always ask for a discount

I feel like that is something my dad would have said.  But I've noticed that when shopping online if you load up a cart and go through the process except for the final purchase confirmation, you'll often get an e-mail from the company asking you if everything is OK.  Sometimes it comes with an enticement to finalize the purchase, a 10% off promo code. Even when it doesn't, I've responded to these, "Is everything OK?" emails asking for one and more often that not been offered a discount.  Every little bit helps.

FYI, some online retailers (cough) don't rely on this sort of sales technique. You don't get charged extra at FM just because you didn't ask for super special price.

Yes, this tech is called "dead cart" or "left in cart" and it's an optional package (read, extra $$$ per month on the hosting bill) when setting up a webstore.  It's going to be up to the individual company if they interact that way, as Keith indicated.

Abandoned cart emails do work. But you don't need to throw a coupon in there and force your customers to play games to get to the expected selling price.

It's part of a larger marketing strategy - some people like a higher "normal" price with a discount, some people like to be shown the real price right from the start. The "mark it up and put it on sale" technique definitely works on the short term and on commodities but I personally think it backfires in the long run and it annoys me so we choose not to do it.

Don't do it to small business people. I hate it when customers automatically assume they can get something cheaper. I especially hate it when they say "blank sells it for xxx". Ok go the berkeley over to blank and buy it then. There's a reason my stuff is the price it is. 

So as a professional buyer there are a few of points on this:

Most really good suppliers tend to give you their best and final offer up front.   

I have a similar take as Keith, in that  if someone suddenly gives me a 10%, I start wondering about why they just didn't do this upfront (Keep in mind I do about 62 million a year so my expectations are different).  Your cable bill is a prime example of how annoying this tactic is..............if you don't call and squawk they'll happily charge you more.

Sometimes the timing is such that supplier is willing to give discounts; they may be trying to meet a quarterly goal or they just want to move the inventory. 

I negotiate all day long but on small items I prefer to do my due diligence and order from the supplier who offered the best deal up front.

It never hurts to ask and as pointed out sometimes you can get a deal. 

Keith Tanner said:

The "mark it up and put it on sale" technique definitely works on the short term and on commodities but I personally think it backfires in the long run and it annoys me so we choose not to do it.

Just depends on the industry and product. The largest customer of our software does exactly that, in 2019 they had 5.7 billion in revenue.

In reply to z31maniac :

Reading posts like this makes me happy I'm not our main software buyer, although the services I contract for do soemtimes involve software. I tend to loathe the industry's tactics. My experience, albiet limited, has been it's like pulling teeth to get answers to direct questions. The legal departments seem to drive a good bit of this. Third party resellers exacerbate the issue even further. I do understand it's driven by a history of competing companies being less than ethical.............. Nevertheless I still find it annoying.

"Hi.  We've been berkeleying you with our prices every day for years .  If you just whine a bit, we will give your whiney ass a discount."

Hate it. 

Mndsm said:

Don't do it to small business people. I hate it when customers automatically assume they can get something cheaper. I especially hate it when they say "blank sells it for xxx". Ok go the berkeley over to blank and buy it then. There's a reason my stuff is the price it is. 

I've always worked for small businesses.

My standard reply in retail was: "Sure, buy 5 of them and I'll give you 5% off" 

It worked a couple of times.

People don't realise that the discount isn't 10% of the profit on the item, it's 10% of the total. If the item costs $100 and the employee gives you $10.00 off on an item they may have only been making $10.00 on in the first place, the store is losing money just by being open.

Then everyone sits around and moans that there are no mom-and-pop businesses left. It's just a race to the bottom.

z31maniac said:

Keith Tanner said:

The "mark it up and put it on sale" technique definitely works on the short term and on commodities but I personally think it backfires in the long run and it annoys me so we choose not to do it.

Just depends on the industry and product. The largest customer of our software does exactly that, in 2019 they had 5.7 billion in revenue.

Yeah, we're a little more concerned about not pissing off individual customers. You win and lose them one person at a time when you're not measuring your sales in the billions. Someone finds out they had to pay an extra 5% for no good reason, they don't come back.

But it works for Ford and F150s.

Asking for a discount is just a form of negotiation, and negotiation is a cornerstone of business.  Nothing wrong with negotiating price and other terms of a sale, so long as you're reasonable.

As a (very) small business owner, the people that ask for a discount are going to be a pain in the ass. Either now or later. Fire them as customers and wait for the good ones 

Paul_VR6 (Forum Supporter) said:

As a (very) small business owner, the people that ask for a discount are going to be a pain in the ass. Either now or later. Fire them as customers and wait for the good ones 

So much this.  The ones that want to pay the least always expect the most.

I hate dead-cart emails. Mostly because we frequently get them saying "you seem to have forgotten X item" when I know berking well it wasn't in my cart, if I even looked at it.

That ish is a very prompt way to lose me as a customer.

