Will Electronic Price Labels Tempt Stores to Try 'Dynamic Pricing'? (yahoo.com) 221
"Electronic shelf labels are already common in Europe," reports the Los Angeles Times, "and will become wider spread in the U.S., with Walmart planning to implement the labels in 2,300 stores by 2026." And grocery giant Kroger also plans to introduce digital labels.
But will they also bring "dynamic pricing", where stores raise the price of ice cream on hot days — or jack the cost of water and canned goods before upcoming storms? Kroger and Walmart said they have no plans to implement dynamic pricing, and added that electronic shelf labels will only be used to help lower costs. "Kroger's business model is to lower prices over time so that more customers shop with us," a Kroger spokesperson said. "Any test of electronic shelf tags is to lower prices more for customers where it matters most. To suggest otherwise is not true." A Walmart spokesperson said updates to the electronic tags will be used to reflect lower prices for items on sale or final clearance. Prices will not change throughout the day, she said...
Grocery industry analyst Phil Lempert said the digital tags will help save time and money amid a labor shortage, but they could lead grocery chains down a slippery slope. "If you can make it electronic you can take a lot of costs out of the system, and that's great," Lempert said. "But once that's installed, and regardless of what any retailer is going to say, it's now easy to change prices."
Santiago Gallino, a professor specializing in retail management at the University of Pennsylvania, said he hasn't seen signs that retailers plan to use electronic shelf labels for surge pricing. "In my conversation with retailers, it's clear that those who are pushing towards this technology are mainly trying to drive efficiency up in the stores and try to reduce costs," Gallino said. "Grocery retailers operate on very thin margins, so every time they find technology that can help them save in labor, they will do that."
What grocery stores save in labor they may lose in customer trust and loyalty, however, said Dominick Miserandino [CEO of the retail disussion forum RetailWire.] "Consumers are exceptionally skeptical," he said. "When most of the consumer reaction to any product seems to be overwhelmingly negative, it's probably a product that one might want to reevaluate quickly."
The article notes one U.S. presidential candidate has already pledged they'd "work to pass the first-ever federal ban on price gouging on food."
But will they also bring "dynamic pricing", where stores raise the price of ice cream on hot days — or jack the cost of water and canned goods before upcoming storms? Kroger and Walmart said they have no plans to implement dynamic pricing, and added that electronic shelf labels will only be used to help lower costs. "Kroger's business model is to lower prices over time so that more customers shop with us," a Kroger spokesperson said. "Any test of electronic shelf tags is to lower prices more for customers where it matters most. To suggest otherwise is not true." A Walmart spokesperson said updates to the electronic tags will be used to reflect lower prices for items on sale or final clearance. Prices will not change throughout the day, she said...
Grocery industry analyst Phil Lempert said the digital tags will help save time and money amid a labor shortage, but they could lead grocery chains down a slippery slope. "If you can make it electronic you can take a lot of costs out of the system, and that's great," Lempert said. "But once that's installed, and regardless of what any retailer is going to say, it's now easy to change prices."
Santiago Gallino, a professor specializing in retail management at the University of Pennsylvania, said he hasn't seen signs that retailers plan to use electronic shelf labels for surge pricing. "In my conversation with retailers, it's clear that those who are pushing towards this technology are mainly trying to drive efficiency up in the stores and try to reduce costs," Gallino said. "Grocery retailers operate on very thin margins, so every time they find technology that can help them save in labor, they will do that."
What grocery stores save in labor they may lose in customer trust and loyalty, however, said Dominick Miserandino [CEO of the retail disussion forum RetailWire.] "Consumers are exceptionally skeptical," he said. "When most of the consumer reaction to any product seems to be overwhelmingly negative, it's probably a product that one might want to reevaluate quickly."
The article notes one U.S. presidential candidate has already pledged they'd "work to pass the first-ever federal ban on price gouging on food."
Blue Light Special (Score:2)
I only want discounts by flashing blue lights - not saving 2% by shopping on off-hours so stores can level their labor costs.
Somehow that would be terrible, I'm told.
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"where stores raise the price of ice cream on hot days - or jack the cost of water and canned goods before upcoming storms?"
