Supermarket DisEconomy of Scale Name & Shame

System

This is the flip side of this thread, I guess, but...

In Sainsburys, a 500ml bottle of their own brand spring water costs 49p. A 2 litre bottle of their very same own brand spring water costs 47p.

So if you just want a small drink of water, it's actually cheaper to buy the larger bottle, drink 500ml, then pour the rest down the drain than it is to buy the 500ml bottle.

Economies of Scale to the extreme.

altikaka

Being a cynic, my point of view is that when I get a 'two for the price of one' offer, what it really means is that at any other time I'm getting 'one for the price of two' !!

RufusA

I've notice in my local Sainsbury's a few products (for example salmon) frequently alternate between either "50% off" or "2 for the price of 1"!

I wonder if the BOGOF offers are a way of getting round the Consumer Protection Act 1987 which states you must sell a product at the higher price for 28 consequtive days (in the last 6 months). 28 days of BOGOF allows you to establish a high price (but still sell loads), before knocking 50% off the high price whilst quietly dropping the BOGOF!

Rufus.

RufusA

I notice my local Sainsburys selling packs of 4 Duracell AA batteries (with 4 free) making 8 in total for £2.87. A bulk pack of 20 Duracell AAs costs £9.99, whereas 3 packs of the "4" batteries (making 24 AAs) would only cost £8.61.

Not really Sainsbury's fault though!

Rufus.

littlemisscheap

Here's one that had me confused as to what to do?

Boots had a recent promotion, on their own brand called 'Smile' mouthwash 200ml bottles

Buy one at 99p and get 100 points (worth £1.00) so buy two at 99p each and get 200 points, etc.

So of course I and others filled our 'Boots' and made a penny profit in the process.

Then, what Boots did was price the double sized 400ml bottles at £1.99 at BOGOF (so 2x400ml bottles) plus 2x100points (...worth £2.00) so you still make a penny profit but end up with double the mouthwash instead!

I think they then realised something as no longer find the offer of 100 points per bottle (mind you just as well as the 99p ones may have ended up back in Boots - I suppose they still can but I wonder if I should return items I made money/points on in the first place!)

squarecat

Asda cat food:
Canned is cheaper to buy 6-pack than the 12 or 24pack by about 1p per can.
dried food is cheaper to buy the 750g box than the 2.5kg bag. Again not helped by the pric comparision on the label switching between p per 100g and p per kg

supermum

Today in Asda they had a multi pack of 3 Magic Stars for 98p but you could buy 3 individual packs at 31p each ie 93p for 3 (exactly the same size bags) :-/

stavros_2

Hello people,

They may not do this anymore but when i worked at Spar they used to do the following...

when a wine was on a multibuy promotion, eg 3 for £10, that they didn't usually sell - and hence didn't have a price for it normally - head office would send down the price of a single bottle as it's equilavent price in the multibuy, in the example above it would be £3.33. This would be expecially useful for anyone who wants to buy just a single bottle of wine. I don't know if this still occurs but I always found it highly amusing when the third bottle went through the tills and the promotion ADDED on 1p! ;D don't remember the customer noticing this once!

Just in case you want to get a single bottle of wine from Spar, remember to get a price check on one of the promotion ones!

ps. don't know if they still do this :P

cjb02

Superhoop.  Your points are very valid.  The difference between this and overcharging is this is a pricing policy from head office - overcharging is an error not a deliberate policy.

Of course this isn't criminal and people can check things out - but it's typical of the prestidigitation that the supermarkets play to make us spend more.   Interesting to see who is worse!

martin

Prestidigitation .............. I had to look it up..... great I am getting a free education on this site too . Life doesn't get much better.

CJb ;D

quoia

Slightly off topic but quite a few years ago (26-28 ish?) I used to quite frequently have lunch in a pub in Nottingham (The Toll Bridge on the Embankment).
After the 1st few visits one day it stuck me looking at the menu that the meal that I usually had, "pie, chips & beans", was actually 5 pence more expensive when bought as a single meal than if you bought it as "two".
When you only got paid £20 a week, not wasting 5p like this was a big saving.
I can't remember now whether the option was "pie & beans" and order a separate portion of chips, OR "chips & beans" and order a pie on its own.
Whichever way it was, I ordered the "two meal option" for several years before the anomaly was sorted out.
Not only did you save 5p but the "dual meal" arrived on 2 plates, with 2 napkins and 2 sets of knives & forks !!!
So I also ensured the continued employment of their dishwasher !