Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2013 February 19

= February 19 =

Short duration sales
I've seen plenty of 1 day sales before, but now I just saw a 1 hour sale. I'm wondering how such a sale can be advantageous to the retailer. Surely this will result in an overcrowded store, frustrated customers and employees, long lines at registers, and limited sales, because only so many people can buy things within the hour. Are they counting on people who miss the tiny window buying things anyway, at full price ? StuRat (talk) 07:29, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * For one, it probably generates more sales than one hour where there are little or no sales at all. I'm sure retailers would rather have the "good" problem of having their store full of people rather than the "bad" problem of having an empty one. Yes, it can frustrate customers and employees, but really the bottom line is if the short duration sale generates way more revenue than not having one at all. Zzyzx11 (talk) 07:49, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * However, there will be advertising costs, cost to mark things down, possibly costs of hiring temp employees for 1 hour, etc., and I have a hard time imagining them recouping those costs in an hour. StuRat (talk) 08:06, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * What about the secondary sales, the items (including full-price ones) the customers buy because they're in the store, which they would not otherwise have bought at all, or maybe not at that time. --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  08:30, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes. Again, it depends on the bottom line or situation of that particular business. Would have they generated more revenue during that day/week/quarter/year if they did not have that sale at all? Would they have cleared all the excessive or dated stock they wanted or needed to get rid of if they did not have that sale at all? Particular in a clearance sale, sometimes it is better to sell the inventory off rather than return it to the manufacturer (who may not really want it back because they would rather clear it also). Zzyzx11 (talk) 09:26, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Compare it with a longer sale. What are the advantages of having it be so short ?  It would seem they could sell far more during a longer sale, yet with only slightly higher costs. StuRat (talk) 09:33, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * It probably depends on the specific business, especially if they also want free publicity in a very competitive marketplace because one-hour sales are less common. Take for example this one-hour sale that Walmart did on Black Friday of last year: between 10 and 11 pm only, special prices on a 32-inch Emerson TV, an iPad 2, and a LG Blu-ray player. They advertised it in their regular weekly ads, so there was minimal additional cost there. Then, as a condition of the sale, if a store sold out before 11 pm, everybody still waiting in line would get a "Guarantee Card", basically a rain check they could redeem online and the product would be shipped to their house. Finally, they got extra publicity because it was reported by several news sources such as the one I cited. So really, they got free extra publicity, to stand out in a busy Black Friday, by just using their normal regular advertisements to hold a sale where, in many cases, they ended up handing out tons of rain checks. Zzyzx11 (talk) 10:19, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I do not know if you are in the United States, but these past few days were part of the country's Presidents' Day holiday weekend, and that is a busy shopping period also. And so a retailer may also want to use a very short sale to stand out, and gain free publicity and word-of-mouth, among its competitors. Zzyzx11 (talk) 10:39, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * See my comments below. StuRat (talk) 17:25, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * If I braved such a sale, I'd want to get the sale item and get the heck out of that hell-hole as quickly as possible. StuRat (talk) 09:30, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I'd say it sounds like Bait-and-Switch. In some countries this is considered a form of fraud. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bait-and-switch 196.214.78.114 (talk) 08:55, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Blue light specials were sometimes even shorter. Rmhermen (talk) 16:08, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * True, but that doesn't require any advertising or extra staff, except the guy who moved the blue light around and made the announcement. The sale I saw was advertised on TV, so did cost them quite a bit of money, which I can't see them recouping in an hour. StuRat (talk) 17:24, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Even if the sale is short, any ad (therefore exposure) for the shop would be worthwhile. Even if people miss the sale, the thought is they wouldn't bother going elsewhere and would buy anyway. Mingmingla (talk) 18:43, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, as I had feared, the goal here seems to be bait-and-switch, which is the only way such a sale, advertised on TV, makes financial sense. StuRat (talk) 19:44, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Feared? What's that about?  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  20:52, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I don't like to see retailers intentionally ripping people off, such as luring them in with a sale, only to find that by the time they get to the register, the sale has ended and they must pay full price. This seems to be a new take on the bait-and-switch practice of advertising something on sale, knowing they won't have enough.  Are you in favor of such practices ? StuRat (talk) 22:07, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Of course not. But surely your advanced country has consumer protection laws, whereby if they select the item from the shelf within the advertised sale period, and they get to the checkout queue within a reasonable time, they will still get to buy it at the advertised sale price, and will not be penalised simply because the queue was very long and it took a long time to reach the front of it, a matter over which the consumer has no control.  Surely.  Most stores are actually interested in good relations with customers, whom they would like to see again and again and again and again, rather than ripping them off once and permanently alienating them thereafter (not to mention all the negative word-of-mouth advertising they'd be attracting).  I can tell you that if I were charged the full price in those circumstances, I would demand the sale price and would not leave until I got it.  And everybody else in the queue would know about it.  And if the store stuck to its guns and finished up having me physically evicted, I'd make sure they copped the PR nightmare from hell.  What store manager who isn't mentally deranged would actually want this? --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  22:34, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I don't know if any laws would force them to comply, and, even if such laws existed, I doubt seriously if anybody bothers enforcing them here. That would be like properly regulating the subprime mortgage business, and we can't have that now, can we ?  It would be nice if all businesses were after long-term customers, but, alas, there's also money to be made by ripping off a new batch of suckers every sale.  Remember "A sucker is born every minute". StuRat (talk) 23:21, 19 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, you folks seem to be proud of living in a country where There's a sucker born every minute. If you're all so meek and mild and limp and flaccid and naive that you'd cop this sort of treatment from unscrupulous merchants without the slightest demur, good luck to you, is all I can say.  This sort of passive, "please ride roughshod over me, please trample my hard-won rights into the dust, please treat me like a doormat, I'll never complain" attitude is most untypical of the Americans I've known.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  00:40, 20 February 2013 (UTC)