It's not discounts at off-hours, or even about discounts in general.
Re:Blue Light Special (Score:4, Insightful)
There is nothing wrong with raising prices when demand goes up. It is in fact the rational thing to do.
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I think I know where you think you're coming from but all I can say is that your system basically makes disasters purge events for the poor.
Re: Blue Light Special (Score:4, Insightful)
I think it's more likely to hedge against panic buying than anything else. I would have been all in favor of raising the price on things like hand sanitizer and toilet paper during covid if it would have done nothing more than stop people from buying way more of it than they needed.
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That's the excuse they may come up with but the real reason is to make more money. Just like the people who buy products and then sell that on for a large profit. People are not going to be swayed from panic buying by a 2 or even 3 times increase in the price of toilet paper, what is the more likely outcome is they will think it will cost even more tomorrow so they better buy it today.
Re: Blue Light Special (Score:2)
If they know it's a temporary increase, they're more likely to only buy what they need at the moment.
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I think I know where you think you're coming from but all I can say is that your system basically makes disasters purge events for the poor.
The alternative is that they're purge events for everyone who doesn't or can't immediately run to the store. Without adjusting prices to match demand what you get is empty shelves. Is that really better?
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I only want discounts by flashing blue lights - not saving 2% by shopping on off-hours so stores can level their labor costs.
Yeah. People, specifically headline writers, are getting their panties in a twist. Could stores do something annoying such as adjusting prices based on time of day, individual purchase preferences, or outright racism? Sure. And customers would abandon that store in droves. Plus, we have lots of evidence stores who already could do this don't. Amazon is famous (or infamous) for experimenting with dynamic pricing and I'm pretty sure they abandoned the practice. If Amazon isn't doing it (and neither does Kohl'
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Amazon has not abandoned the practice. If you look up anything that is on "same day prime shipping" on two different phones, the prices will be different. Sometimes by pennies, sometimes by 10-15%.
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Amazon has not abandoned the practice. If you look up anything that is on "same day prime shipping" on two different phones, the prices will be different. Sometimes by pennies, sometimes by 10-15%.
Thanks for clarifying. Amazingly, people still buy from Amazon. Apparently this is an acceptable practice.
The good news is we have choices. I could buy from Walmart or Target or Etsy or Home Depot any number of other vendors if I didn't like Amazon's offer.
How and why? (Score:3, Informative)
The first thing would be that people notice and stop shopping there. Groceries are an extremely competitive arena with profit margins of 0.5-1%. The second problem would be that your competitors would notice and undercut you on those days and advertise - hey, if it is hot, we actually give you a discount.
Brand loyalty is rather fickle in this space.
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There are competitors?
I had a Kroger, Albertsons, and an independent store within economical distance. The independent one closed and the other two are now Kroger-Albertsons.
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The first thing would be that people notice and stop shopping there.
Right up to the moment their competitors do the same thing. Remember when only some stores were forcing self-checkout on people because they said it would save them money? How long did it take for every store to force self-checkout on people?
The second problem would be that your competitors would notice and undercut you on those days and advertise - hey, if it is hot, we actually give you a discount.
No. No they won't. If it's going to be
Re: How and why? (Score:2)
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> The first thing would be that people notice and stop shopping there
We have (electronically) changing prices in my local store. Every day the price can be different, I rarely go twice the same day, so I don't know if prices are changed even more frequently.
I don't see see it as a problem. If the price is too high, I don't buy that product unless I really need it and I don't want to go hunting for cheaper shop. Usually I look for some alternative product in the same shop. There are some products that I b
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...then laboriously count out change, circa 1880 or so.
USian here. Yes, cash (and checks) still exist here. But I can't recall the last time I saw someone pay for their groceries in cash. And I see people writing checks for groceries only once or twice a year. Most common in my community is "pass them over the self-checkout, wave your contactless card over the terminal, and you're done."
Where cash might be more common is in poorer communities, where many people are "unbanked", can't get credit cards, and generally operate in cash to skirt paying income taxes.
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But I can't recall the last time I saw someone pay for their groceries in cash.
