by all the other “sale” noise.