If it's a sizeable purchase, I'll always ask if they'll knock off something if I pay in folding money.  Some folks will do that and I think it's a solid win for everyone:  I save a few bucks, they get their money right now.  Other places want to charge the same if it's cash on the barrelhead or credit card, so then they're welcome to pay the bank some extra money so I can get my cash back later.  We both lose there, but I figure the vendor loses more than I do since I was ready to pay the full price and now they've got to deal with Mastercard or Visa.

The medical industry is weird about that, though.  In the last 12 months I had one bill that I just totally forgot about and another that I pre-paid.  You go to the ER and you get five different people sending you bills and if you're me, one of them goes out-of-sight-out-of-mind.  They called me up - and it was actually the hospital, not a collections agency - and told me that I owed them a couple hundred bucks or whatever it was.  I apologized and told them that I totally forgot and would pay it immediately and could I just call back and give them my credit card over the phone.  They said it was no problem but to just wait for a second while they applied a 20% discount to the total.  Sure enough, I called back and paid them what I owed, minus the 20%.  Even though I was fully ready and willing to pay full freight.

The second was for my hernia surgery.  They called me up with the total I'd owe them and told me that if I paid them within five days, they'd knock either 10 or 15% off the total.  I considered just sitting on it for a few months to see if I could get the 20% discount, but decided to just go ahead and pay it right then and there.

Either way, I don't see a problem with trying to negotiate in most situations as long as you're doing it right.  The jackwads that open with "what's the lowest you'll take" need to go straight to hell as do the mom and pop joints that get all bent out of shape when I won't buy a total commodity item from them because they're 2x the cost of the big box or the interweb.  But if we find a situation where you get a little more and I pay a little less in return, that's just the way it should work.

Duke said:

Paul_VR6 (Forum Supporter) said:

As a (very) small business owner, the people that ask for a discount are going to be a pain in the ass. Either now or later. Fire them as customers and wait for the good ones 

So much this.  The ones that want to pay the least always expect the most.

I hate dead-cart emails. Mostly because we frequently get them saying "you seem to have forgotten X item" when I know berking well it wasn't in my cart, if I even looked at it.

That ish is a very prompt way to lose me as a customer.

That's a decision of the vendor. The email can be legitimately for products that you have in your cart for (selectable period of time), or they can be products you visited. Ours is set up (or will be when I get this new system online) to ask if you need any extra info about the parts in your cart, 2 days after you put it in there. Maybe we can answer questions. The default is something like 3 hours is may make sense for a shiny commodity impulse buy, but thankfully that's not our market. Like magazine blow-ins, these followup emails aren't popular but they really do work.

When I was working as a flight attendant, the worst passengers were the ones who had paid the least for their tickets. And it's not just on airlines...

You guys need some learning about haggling

wae said:

If it's a sizeable purchase, I'll always ask if they'll knock off something if I pay in folding money. 

I had to check but my average sale is about $1k and I am not sure why anyone would give a cash discount unless they want to do some things under the table. My time is worth money and depositing cash wastes that and the additional few % is already baked into the cost of doing business, so no real gain to be had (again unless avoiding uncle sam). My point is as a business owner, sometimes this gets annoying. I do ONE sale a year and honestly, I will likely not do it in the future. Now every day is Black Friday pricing  or Presidents Day Sale! or whatever ploy. 

It's only a sale day if you let it be :)

I can see the rationale for a discount for cash sales. Credit cards and associated overhead will cost you 2.5-5%, and if you're already doing cash then the additional burden of an extra transaction is zero.

Some people will pay $20 for a $10 they need.
Some people will pay $10 for a $20 they don't need. Unfortunately, there are lot more of these.

I'll take a discount.  But I also try to deal with the mom and pop stores if possible to cut out the big box places.  Yesterday I decided it was time for granite countertops.  HD quoted me $3700.  I went to a place it town and negotiated a bit and got what I wanted for $2200.  They are still making money (maybe not a fortune but it's better than a poke in the eye) and I paid cash on the spot.

Tom1200 said:

In reply to z31maniac :

Reading posts like this makes me happy I'm not our main software buyer, although the services I contract for do soemtimes involve software. I tend to loathe the industry's tactics. My experience, albiet limited, has been it's like pulling teeth to get answers to direct questions. The legal departments seem to drive a good bit of this. Third party resellers exacerbate the issue even further. I do understand it's driven by a history of competing companies being less than ethical.............. Nevertheless I still find it annoying.

You may have misinterpreted my post. The customer who uses our software for their various websites, use the tactic of everything is always is discounted, lots of SALES!!! 

They sell high-end home wares.........it's the place you find in the fancy areas of town where you can buy a $300 toaster that's been marked down from $400.

I have no idea how the pricing for our actual software works, I just assume it's expensive!

Keith Tanner said:

Abandoned cart emails do work. But you don't need to throw a coupon in there and force your customers to play games to get to the expected selling price.