I paid for an item (not grocery) with case at an Ollie's last week. I pay for my gas with cash. The one grocery I visit I sometimes pay cash depending on on how little I buy. If it's one or two items it will most likely be cash.
When my dad goes to Walmart and buys his doughnuts, he pays with cash at self-checkout. I recently paid cash for two notebooks at Walmart because the cost was less than $1 in total.
and generally opera
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If they're making that little money, not filing taxes is working against them. They would most likely get a refund. Also, not having a bank account means it is highly unlikely they will ever own a home or be able to purchase large ticket items.
You should explain that to them
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If they're making that little money, not filing taxes is working against them. They would most likely get a refund. Also, not having a bank account means it is highly unlikely they will ever own a home or be able to purchase large ticket items.
You should explain that to them
It's been explained countless times and they refuse. They're so set against not paying taxes, or having their income known, they'd rather lose money. It's the same reason they'll use a check cashing faciilty and lose 3% - 10% of their paycheck rather than use a bank. However, Walmart does cash checks [walmart.com] for only $4 (up to $1,000 limit) or $8 up to $5,000, so there's always that option. If they can get to a Walmart.
Also, one of the reasons they're getting paid in cash is probably because their employer is d
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My point was that telling me or anyone else here on /. is pointless. Wrong audience. The people you're trying to reach don't read /.
Banking / the Un-banked (Score:3)
Also, not having a bank account means it is highly unlikely they will ever own a home or be able to purchase large ticket items.
It's been explained countless times and they refuse. They're so set against not paying taxes, or having their income known, they'd rather lose money. It's the same reason they'll use a check cashing faciilty and lose 3% - 10% of their paycheck rather than use a bank..
They will never be able to own a home or purchase a big-ticket item, regardless of whether they have a bank account. They do not have any money. I don't think you're entirely clear on the "poor people" concept.
It's also funny that you think that banks cash checks.
They generally do not.
Here is now it works.
You go to your own bank with a paycheck drawn
on some other bank. They will NEVER "cash" this.
(Unless it is a Government paycheck or Social Security.)
What they may do, if you have been a customer in
good sta
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Even in poorer areas, it seems that what usually takes care of that are Green Dot cards, which people use to fill up their debit card and use that for their charge stuff. Even in rural areas where there are people without checking accounts (be it due to visa issues, ChexSystems hostile reports, getting money via cash because they have wages garnished), most people use credit cards.
Overall, where I am, cash is rare, and someone whipping out a checkbook seems to be extremely rare, mainly because most stores
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I still pay cash for most things under $100, including my groceries. I use it to budget myself, and I still like feeling like I paid for something. I still only use cards for big ticket items, and still pay all my utility bills by mailing a check.
I want to be involved in my money, just tapping a card for everything causes a disconnect. Great for piling up debt, which the card companies love.
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take them to a checkout, hand them to an operator, and then laboriously count out change, circa 1880 or so.
Just for accuracy, you're describing 1930s-1950s. According to Wikipedia, Self-service was invented in 1917 by Clarence Saunders, founder of Piggly Wiggly. In 1880, you'd ask the items from the clerk.
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Ah, good point. I've actually experienced the Open-all-Hours style of shopping, but that was in a village store where the shopkeeper knew everyone in the village and almost everything was cashless because she just charged it to the person's account.
It was weird going back 30 years later and it had become a mini-mart with electronic checkouts. I think it was her granddaughter that was running it then.
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You should be blaming the chipping away at, rolling back consumer protection laws as the fuel for distrust, not the movements that gave birth to them.
Wrong reasons (Score:3, Insightful)
What consumers need to be wary of is not price changes day per day. Where I live, this is standard practice, and electronic labels are still a thing of the future. Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however, and this must not be allowed to happen.
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Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however, and this must not be allowed to happen.
How? There are no sensors in these labels that can detect what customer is close by. And even if it was, how would that work? It is still the same bar code that is scanned when I exit the store, whether I do it, or the clerk does it.
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What consumers need to be wary of is not price changes day per day. Where I live, this is standard practice, and electronic labels are still a thing of the future. Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however, and this must not be allowed to happen.
