I hope Moonlitherial’s store sends her some internet coupons for aspirin.
It’s okay, I’m Canadian we can buy codeine (theme of the week!)
Well for one, I am not paranoid, I just don’t like all my personal information, name, address, DOB, phone number, plus all my purchasing history to be available to some random company that has no vested interest in my privacy. I get that you’re confused by the concept of targeted marketing. You say you don’t give a shit about anybody knowing about the massive quantities of vitamin water you get. Great. But let’s say you have scanned that loyalty card for all of the prescriptions you’ve purchased, all the condoms, yeast infection creams, cigarettes, diet and weight loss pills, ibuprofen, “male enhancement” pills, etc.
So when they’re going through the aggregate data, they see that sexually active males with smoking habits and poor self esteem, weight issues and small penises also get a lot of body aches (ibuprofen purchases). The next time you scan your card, you might get half a dozen coupons for Ben Gay muscle rub, nicotine patches, chemically activated ice packs that don’t need to be frozen, $2 off a subscription to “Self Help” magazine, and Kimono condoms (size extra small). It’s not just that you buy a lot of vitamin water, the goal is to create a whole profile of you and who you are and what you buy, so they can try and sell you more things, and different things. And all of that information is tied to your phone number, your name, date of birth, and your address. So suddenly it’s not as benign as it seems.
Listen, I’m not some crazy tin-foil paranoid conspiracy theorists. These are data mining companies and their goal is to find out what sells. If that doesn’t bother you, great. It bothers a lot of people, and the fact that they have become so prevalent that they are artificially jacking up the prices of products so the appearance of “saving” a couple bucks per purchase justifies an intrusion into your purchasing habits and privacy is irritating to many.
PS: When I was referring to ads, I was talking about web browsers who inject targeted ads into your browsing that is based on where you have previously visited, as a similar activity that I find intrusive and annoying. When I talked about loyalty cards, I was referring to targeted marketing that occurs as a result of the tracking of purchase histories.
I’ll give a personal example of how annoying this is. One time, my mother was in town and wanted to stop by CVS to grab a couple things. I gave her my CVS card to scan when she made her purchase. Turns out she bought a bottle of Beano during her trip. So every week for like 3 fucking years I would get a coupon for Beano printed out with my receipt. Apparently the purchase of Beano one time on my card fucked with their algorithm so badly that they assumed I needed it nearly constantly, and were constantly printing coupons for it for years afterward. Yeah, just throw it away, I know. But it was a constant reminder of “we know everything that you’ve ever purchased, ever”.
Mine, too!
Observe right of way. If I’m in the main aisle and you’re on the secondary aisle, stop! Don’t just barrel out into the main aisle. It’s just like driving. Hell, it is driving.
I think tumbleddown is describing the same problem with the situation reversed, i.e., the pedestrian exits the secondary aisle without yielding to the motorized cart in the main aisle, and so I think we could just both sum up by saying, yield right of way.
Or it could mean that they can function more efficiently, with less spoilage, greater inventory turnover and more cost-effective advertising.
In other words, it does NOT necessarily mean that you wind up paying more for their system.
No, you DON’T necessarily have to pay more for the system to work. Not if it means that they can operate their stores more efficiently. I would think that this would be pretty clear.
I’m not sure why “increased sales” is being substituted with “operate more efficiently”, but:
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2005/loyalty_cards.html
So yes, everybody is paying more when stores institute loyalty cards.
The efficiency possibility had occurred to me. However, I don’t see how having individualized data would increase their ability to do this over simple aggregated data. In other words, for this purpose, knowing “last month we sold X number of these and Y number of those” should be just as useful as knowing “Person A bought 3 of these and person B bought 4 of these…”
As for your other points, “greater inventory turnover” and “more cost-effective advertising” both boil down, ultimately, to more money coming out of my pocket and going into theirs.
Yeah, I’ve heard people bitch and moan about the ads that loyalty cards cause for years but I don’t think I’ve ever gotten a single one. I’ve got cards for the local grocery store, Best Buy, Rite Aid and (for the time being) Borders. None of them tailored the ads towards my purchases. And any ads I was sent were general purpose ads.
My local grocery started their loyalty card about twenty years ago and I knew a ton of people who worked there. The story they told the public and all of the workers in the stores was that they were bringing out a loyalty card (it wasn’t standard practice then) to save money versus the very expensive color circular with coupons they had to print up every week.
There are two things you’re missing from your equation
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The point of target marketing is to figure out what I want and try to sell it to me. Look, I’m going to get advertising anyway. Why wouldn’t I want advertising that targets me, specifically, and informs me about things I’m probably most interested in. Worst case, I ignore it just like all the other advertising out there. Best case, I try something I’d never have tried and like it.
I know…you’re thinking worst worst worst case where I actually buy something and don’t like it. That’s happened a billion times before and it’ll happen a billion times afterwards. Fact is, no one forced me to buy it. I wanted to. -
No one needs to know shit about you if you don’t want them to. Make up a fake name, a fake phone number, a fake address and go to town on the savings confident that you’re giving the marketers what for.
And don’t comment on my using an EBT card. Some very nice people go through bad times.