 * If you were here and went to that sale and missed the 1 hour window, you'd just get arrested for disturbing the peace, and that would hardly make them change their evil ways. I protest such sales by not going in the first place.  I just got a coupon for a free appetizer with the purchase of an entree at a local restaurant.  Having been burned by such offers before, I called them today, told them exactly what I would be ordering, and asked if the coupon would be accepted.  They told me, as they often do (with slight variations), "No, because that's a special lunch price", even though the coupon says nothing about excluding "special lunch prices".  So, I just won't go.  Another common scam here is movie passes that say "Special engagements excepted".  I was first burned by this when I was a kid, and didn't know the difference between "accepted" and "excepted", or that every movie worth seeing is always a "special engagement".  In the US, retail scams abound.   StuRat (talk) 00:50, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I can't comment on how things are in the US but here in NZ I'm pretty sure I've seen similar ultra short sales before during Christmas time although I don't know if they ever included items like TVs. And I'm confident here that if you enter the que reasonably before the deadline they will give you the special price. S clearly it's not always bait and switch. As for coupon specials, I'm surprised that in a country as litigous as the United States they don't just include a term on the coupon that it's not valid with other specials and promotion which pretty much all coupons I've seen here in NZ include (so I wouldn't be surprised or complain that the coupon isn't valid with lunch special prices although I may still ask since some stores are generous) Nil Einne (talk) 04:18, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Coupons in America typically do have terms and conditions on them, often as prescribed by law. Stores themselves are often more flexible about the coupons, depending on how desparate they are to sell something. Although the bait-and-switch thing can go both ways. It reminds me of this oldie: A guy has a sale on shirts, 9 dollars marked down from 10. A guy comes in and complains, "The store across the street says 8 dollars for the same shirt." The store manager says, "So why don't you buy them over there?" "They're out of them!" "Hey, if I was out of them, I'd price them at 7 dollars!" ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 05:02, 20 February 2013 (UTC)


 * StuRat: Two things. (A) You say you "protest such sales by not going in the first place". Are you saying you are so well-known in the shopping precincts that your absence from a sale would actually be noticed?  If not, how is this any kind of protest?  (B) If you didn't know the difference between "accepted" and "excepted", you can hardly regard the outcome of you acting on your ignorance as being "burnt" by a shop.  They did precisely the right thing by spelling "excepted" correctly, but it still somehow manages to be their fault that you misinterpreted it as "accepted"?  Please come back to planet Earth.  We miss you.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  05:25, 21 February 2013 (UTC)


 * A) If everyone does as I do, then they will go out of business.


 * B) They intentionally chose to word it this way, knowing it would confuse many people, like me as a kid. They could have simply said "not accepted" to make it clear, but chose not to.  This is rather the point of small print, to make offers not nearly as good as they appear, when you first agree to them.   StuRat (talk) 05:42, 21 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Those are the most ridiculous non-arguments I've ever heard. The point of small print is to inform the consumer.  If the consumer chooses not to read it, that's their decision and their responsibility.  It's widely recognised that wading through all the terms and conditions is something very few people are prepared to do; but leave one thing out and the consumer has the company in court before you can say "litigious society".  Your prism of "The company is always wrong" is colouring your judgment.  Children are assumed to have a responsible adult looking after their interests, and guiding them in interpreting these kinds of disclaimers.  If that wasn't the case in your childhood, the vendor can hardly be held responsible.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  06:31, 21 February 2013 (UTC)


 * On a similar note, if they had said not accepted I can't help thinking Sturat would be complaining about how his cousin got confused when they were younger. Nil Einne (talk) 14:15, 21 February 2013 (UTC)


 * The average consumer is quite lazy and/or stupid. They know this.  They could choose to make it easy to understand the terms of any contract, but they often make the terms intentionally difficult to understand, in the hopes of getting people to agree to contracts which they wouldn't agree to, if they were fully informed.  One recent example of this was when tax preparers were advertising "early refunds" for customers.  They didn't make it obvious that they were actually giving high-interest, short-term loans on the refunds, and many people signed up, not realizing this.  The courts eventually ordered them to make this clearer.  See refund_anticipation_loan.  However, in many other cases, businesses are able to legally confuse the customers and get more money out of them this way.  As I said before, consumer protection laws and enforcement in the US are quite lax.


