BOGO Black Friday Sale Poll - How would you handle this transaction? 1 1

[Real Frantic One]

Just went to a LCS for a Black Friday BOGO sale, and I'm curious to see what everyone's thoughts are on this.

Edited November 24, 2023 by Real Frantic One

[CAHokie]

The right thing to do is buy one $50 book get one $50 book free, the same with the $3 books.  What I figure they will do, is charge you a $100 and give you $6 worth free. 

[stormflora]

Is it you selling, or an actual store? Because it's super easy to circumvent with two separate receipts. One for the $50 comic + bonus, and one for the $3 comic + bonus.

Having to pay for two $50 books and getting only two $3 books is an awful move and deserves contempt.

Edited November 24, 2023 by stormflora

[Axelrod]

Not sure why this would even be in question.  It would be ridiculous to say that only the $3.00 books are "free."  And if the store tried to say, sorry, that's the way it works, then the answer would seem to be to just not buy the $3.00 books.  Or make two separate transactions. 

Yes?   

[Real Frantic One]

On 11/24/2023 at 2:47 PM, stormflora said:

Is it you selling, or an actual store? Because it's super easy to circumvent with two separate receipts. One for the $50 comic + bonus, and one for the $3 comic + bonus.

Having to pay for two $50 books and getting only two $3 books is an awful move and deserves contempt.

This doesn’t involve me as a seller, which is why I proceeded this by saying I went to a LCS. I’ll explain why I’m asking this question later.

[wombat]

I'm sorry, but to not take off $53 would be a complete DB move. I would just say no thanks. Get back in line with the two $50 books and laugh the whole time. 

[DeadOne]

In my opinion, if you are buying those 4 items in one transaction, of course the 2 least value items would be the free ones.

But why put yourself in that position anyway... just make it 2 separate transactions.

However, a good clerk/owner, knowing the customer could just make it 2 separate transactions anyway, would just ring it up separately without having to be told to do so.

P.S... my wife thinks it should automatically be $53, so what do I know.

Edited November 24, 2023 by DeadOne

[wombat]

So if someone walks up with ten $50 books and ten $3 books people think the right answer is to make the guy get in line 6 times?

Edit: So my numbers of trips is not right, but you get the idea. 

Edited November 24, 2023 by wombat

[fmaz]

I 100% believe that anyone who goes to check out at a busy store with a BOGO sale with that set of four priced books gets what they deserve, sorry. It is a very generous deal, but the sale does require the buyer to do a bit of basic math.  And while people are of course correct about what the store SHOULD do (and, I believe, would do if before checking out the buyer pointed out what they’d picked out and asked that they be treated as two separate transactions), I think most sales people are just trying to keep the line moving and playing by the rules of the sale.

I guess what I’m saying is, if you found yourself in that situation - buy the two $50 books (get one free) and be happy about it. Live without the two cheapies until your next visit. I don’t think the $3 savings will impact you either way.

 

[ChiSoxFan]

I've gone to the grocery store before, and when BOGO free things ring up, it's always the lesser of the items that show up free, so if I'm buying packs of chicken and grab 4 of them, the two lesser priced ones are the ones that will come off of the receipt.  But that's a chain store with automated registers, and as has been said, the way to circumvent it is to do two separate transactions (or in the case of the above-referenced chicken, when my wife and I shop and get a deal like that, we tend to get things priced as close to one another as possible to avoid that issue).

A comic shop, presumably operated by someone who has more command and say in how policies are enforced, is a different story.  If it were my shop, I'd go with the "one of the $50 books is free and one of the $3 books is free", but that's just me.  When I managed a KB Toys store many moons ago, that was the way I handled anything that was in BOGO free sales (and I had the authority to do so).  As fmaz hinted at above, it might be an instance of an employee (and not a store owner) who's trying to abide by the "rules" of the sale to avoid getting themselves in trouble, and if it were me, to make sure I got the discount as a customer, I'd be buying the 2 high-priced books and ignoring the cheap stuff to make sure there wouldn't be an issues.