Here that ship sailed long ago and every grocery chain has pricing per customer since well before my time with loyalty cards and coupons, now apps.
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Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however, and this must not be allowed to happen.
Regarding that concern..the ironic part about those abusing the masses with viral clickbait is that tactic can absolutely be used against them. I say to Greed, go ahead. Charge 100 customers all different prices and see what happens when THAT news, goes viral. Wouldn’t be surprised if a store owner didn’t find an intact store building by morning.
Corruptly raising a lot of other costs in life is bad enough (cars, insurance, houses), but if you want to know how to start the actual revolt, keep
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Charge 100 customers all different prices and see what happens when THAT news, goes viral.
You mean like was known 19 years ago [findlaw.com]? Or how Amazon does [bayourenaissanceman.com] on a regular basis?
Here's an entire article [influencer...inghub.com] about dynamic pricing on Amazon from five days ago.
Let us know when people throw a fit over this and stop buying from Amazon.
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Let us know when people throw a fit over this and stop buying from Amazon.
First off, there’s a premium you can charge for convenience. So that can be assumed with any online retailer delivering to your doorstep so you don’t have to leave the house.
But perhaps the most obvious point with Amazon pricing, is that no matter how “dynamic” it gets, it STILL manages to either meet or beat store prices, or justify the convenience.
What do you think keeps Amazon in business? Prices, or convenience? People are lazier than ever. That’s fact, not theory.
Re:Wrong reasons (Score:4, Informative)
Back in the 50s, cars used to use plate casing. Made them heavier and slower, but carcrashes weren't as bad. Why is no-one talking about that?
Because it's an ignorant belief. Back in the 50s, cars didn't have crumple zones or shoulder belts, to say nothing of SRS. When you got in a crash, the car was less likely to be written off, but you were more likely to die.
Also, the car was more likely repairable not because of "plate casing" whatever you think that is, bad translation? But because they were full frame. The entire front end group (everything in front of the cowl) was bolted. The rear end of the vehicle was fabricated separately and attached minimally to the cab, with a seam in the sail area which was filled with lead. This was easy to remove later (torch it out) but of course the processes of removing it and of filling it again were both toxic.
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Cars cost more? Colour me surprised. They have much weaker glass and plastic instead of metal around it. Even lamborgini does it. So they should be decreased in price, logically. Back in the 50s, cars used to use plate casing. Made them heavier and slower, but carcrashes weren't as bad. Why is no-one talking about that?
Because cars used to be rolling boats made with steel bumpers not filled with styrofoam, weighed 5,000 pounds, and got 15MPG?
THAT was our “advanced” technology back then that kept people alive. Once we went to econo-micro-shitboxes, manufacturers were rather forced to require additional technology (ABS, airbags, etc.) to make up for the obvious lack of physical protection.
Decreasing prices based on that “logic” would also assume you’re paying an auto worker a 1960s salary in 2
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Because cars used to be rolling boats made with steel bumpers not filled with styrofoam, weighed 5,000 pounds, and got 15MPG?
THAT was our “advanced” technology back then that kept people alive.
Except it didn't. As pointed out above, cars didn't have crumple zones and the like. Instead of the cars crumpling by design and absorbing a lot of the impact energy, it was the occupants who crumpled. Back then you could get in a minor crash and the car wouldn't be to bad but you died from your injuries. Nowadays you get in a medium-severity crash and the car is a mess but you walk away, maybe completely uninjured. The car is a mess because it did its job, saving your butt.
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Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however, and this must not be allowed to happen.
I'm curious why you say this. Yes, it might be irritating as a consumer but put your and my personal feeling aside for a moment. Why exactly must this not be allowed? Prices get adjusted per customer in all sorts of other contexts (mostly big ticket items like cars, home renovations, legal fees, and the like). What makes groceries different? What's your ethical, moral, or legal basis for saying this would be bad?
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Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however, and this must not be allowed to happen.
Is that even legal in the USA?
It's highly illegal here in my Eastern European country.
With one exception, though, you can get discounted prices if you use the store app - but that is not discriminatory, because everyone can qualify if they wanted to.
Price jacking because I seem more well-off than others, though? Highly illegal.
