It's a while since I've blabbered on about the exciting business of buying big bottles of coke and suchlike at supermarkets, so here's the latest instalment.
There may actually be someone in the universe who remembers the previous posts, but for the other, er, person here's a quick recap.
Tesco's own brand Cola Zero was selling for around 40p or less per 2 litre bottle. The price increased fairly sharply until it rocketed to 78p. But this was accompanied by a three for two offer, so ostensibly a good deal, the only catch being that the price per bottle was still significantly higher with the offer than that prevailing not long beforehand. And a similar Asda product largely followed the price increases, ending up at an identical 78p, but no three for two offer or BOGOF. (Although Asda has apparently ditched such 'gimmicks' in favour of "being transparent in its price cuts". Oh, aye!)
Then Tesco's product plummeted to 39p, precisely half of what it had been retailing at previously, and indeed substantially cheaper than with the three for two offer.
Now Asda's product has also plummeted back from the 78p of a few weeks ago to 52p. And naturally it's marked as one of the retailer's 'Rollback' offers. Oh whoopee! But it's still dearer than before the price rocketed to match Tesco's. And there was nae word of the 'Rollforward' when the price was surging ahead. And Tesco now has the Asda price marked on its shelves as a comparator. Of course, there's never any mention when the price is dearer than in other stores!
And the big tins of sweeties mentioned in my previous post - Quality Street, Roses, Heroes, Celebrations - have reappeared on the shelves, once again priced at £5, thus a substantial discount on the £10 normal price. But, as pointed out previously, I can't ever recall seeing these things actually offered at the 'normal' price. They seem to reappear a few weeks before Christmas at the 'discounted' price and then disappear for the rest of the year on an annual cycle. And if they are to be on display until the festive season then they certainly seem to have 'rolled' Christmas 'forward' this year!
But as usual the irony of Asda's petrol director saying that "customers shouldn't have to buy into gimmicks and promotions" shouldn't be lost on anyone.
As for Tesco, it all reminds me of the time I was attempting to master the self-service tills (a topic worth several blogposts in itself) when I overheard a couple of members of staff (who probably thought I was listening to The Clash's 'Lost In The Supermarket' or whatever on my iPod, but unbeknown to them the album I was listening to had just ended) bitching about us customers, saying "you ken what they're like". Aye, zipped up at the back, presumably!
Of course, retailing is hardly the only environment where we're triumphantly told the good news but the bad is kept hidden, and where we're constantly being manipulated in other ways. Now, I wonder where else that would happen? For those who didn't read my previous post, the clue's in the name of this blog!
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3 comments:
Don't supermarkets always raise the prices of soft drinks and ice-cream in the summer months, accompanied of course by 3for2 or BOGOF offers which disguise what is really going on? As for dramatically lowered prices, well isn't the rule that the higher price must have been in place for a month (perhaps 28 days?) before they can trumpet it as a 'genuine' price reduction?
I stopped drinking sugared fizzy waters years ago, specially those containing caffeine - they are so bad for you. So-called 'lo-cal' drinks are even worse with the chemicals they contain. I prefer plain water, with the occasional glass of wine.
I daresay they do raise the price of ice cream etc in the summer Bill, but not of the magnitude I'm referring to for purely seasonal reasons, although the whole thing's so convoluted it's difficult to tell what's going on sometimes.
For example, a relative who works in retail told me that some of the more bizarre pricing swings could simply be due to someone transposing some figures that they're keying into some computer somewhere - 64p instead of 46p, for example - and the whole thing stems from that, perhaps even leading to wild price swings in competitor stores as they price match, or whatever.
Indeed, I think there is some rule about discounted prices having to be from that in place for a certain period, but if the goods aren't even on display it perhaps doesn't really mean that much.
And indeed I'm quite sure I drink far too much low-cal fizzy drinks, but I console myself that my diet is a lot better now than it was three or four years ago, and that's just one of the things I have to live with and hope that the other factors involved - eg more exercise, more fruit and veg - make up for it.
And at least I've managed to stop the booze altogether, as opposed to twenty years as a binge drinker in an earlier life!!
By the way, hope you're getting on OK at your shiny new Sainsbury's!!
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