Usually in retail, BOGO free things are limited to items that are all the same price (like buying 12 packs of soda at the local Winn-Dixie) to avoid these type of situations.  It's a reason that, no matter how big of a discount I offer in my sales threads, I don't do BOGO free offers -- too much of a headache to deal with. 

[fmaz]

On 11/24/2023 at 4:29 PM, wombat said:

So if someone walks up with ten $50 books and ten $3 books people think the right answer is to make the guy get in line 6 times?

Edit: So my numbers of trips is not right, but you get the idea. 

Your maximum register trips (or splitting the transaction) would always be two. Big ticket books in one transaction, small in the other. Regardless of how many. Just make sure you are getting an even number of each. 

 

[wombat]

On 11/24/2023 at 4:36 PM, fmaz said:

Your maximum register trips (or splitting the transaction) would always be two. Big ticket books in one transaction, small in the other. Regardless of how many. Just make sure you are getting an even number of each. 

 

Depends on how many books and how much they are. If you have two $50 books, two $40 books, two $30 dollar books and two $3 books you would certainly need more than two trips. 

[shadroch]

If the clerk/owner insisted on the letter of the law, I'd put back the two cheapest books.  If it was the owner/manager ringing it up, I'd give him a piece of my mind.

[Real Frantic One]

OK, so here’s what prompted the question. I drove about 40 minutes to get to this store today for their sale. I’ve known the owner for a few years and only been there when he’s run 40 or 50% off sales before.

I told him I’d probably be putting together a stack of books and was curious how he was running this. So I asked him this question from the poll and he said he would just make the two $3 books free.

I looked through his inventory and focused on books closer in price ($20 - $65) as I didn’t want to put a $100 and $1 book in the same stack. Picked up about a dozen books and ended up getting about 44% off.

The thing is, if he would’ve matched equal value books together, then I would’ve bought more. There’s a lot of stuff I saw $10 and under I would’ve picked up, but he didn’t seem open to pairing up books or ringing it up as two separate transactions. It wasn’t some big deal to get a discount on those books for the most part. But it was going to take discounts away from others to buy them due to how he was running the sale.

I don’t understand why matching up equal books would be controversial to anyone. If you’re having a BOGO of EQUAL or lesser value sale, why take it off the bottom and discriminate against a buyer who wants to purchase more books than two? Doesn’t make any sense to me as it’s a disincentive to buy more.

If a store owner is opposed to matching up books of equal value for a BOGO sale, it would be better to run two sales at once. Make all books under $10 BOGO and take a percentage (30-40%) off anything above that if you can’t afford to do 50% off everything. That way you can clear out lower priced inventory and encourage people to buy more of it, while pulling in those looking for higher value books. Or a buyer may be more likely to do both as I was.

This is the second time I’ve run into this with a BOGO sale. Used the strategy above there too. One interesting thing I noticed: When I’ve gone to V Stock for their sales, they have paired items of the same value as I suggested with no problems. Like I said, this seems like the most logical way to do it.

[BigLeagueCHEW]

Buy the 2 $50 books, walk out, come back in for the 2 $3 books 

[Cat]

It's not rocket surgery. The letter of the law may be $100, however good customer service and customer goodwill is $53.

 

[Buzzetta]

If the owner wanted to ring up the two $50 books to get a total of $100 and give the two $6 for free I would do two separate transactions.  If he then declined it, I would shrug and walk. 

Lego does gifts with purchases if you reach certain thresholds in ordering.  If they are giving a free set for any order $200 or more and I am picking up two $100 sets, I do not check both sets out at the same time and only get one free gift with purchase, I do two separate checkouts to maximize my purchase. 

I would do the same thing here. 

[s-man]

I am guessing that the sale does not include any big keys?  Can't imagine buying a Hulk 181 and getting a GSXM for free.

[shadroch]

What was so important about the $3 books that you walked away from taking advantage of a great sale?

[stormflora]

On 11/24/2023 at 10:55 PM, BigLeagueCHEW said:

Buy the 2 $50 books, walk out, come back in for the 2 $3 books 

Yeah... Not sure why this was so hard for OP. It almost sounds like the $3 book was more valuable than the $50 book, and OP couldn't afford to miss out on both.