Besides, I'm curious how would that even work in practice.
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Having seen "just for you" coupons in Lidl's app from the UK to Russia's border and anywhere in between I'd say to get of the "not happening in my European country" high horse.
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1. It's a very generic "just for you".
2. It's not discriminatory if everyone can get access to discounted prices, if they meet some conditions.
It is, however, illegal to raise prices just for some people.
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Generic? It includes for sure among many other things AT LEAST:
- if you are older than X or younger than Y
- if your birthday is within a certain interval
- if you are buying a certain amount of whiskey, Pampers or crayons
- your postal code
- the specific shops you shop at, the times and frequency, how much you spend
It can't get more selective than that.
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"For sure"?
Nevertheless, to address your points:
"- if you are older than X or younger than Y": Yes, laws allow discounts for seniors as well as for children and students, but for ALL seniors, children or students, whenever there is public access. Discounts, not price hikes. Big difference.
"- if your birthday is within a certain interval": Never seen that. There are birthday discounts in some places, that's true, but last I checked EVERYONE has a birthday, therefore EVERYONE is eligible, once per year. Not d
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Electronic labels may enable pricing per customer however
No they can't. That's not how they work. And if you did try and vary price depending on who happened to be standing closest not only would someone notice it (and then claim the cheapest price on checkout since that's what the law requires be provided), but it would also very quickly run the batteries on these things down and be an absolute financial disaster.
Reckless expansion of the money supply (Score:2)
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If they really want to raise prices during opening hours they can have some generic warning that prices are valid for one hour (or whatever time) and activate them in the register only after that time. Or they can have some clear time windows when they change them, like from 7PM we're changing the prices for drinks.
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If they really want to raise prices during opening hours they can have some generic warning that prices are valid for one hour (or whatever time) and activate them in the register only after that time. Or they can have some clear time windows when they change them, like from 7PM we're changing the prices for drinks.
Might even be a good sales tactic. "Government mandates requires us to tell you that the price for this item is going up soon! Buy it now, quick!"
Re: Reckless expansion of the money supply (Score:2)
In Norway several chains use e-ink price tags, and raising prices only happens outside of opening hours. Lowering prices can happen at any time.
Sure, requires the stores to play ball but itâ(TM)s a good principle. If stores fuck around, legislation will easily harmonise behavior so as to protect consumers.
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Continuous rapid expansion of the money supply (inflation) by irresponsible central banks is probably another reason vendors want to use electronic price indicators (tags). They have to keep raising prices in order to maintain profits on each sale.
Yep. Grocery stores have super low profit margins. Despite Kamala's tactic, the people to blame for your high food prices are not the grocery stores ...
Might run afoul of laws (Score:4, Insightful)
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There are two grocery stores here and Walmart. I've abandoned one of the grocery stores because it consistently charged higher prices at the register than listed on the shelf label. When confronted they always backed down, but why put up with it?
But with electronic labels the cashier can press a button and the label will instantly update to the price on the receipt. The customer will never win a price check again unless you take a time stamped picture of the label of every item you buy.
Would run afoul of Canadian law (Score:2)
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I could see a good use of this being to lower prices during off peak hours in order to shape foot traffic a little better. If they use it to jack up the price for surge pricing, they will lose as much of my business as humanly possible.
So, discounts to encourage a better customer experience == good. Price gouging to just be price gouging == bad.
That's my two cents.
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In Australia if a retailer advertised an item at a certain price (say in a TV ad or a catalog) but charged a higher price for it, they would be in trouble under false and misleading advertising laws (and there would absolutely be action taken by the ACCC as the relavent regulator). If a retailer has a different price on the shelf to what you pay at the checkout, there are rules around that as well.
There are retailers who have started using e-ink price tags but none of them (that I have seen) do anything dod
Huh? Or course. That's the whole point ... (Score:2)
... of remotely update-able price-tags.
Captain Obvious strikes again!