It's part of a larger marketing strategy - some people like a higher "normal" price with a discount, some people like to be shown the real price right from the start. The "mark it up and put it on sale" technique definitely works on the short term and on commodities but I personally think it backfires in the long run and it annoys me so we choose not to do it.

This.

The larger mechanism here is called market elasticity.  It's incredibly hard to nail down that metric.  It's basically a big subsection of economics that deals with trying to find the perfect price that maximizes both sales and profit.  That grocery store shopper card in your wallet?  It has nothing to do with discounts or customer loyalty.  It has to do with calculating market elasticity.  Pay attention to how the use those discounts.  One week you'll have generic peanut butter for $3 and JIF for $4, but the JIF is $3.50 with a shopper's card.  Then the next week, there is no discount on the JIF, but the generic is 2 for $5.50.  They're trying to determine what the price difference should be between generic and JIF to make people buy one or the other.

This has been the age-old thing.  Some markets, the customer prefers the negotiation (cars) and sometimes they just want the best price up front. (WalMart)  Ever notice how Saturn tried that "this is the price, take it or leave it" thing?  People hated it because they didn't know how much they were getting screwed on the retail part.  But if people had to negotiate for daily staples, imagine if you discovered the marshmallows you negotiated for $1.50 at WalMart you neighbor negotiated for $1.  You'd be miffed that something as simple as marshmallows were a commodity.

I have an app for Amazon that tracks the price of things.  Amazon does a similar thing.  It's like a mini stock market.  Supply and demand.  They adjust the prices of things to keep them moving.  Just last night I bought a backup camera for my van that had been in my shopping cart for three weeks.  It was $89, then went to $79, and it dropped to $74 which was the lowest price it had ever been (according to the app).  THEN checked out.

I worked in several Operations departments for HD.  Total eye opener.  Home Depot averages anywhere from 2-7 cents profit on a stick of dimensional lumber.  We know that we don't make money on the 2x4s you buy, we make money on the screws, the impact driver, the paint, and the floor tiles you buy to go with it.  The rental department makes next to zero profit, but the fact that it brings people in the door and they buy all the associated things to go with the rental, it pays off.  Appliances and Tools are really the only departments where we made significant profit margins.  All of the departments made money, but 80% of the store was cheap eye candy to get you in the door and buy other things.

Also, pro tip.  Cashiers at HD are allowed to mark down up to $50 without manager approval.  I recently bought one of those Milwaukee pack-out tool systems.  It was about $200.  I grabbed one and told the cashier I needed a price check because it was just sitting in an aisle, and I told her "if this ends up being $150, I'm buying it."  Sure enough, she marked it down to $150.

Lowe's does a similar thing, but they're not quite as liberal with it.

Abandoned cart emails are good for the retailer not only because they help make a sale, but also because it can berk with inventory. 

The percent off emails for an abandoned cart... Well, I'll sometimes abandon things that I want but don't need on purpose to see if they'll come. Then if they do, I'll search online for it cheaper. But that is always for something that is commonplace, or else NOS that is no longer available anywhere else and I know they're looking to close it out. There is no point in doing that for a turbocharger from FM. 

Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) said:

Keith Tanner said:

Abandoned cart emails do work. But you don't need to throw a coupon in there and force your customers to play games to get to the expected selling price.

It's part of a larger marketing strategy - some people like a higher "normal" price with a discount, some people like to be shown the real price right from the start. The "mark it up and put it on sale" technique definitely works on the short term and on commodities but I personally think it backfires in the long run and it annoys me so we choose not to do it.

This.

The larger mechanism here is called market elasticity.  It's incredibly hard to nail down that metric.  It's basically a big subsection of economics that deals with trying to find the perfect price that maximizes both sales and profit.  That grocery store shopper card in your wallet?  It has nothing to do with discounts or customer loyalty.  It has to do with calculating market elasticity.  Pay attention to how the use those discounts.  One week you'll have generic peanut butter for $3 and JIF for $4, but the JIF is $3.50 with a shopper's card.  Then the next week, there is no discount on the JIF, but the generic is 2 for $5.50.  They're trying to determine what the price difference should be between generic and JIF to make people buy one or the other.

This has been the age-old thing.  Some markets, the customer prefers the negotiation (cars) and sometimes they just want the best price up front. (WalMart)  Ever notice how Saturn tried that "this is the price, take it or leave it" thing?  People hated it because they didn't know how much they were getting screwed on the retail part.  But if people had to negotiate for daily staples, imagine if you discovered the marshmallows you negotiated for $1.50 at WalMart you neighbor negotiated for $1.  You'd be miffed that something as simple as marshmallows were a commodity.

I have an app for Amazon that tracks the price of things.  Amazon does a similar thing.  It's like a mini stock market.  Supply and demand.  They adjust the prices of things to keep them moving.  Just last night I bought a backup camera for my van that had been in my shopping cart for three weeks.  It was $89, then went to $79, and it dropped to $74 which was the lowest price it had ever been (according to the app).  THEN checked out.

Would you mind sharing the name of the app for Amazon you're using?