Shops putting prices UP for Christmas!

Honeydog

A little tip. On launch days you can often get games cheap at Tesco which is great as long as the muppety shop assistants have actually put them out on the shelves. I had to ask for Heavy Rain! The price goes up quick though so don't hang about.

Skyrim is worth waiting for! I had issues with Amazon over it though as I pre-ordered for launch day and it didn't turn up on time.

I haven't bought any games from Game (or any of their other shops for years) Too expensive.

prowla

I always thought that the idea of the sales is/was to keep trade going in an otherwise slack period after everybody had spent up for Christmas.

texranger

Azari wrote: »

I think that what TR is saying is that he'd much prefer to make a smaller discount available to all his customers. Which seems sensible.

exactly. i would rather reduce by say £3 for a month or so rather than have 30 items to sell at £10 and then when these sell other are £15. as if the £10 sell within a couple of hours you are left with 2 choices, place other stock on the shelves at £15 where you may get upset customer who may return later and see you have upped the price by £5 or just wait until the following day to put new stock out, which means you have lost sales during the day before.
i always look at my pricing etc. as a consumer would. i have even stopped selling lines that were good sellers as the price i would have to sell at as a consumer i would not pay

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

texranger wrote: »

PC games. Console Games, DVDs, CDs are price set by the distributors, so they tell retailers to price to sell them at. this price will depend on the quantity to retailer orders. every so often the distributors will run promotions of let say they give a retailer 200 copies of a game to sell at £x and when these 200 are sold then the price will go to £y.

As a toy retailer i have had these sort of promotions offered to me, which i have turned down as i personally think these promotions are unfair on consumers

That isn't exactly correctly with regards to media, the product has a Dealer Price and the retailer will have a file discount agreed with the label.

The retailer can sell at any price, Amazon often sell DVDs at a loss and the studios can't do anything about it other than not supply them which isn't an option.

Normally promotions are run quarterly, ideally the label would rotate their catalogue so that throughout the year the majority of titles were discounted at some point but are sold at 'normal' price for the other 3/4 of the year. New release would usually be excluded from this with around 6 months to a year before a major price drop depending upon the studio and the sales success.

As the consumer now strongly shops on price in this market and knows the price will drop a lot of back catalogue is discounted most of the time, a studio such as Warner releasing films from decades back will have made their money time and time again so might as well just permanently price the DVD at 2 quid to shift units on low margin.

The retailer can approach the label and suggest a large quantity at a heavily discounted price, for example when TheHut used to offer big box sets at 17.99 they have taken a few thousand units, when the supermarkets have certain titles heavily discounted they can take thousands and only need to stick a handful of units in each store.

The distributor in this market doesn't handle the price and the label can not tell you what price to sell at but could suggest, if you were selling too cheaply thus affecting their bigger clients, that they would stop supplying you, but small businesses don't really have the buying power for this situation to occur and the labels need the big companies to lap up stock.

In the example of Game, if they increased the price a few days before Christmas it's called capitalism. People shopping last minute who must have the item will pay and why shouldn't the retailer take advantage of this?

I increased my prices in the last few weeks before Christmas above what they have been all year, demand increases and whilst some sales may be lost by the increased price, the extra margins balances this out and it's far better to sell less at a high margin than loads for a tiny margin, unless as above you have purchased a vast quantity (or are trying to increase spend with the supplier in the hope of further discounts down the line).

Simply put, the retailer's objective is to maximise their profits whilst retaining custom.

timbstoke

knightstyle wrote: »

The game is Skyrim for those who asked.

Skyrim was on offer for one week only under a very highly publicised promotion. That promotion ended and it went back up to its usual price. Unfortunately, that's the way these things work.

Coopdivi

texranger wrote: »

suppliers still try and push RRP of items, but i never take any notice of these.

an example of how daft RRP is. before christmas i purchased some dolls they cost me inc. VAT £2.50 the RRP was £45. I sold these far less than the RRP.

the price competition changes started with the tobacco war when local stores to make a profit had to sell tobacco at RRP, but supermarkets were able to undercut the RRP. so the changes were made that all tobacco had to be sold at RRP, which i think now is the only goods that are legally to be sold at RRP

Complete rubbish. The price of fags and baccy varies across the board although not hugely because the Treasury takes more than three quarters of the price of a packet.

The tobacco I smoke, Cutters Choice, costs anywhere between £6.55 and £7.30 for a 25g pouch and supermarkets aren't always the cheapest.

texranger

Coopdivi wrote: »

Complete rubbish. The price of fags and baccy varies across the board although not hugely because the Treasury takes more than three quarters of the price of a packet.

The tobacco I smoke, Cutters Choice, costs anywhere between £6.55 and £7.30 for a 25g pouch and supermarkets aren't always the cheapest.

no i am right on this point, it has been 30 yrs since this was brought in when tobacco was always cheaper in supermarkets it is so that small shops and supermarkets sell tobacco at the same price level.

thespiderspeed

timbstoke wrote: »

Skyrim was on offer for one week only under a very highly publicised promotion. That promotion ended and it went back up to its usual price. Unfortunately, that's the way these things work.

Was on offer until the 23rd December, I know because my sister was giving me the money to buy it for her, just in case my Santa Mam hadn't bought it for her.

dacouch

texranger wrote: »

no i am right on this point, it has been 30 yrs since this was brought in when tobacco was always cheaper in supermarkets it is so that small shops and supermarkets sell tobacco at the same price level.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/8951291/Imperial-Tobacco-wins-price-fixing-appeal.html

texranger

dacouch wrote: »

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/8951291/Imperial-Tobacco-wins-price-fixing-appeal.html

i am on about the retail sector where supermarkets were selling tobacco at heavily reduced prices where small retailers could not compete.

this is the same process going through the system now to stop supermarkets selling cheap alcohol