Will they abuse an abusable technology? (Score:2)
Depending on how you update these displays, you could possibly hack them, and due to pricing laws, save a lot of money. In Canada, the price shown / advertised is what they have to give you. This m
That would be illegal here in Europe (Score:3)
So, if I pick something from a shelf that has a price tag 3Euro they can't change it to 4Euro on my way to pay for the item. They would have to close the store to change the prices.
And, we already do have those fancy electronic price labels here in grocery stores.
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False they must sell it to you for the highest of a discrepancy between prices. No they don't need to close the store to change prices. And here's the thing: Supermarkets have been changing prices during work hours for over a century. Your legal quandary is trivially resolved by adding a small delay - say 20min, to the price update and the checkout becoming more expensive, or no delay if it becomes cheaper. Even old people on walking frames don't spend 20min in supermarkets.
Not the biggest problem and USA backwards (Score:2)
The words could be the meaningless promise of an election campaign but saying the USA needs goodwill regulations, reveals the country to be backwards.
Other countries already have limits on marking-up essential foods and on changing prices. But that doesn't stop all price-gouging: IIRC, during a banana shortage, retail prices in one country were US$8/kilo while the wholesale price barely changed. (Wholesale price was set months before the shortage happened, and farmers have to sell, they have no leverag
"Not having plans" is not "won't do it". (Score:2)
And you know why you chose those words.
Electronic Tags are already in use (Score:2)
Here in Saskatchewan, Canada, Wal-Mart is already using eInk electronic tags in some areas of the store. This means they don't have to print out reams of paper tags and have staff members walking the aisles to change them. And because of the way they are designed, the eInk tags get a long, slow refresh cycle over the period of a day, as they're all battery operated and using the 432MHz or 915MHz frequency band for short-length, low bandwidth signalling
With frequent updates for things like "surge pricing", i
Supply and demand (Score:3)
...is a fickle bitch.
Barcodes (Score:2)
You haven't noticed dynamic pricing at gas pumps? (Score:3)
Gas prices at the pump can change several times a day. This is not a new phenomenon, and it's driven by replacement cost of inventory.
Look it up, and don't complain to the convenience store clerk, they merely rent space for the pumps and the petro company drives the price. Or the convenience store rents space from the petro landlord and handles sales for commission. Either way they make nothing to very little on gas. That 24 oz soda they charge $1./39 for is a profit item, though every other item is inflating so fast it's demoralizing.
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This happened to me whilst I was pumping gas, the price increased on the digital signage out front, but I was locked in on the price it was when I began pumping.
Simple Solution-Retailer Liability to customer! (Score:2)
this changes little (Score:2)
Understand that grocery stores replace prices on goods CONSTANTLY.
I work in the label industry. One of our larger customers got to be as huge as they are by specifically designing printers and label systems solely for grocery stores. As they explained to me, a larger grocery store would COMMONLY reprice everything about every 2-3 days. A single large grocery would have 8-10 laser printers in the back running 24/7 churning out new shelf label tags.
So understand, the ability to change prices instantly IS A
Nice Spin Kroger (Score:2)
there is absolutely nothing new about this (Score:2)
It's common for restaurants to change prices, like at 5pm when they switch to the "dinner menu", which does change up a lot of what's available, but some things that were on the lunch menu are still on the dinner menu but at a higher price for exactly the same food and portions.
There are lots of other examples of "dynamic pricing". All this really is doing is making it easier for them to change prices when they have tens of thousand of products on the shelf. This isn't a problem, it's a symptom, of the hi
They already do⦠(Score:2)
Except itâ(TM)s the other way around. Stores charge a high price by default (manufacturers suggested retail price) and add a variable discount.
Said before, I'll say it again: (Score:2)
Price Per need to be made consistent (Score:2)
When I buy things like sour cream, one brand will be $ per ounce and the other will be $ per lb ... it should be a legal requirement to get these to be consistent, or show all the variants. Yes, I can multiply/divide the prices, but after a long day at work my brain is fried and I don't feel like doing math on every item. In Europe some store will actually flag which brand, or off brand, will have the best deal. This is how you fight inflation.
Canadian Tire implemented this a while ago (Score:2)
As with everything good, there is bad (for the consumer). The prices can be changed dynamically, thus if new stock arrives at the store the tags price is updated rem
Will they? No. (Score:2)
That has been a primary driver behind the technology for almost 2 decades.
