Hiding watch/ jewelry price tags

[Yarster]

So, my sister in-laws' graduation is approaching and my wife and I decided to get her a nice watch as a gift and did the usual search at department and mall stores to get an idea of what we might want to select.

Sure enough, every store we went to, we would find a watch we liked in a display case, then have to go track down a clerk, get them to open the case, and lift up the watch to expose the tag that said the price.

In one store, a single clerk was trying to help us and a number of other people at the jewelry counter next to us, and was getting noticably pissed off about having to run back and forth getting things out.

So to anyone who ever worked in retail, explain to me the logic of hiding the price of the watch/ jewelry. Since 95% of the time, you lift the watch and I find out it is WAY out of my price range and you just end up putting it back. You are just wasting both our times. Why not just display the price, let me decide if I like it based on that price, and THEN I will come bug you to open the display case?

[Doctor Jackson]

Why not just display the price, let me decide if I like it based on that price, and THEN I will come bug you to open the display case?

You just answered your own question. They don't want you to make that decision on your own. The merchant knows he has a better chance to "sell you up" if you have the merchandise in your hand and have a salesperson in your face telling you how good the item looks on you. It's the same reason a car salesman will pressure you to take a test drive. It's to get your hands on the product - to get you physically involved in the process - while they play the mental sales game.

It works for them, so don't expect it to change.

[Lissa]

Jewlery stores also want to have the air of class, and having exposed prices, in a way, sort of lowers them to the level of a Wal-Mart-type establishment. Big, exposed price tags are thought to be tacky.

[Fyodor]

The price of these big ticket items are negotiable in smaller independent stores.

Dress yourself to project fashionable dignified poverty, ask for the best price they can give you before you see the tag, and then politely, radiating deep regret, walk slooowly away.

That's how I got a $2600 Cartier watch for $1800. They still made money.

[Yarster]

All good points you bring up, especially with cars and negotiable price items. But in a department store where everything is fixed price (less perhaps a minor discount if I sign up on the spot for the store credit card) I would argue that the clerk spends so much time taking things in and out that relative to what they'd otherwise sell, it can't be the most efficient use of their time. And sure, maybe they are able to upsell you on some items, but how many lost sales are there in turn from people like me who walk past a watch, wonder what it costs (not realizing it was much cheaper than what I would have guessed), and walk away because I assume it's too expensive and don't feel like getting a clerk to help me.

[Doctor Jackson]

Having worked in retail the first half of my adult life, I can tell you that the "hidden price" policy on high ticket jewelery items works. Believe me, the retail industry has spent much time and money analyzing customer behaviour and best sales practices. The results of these studies are rapidly spread around the industry, which accounts for the similarities one sees in store layouts, sales techniques, and product placement throughout the country.

Retailers can tell you:
-which direction most consumers turn when entering the store (right)
-what shelf level (height) will produce maximum sales for a particular product
-how the layout of the store affects profits

and a host of other tidbits that most consumers have never considered.

Again, I submit that if the hidden price strategy was not hugely successful it would not be so widely used.

[handy]

With real estate, they give a price but they don't tell you where it is. You have to call them & ask.

[Devil In Disguise]

Al Zheimers said:
Dress yourself to project fashionable dignified poverty, ask for the best price they can give you before you see the tag, and then politely, radiating deep regret, walk slooowly away.
How does one dress to project fashionable dignified poverty? Do you wear the frayed tux? Don't clean your diamond tiara? Get your clothes at the Beverly Hills Goodwill? I have never heard the term "fashionable dignified poverty" and can't imagine what that is. Course my idea of dressing up is wearing Dockers instead of jeans, so I don't really run with the fashionable crowd.