Anyone who pulls that shit when I am on line behind them will get a very loud running commentary on their inability to read, count and follow the rules. And the cashier will get on on allowing people to pull that shit.
Unfortunately, getting on the cashier is pointless. They are usually told not to say a word when people have an overage of items on the express lane. Leave the poor cashier out of it. Generally he/she isn’t permitted to turn the person away.
I guess the point of this “debate” is that some people care and some don’t. Personally, I love them tracking my purchases and giving me discounts. While dieting last year I was using an OTC product that cost 70 dollars per month. It was no cheaper elsewhere. After the first purchase, once a month I received a coupon for 10 dollars off that product. I also receive a percentage of my purchases back each quarter and “extra bucks” coupons to use that reduce prices further. Yesterday I used a coupon for two dollars off any two shampoos, (my preferred brand on sale for buy one get on 50% off already) one dollar off excedrine, (on sale for 2 for 4 for the 24 count) five dollar extra bucks and a 35% coupon for all regular priced items. I left with two bags of merchandise and paid just over five dollars total. CVS can track me anytime. 
Man I hated that too when I was stocking at my local grocery retail store, at least I had the courtesy of putting skids and l-carts out of the way (on the side, next to the shelf spaces that wasn’t being shopped over).
I once got a notification of a food recall printed out on my grocery receipt because they knew I’d purchased the item in question, due to my using a shopper’s card. I mean, those five jars of Spaghetti-Os (don’t judge me) probably wouldn’t have killed anyone anyway, but I wouldn’t have known about the recall without the notice on my receipt. Yes, I know that’s not what the shopper’s cards were originally meant for, but it’s a nice little side bonus. And I don’t care about the targeted ads either. I’m going to get ads either way so they might as well be targeted.
One of our largest area chains has loyalty cards, but you don’t need one to get a discount. You simply tell the cashier you don’t have one, and they’ll automatically enter a universal loyalty card number. Works for me!
Bakery bulk bins? You mean not all bakeries have them? All the supermarket bakeries in my area have them. Or a bulk case 
I don’t even know what a ‘bakery bulk bin’ is. Do you mean the plastic boxes they keep the various flavors of bagels in?
No one is.
This doesn’t sound all that awful. I’d rather see ads for condoms, than, say, tampons. One I don’t use nearly as much as I’d like, but the other has no use for me at all. Seriously, this is the worst case scenario? More targeted advertising please!
Evil fuckers. How dare they want to know what sells. Knowing that might actually help them serve their customers better. I hate that. Oh wait, this info will compel me to buy (apparently I lack free will). That is evil.
You have a cite for this? Is this any different to jacking up the prices of products so the appearance of “saving” a couple bucks per purchase that they did before loyaly cards?
Yeah. Not really analogous, are they?
The horror!! Beano coupons on my receipt are the work of the devil!
Or it might be. I generally don’t pay much attention to my receipt. I might be missing those evil coupons offered to me.
This annoys you? Really? A coupon for something you probably won’t use? Eliminate loyalty cards and you’ll still be receiving a coupon for something you can’t use.
Listen, I don’t know what beef you have with me over this issue, it’s clear you don’t give a shit and I do, so trying to convince me that they’re doing it “Oh so they can better serve their customers!!!” is a waste of time and incorrect to boot. Their goal is to make more money off you, period.
I’ve actually posted the cite twice, but you’re clearly not interested in reading it or the portions which I quoted in my posts. So whatever.
Yeah, because I said that they’re evil. :rolleyes: No, I said it’s annoying. And facilitates them learning how to better exploit their customers in order to sell them more shit. You’re fine with receiving targeted ads because they “help them help their customers more”. I have sat in on corporate discussions for providers of loyalty cards, I can assure you they are not talking about how “awesome it would be if we could just make our customers save more money!”. They’re talking about how people who use cards spend on average 24% more per visit to the store than shoppers who don’t use loyalty cards. And how if they see you buy brand name X product, and offer you a coupon for Store Brand X product, their profit margins will increase by 36% when you likely buy that product instead of the brand next time. They are also not discussing the best ways to safeguard your privacy.
Yeah, it annoys me because I value my privacy and don’t generally like when companies resort to invasive tactics to improve their bottom lines. You obviously don’t give a shit, which is fine. But others have expressed annoyance that it has become standard practice for every store to do this, and I concur, for the reasons I have outlined above. You disagree, fine. But don’t put words in my mouth like I’m some crazy “coupons are evil” person. I have legitimate concerns about it, and don’t like that it is such a ubiquitous practice.
You seem to be missing the fact that marketing is a two-way street. The store wants your money and you want the items you need.
If they give me a coupon for something to try it, they obviously think they have a superior or at least similar product to the competition. So, I try it (since it is cheaper for me in the short term). If I like it and it is cheaper than my normal brand, then it is a win-win. They make more money from me and I get to save a little. If I don’t like it, then I won’t buy it next time.
And they track your purchases. How evil! They track the purchases of the people who typically buy here so they can keep their stock correctly (which reduces overhead and is how most grocers keep prices down). Since they are tracking the ‘regulars’ (since non-regulars typically don’t have cards) the things you buy every week will be there when you need them.
I just don’t get how this is a privacy issue (sign up as a name that is not yours with an address that is not yours).