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Re:you only hear about this now (Score:4, Informative)
I counted one aisle at the store I worked at then did the math, and figured we had roughly 10,000 unique tags in our small store. We had 2 full time and 1 part time employees dedicated to keeping tags up to date.
Odd part about this issue, is the actual age of electronic labels. I’ve seen them in some stores for many many years now.
Two full time and one part time likely amounts to over $100K annually in fully loaded burden on an employer today, not including human error, or the massive cost of labels and printers themselves annually. What’s the ROI on that to convert? Maybe 3-5 years? What is the benefit in using those employees far more efficiently elsewhere in the business?
Electronic labels are an old solution for an even older problem that probably shouldn’t still exist. Probably one of the most pain-n-the-ass things to deal with as a grocer.
My guess is electronic lables (Score:2)
There's also the technical issues around them. The ones Kohls have a *very* basic.
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Why are they less eye catching? They come in different sizes, they come in multi-colour displays (my local supermarket makes the numbers white on red to indicate a sale item. And they are just the bit of text, you can put eyecatching borders around them (another local supermarket does it for items it indicates are the cheapest in their category, or items which are vegan).
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are less eye catching and that's why we haven't seen them.
If society was that fashion centric about price labels, they probably wouldn’t look exactly like they did 40 years ago.
Besides, the outrageous price is eye catching enough. Price tags have never been more photographed for that reason alone.
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Ok say there are 10,000 labels then and each needs a battery replaced once a year, at $5 a pop, plus the cloud you have to pay for, the cost of security, say you need to replace each label after 5 years. It could easily be around $100,000 a year. Not saying it is more expensive I have no idea, just saying that without knowing the ongoing costs its not necessarily cheaper.
Here is the best description of price I found, https://www.zhsunyco.com/how-m... [zhsunyco.com] it says each tag cost $6-$12 you need a base station at a
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label phones home it's battery percentage. requirement to keep batteries above 10%. when below 10% a morning employee walks around and replaces them all. all the bad ones go in a bin. when employees have nothing to do, they replace batteries in the bin.
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Yeah, but I am sure the sellers electronic price tags will figure out how to screw the shops, possibly buy licensing the technology, x cents to change a price tag + $y for a monthly ongoing fee, and occasionally deprecating a product line so you have to go out and buy all new ones.
for example you would think self checkouts would be a massive win for business but from here https://theconversation.com/th... [theconversation.com]
Self-checkouts aren’t necessarily faster than other checkouts and don’t result in lower staff numbers. And there are indirect costs such as theft, reduced customer satisfaction and loyalty.
There maybe hidden costs that aren't clear, for example the cost of replacing broken, labels I know my
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> Thank you for finally giving us the reason! Having to change labels by hand costs a lot of labor.
Thank you for posting this. If I had mod points today I would up-mod it.
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Some stores might try it, others not.
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No, they will all use it.
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Except that's not how expiration dates work. Generally speaking, on perishables such as dairy and meat products, the food is expected to remain perfectly good for at least a week after that date. On canned goods, the date is just a conservative estimate on how long it will stay fresh. On some cheeses
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The so-called "consumer surplus" has been eating at the business manager since he learned about it in econ 101. Now he wants all of it, and will get it.
Right. And the very next thing they learn about is that competition between suppliers for shoppers prohibits them from capturing much of that surplus.
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Within 10 miles of my house, there are 74 grocery stores owned by 7 different corporations. The average margin in this business is currently 1%. That's competition baby.
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Walmart has a 20% market share for groceries in Arizona.
If you think Kroger controls the other 90%, you need to change the batteries in your calculator.
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"Kroger stores, Safeway, Albertsons, Frys and more all owned by the same company."
A simple Google search or even paying attention to the news will reveal this is factually untrue.
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price tags will be individually changing depending who's looking at them.
And that will just lead to services to evade that. Hell, you will just have more instacart like stuff happen, where you shop by proxy to screw with such algorithms.
I mean, here's the simplest thing to evade it, just have my spouse or kid pick the item off the shelf.
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