 * Also note that, in the US, most people just don't use the word "excepted", at least in places where "accepted" would also fit, since it sounds too much like "accepted", causing much confusion. Only lawyers trying to intentionally confuse people do this. StuRat (talk) 16:42, 21 February 2013 (UTC)


 * That last bit is complete bollocks, Stu. Unless you're telling me the general populace of the US is so ill-educated that most people don't know the difference between "accepted" and "excepted".  In that case, you've got far worse problems on your hands than that of evil merchants getting rich by bamboozling unsuspecting and naive customers.  You appear to have been carrying a chip on your shoulder ever since you were "burned" as a kid.
 * But anyway, who are you to wax lyrical about what you call the intentionally confusing language of others, when you persistently, deliberately and doggedly misspell the word "its", contrary to all the advice anyone here has ever given you and contrary to every English grammar book on the planet? You're at liberty to make up your own rules as you go along, but you're one of the world's great finger pointers when it comes to the alleged misdeeds of others.  Something's wrong with this picture.  This has become a very silly conversation and I'm done with it. --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  19:28, 21 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Much as it pains me to say so, and you know it does, the number of Americans who would know the difference between excepted and accepted is small enough when the words are written. When spoken they are probably fewer than StuRat implies. μηδείς (talk) 04:36, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Then educationally you're doing a lot worse than I thought, and a lot worse than the impression Americans generally like to give out. Thank you.  Bye now.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  05:07, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
 * This should not shock you. The two words are homophones except in carefully enunciated American speech.  Something funny about homophobia. μηδείς (talk) 20:44, 22 February 2013 (UTC)


 * If you say so. Let's take this back to the context StuRat provided: Another common scam here is movie passes that say "Special engagements excepted".  These words are written, not spoken, so the homophonic argument is neither here nor there.  In the context, it can only refer to something that is different from whatever else is on offer; otherwise, what's the point of mentioning special engagements at all?  It's clearly an exception, something that does not apply.  The meaning "Special engagements accepted" makes no sense.  If they wanted to say that special engagements are not excepted, they'd say "included" or something like that; but who ever heard of terms and conditions that waste space like that?  Even people with little formal education say "except" all the time, meaning something that's other than what went before, and neither they nor their listeners think they're talking about "accept"ing anything.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  22:22, 22 February 2013 (UTC)


 * And if you don't believe me, check the run of eight 2s in my date stamp. If that's not a sign from above saying "Listen to this man, he is wise", I dunno what would be.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  22:25, 22 February 2013 (UTC)


 * It was not my intention to take up SR's full argument for him. But given that most Americans think "all applications will be accepted" means "all applications will be approved", and think that a car that "comes with available air-conditioning" is a car that has air-conditioning.... 23:44, 22 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm not seeing the point of either of those examples. Accept and approve are different things.  The very fact that something must be applied for, means it will not necessarily be approved; otherwise it's a giveaway.  And the fact that any application will be accepted, is no guarantee of approval.  Anyone who's ever submitted an application for a job or a house loan or a car loan or a credit card, had the application accepted and processed, but been knocked back, knows that full well.  The other example seems not to be particularly germane to this englishe discussion.  All you're succeeding in doing is providing more evidence that Americans think that A means B when all it means is A.  Yet elsewhere today you've asserted that the British have (even) lower standards than the Americans.   Just where you're going with all this ....  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  00:15, 23 February 2013 (UTC)


 * "Except" and "exception" are perfectly common in US English, but "excepted" and "excepting" are uncommon. So, using those is as likely to cause misunderstanding as referring to a cheap black person as "niggardly".  And, if you don't believe that that's a bad idea, come here and try it, and I'll be glad to have your body shipped back home for burial.  StuRat (talk) 06:21, 23 February 2013 (UTC)


 * That's yet another part of Jules Feiffer's "lexicographically revolving door".


 * Is Thirty days hath September well known in the US? I wonder if people experience any difficulty understanding it.  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  09:19, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

I know it, but it requires remembering where several months fall, and, since many end in "ember", it's easy to get confused. I much prefer the knuckle method. Here are the knuckles of both hands held together (no thumbs involved), with months annotated for each:

J M M J  A O D ^ ^ ^ ^   ^ ^ ^ ^ F A J    S N

Those months listed on the top (on the knuckles) have 31 days, and those listed on the bottom (between the knuckles) have 30, or 28/29, in the case of February. The only things you have to remember with this system is the order of the months and the special case for February. (You can also count from the other end, if you prefer, so long as the first knuckle is January.) StuRat (talk) 17:13, 23 February 2013 (UTC)


 * The knuckle method works. The poem works too, the problem being that it takes 3 or 4 lines to explain February. The version I learned, which doesn't rhyme but is easier to remember, is "30 days hath September / April, June and November / All the rest have 31 / Except for February, 28 / Or in leap year, 29." ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 18:15, 23 February 2013 (UTC)