When a gallon is not a gallon

Now two people want an answer to the same question:

And where would you post that info?

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom
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OK. Pick a different product and proceed with the same question. How would you inform customers of the size change?

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

One of your last three sentences doesn't belong with the other two.

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

I've seen a lot of 4 pound bags of sugar. In what way can you call these 5 pound bags?

Maybe you'd have needed 4 gallon cans of paint before. You still need

4 gallons of paint. You bought too little (4 56-ounce cans).
Reply to
Mark Lloyd

I think the theory going around here is that the size change is sneaky unless the customer is somehow notified. The clearly printed numbers on the package aren't enough. Two better methods would be:

- Change the package. Sell sugar in a pyramid-shaped container with a spigot on the side.

- Send a representative to the customer's house to explain the size change.

:-)

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

Because it deviates from normally accepted standards/practices.

Lets say that you have been driving through "Smithville" every day forever. One night "Smithville" changes all of the speed signs to reflect a speed which is now 20 MPH lower.

The next morning you are driving through "Smithville" and are pulled over for speeding. The officer points out the new signs and then issues a ticket. Would you accept the ticket, plead guilty and pay the fine or protest it because of lack of notice?

Or lets say that you have been parking in "Brownville" forever to do errands etc on your way home. The "Brownville" parking rules have been free parking after 6PM forever. They change the rules without any announcement and you find a $45 ticket on your car. Would you pay it?

Reply to
George

You are the CEO at Breyers. You're about to shrink your ice cream containers. How would YOU notify customers?

Nobody else is involved. Just you. Whatever idea you have for notifying customers, your employees will make it happen. Describe your idea(s).

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

JoeSpareBedroom wrote: ...

More appropriately, you're CEO at Breyers and your input costs owing to fuel and milk have risen 20%, health care ancillary costs for employees and salaries by 30% and you're still in competition w/ all the others for shelf space in the markets and customer share. How do you maintain market share and still have an acceptable margin?

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Reply to
dpb

Mr. Room, I can see by your responses that you and I are on the same side of this discussion, so this response is for the benefits of others, not a direct response to you.

re: I think the theory going around here is that the size change is sneaky unless the customer is somehow notified.

3rd try at getting this across - they were notified! Maybe a picture will help...

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Reply to
DerbyDad03

Exactly. Not only that, but you (and some supermarkets) have some of the most advanced data processing methods available, and you know for a fact that you move a LOT less ice cream when the price approaches $4.00 per half gallon (old size). So, you have a choice: Leave things as they are, raise prices, or shrink the package.

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

clipped

I was an occasional Walmart shopper back in the early days. It was tough to compare prices because it seemed that stuff at Walmart was packaged differently that the same brands in other stores - stuff like detergent, shampoo, etc. I didn't shop Walmart often enough to become familiar with pricing, and I think I quit while they were still on their "Made in America" line. In one town I lived for a few years, Walmart escorted out of the store some shoppers who had been writing down prices so's they could compare. That was when I quit Walmart. One of my last purchases at Walmart was a gallon of paint remover, because other stores were out of stock, at $7 more than the same size, same brank I had purchased locally a couple of weeks before.

Reply to
Norminn

"New Family Size!" (to reflect the size of new families)

"Economy Size!"

"More miles to the gallon!"

"Healthy pack!"

"Doctor approved!"

"Fewer calories!"

"Less filling, more taste!"

There's really no limit...

Reply to
HeyBub

Those ideas are as shitty as the so-called "deception" which some are complaining about in this discussion.

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

quoted text -

Are you really expecting an answer to those questions?

If I must...

To keep it simple, here's a short program I wrote:

PSL =3D Posted Speed Limit DS =3D Driver's Speed IF DS > PSL Then Driver Guilty of Speeding

How would you like it to read?

PSL =3D Posted Speed Limit DS =3D Driver's Speed IF DS > PSL Then If Driver has been driving the route every day forever then Driver Not Guilty of Speeding Else Driver Guilty of Speeding

Gimme a break. The town has no *obligation* to inform drivers of a change in the speed limit or of the parking rules. Would it be nice if they did? Sure. Do they try to do it in most cases? Sure. However, it's the obligation of the person driving the route or parking his car to read the signs and follow the rules or risk paying the consequences. Just like it's the obligation of the shopper to read the labels and determine for themselves how much they're getting and how much they're paying for it.

Ya know, by your logic, we shouldn't have to pay the same price for the smaller package because they didn't tell us beforehand. Let me know how that works out for you.

Reply to
DerbyDad03

PSL = Posted Speed Limit DS = Driver's Speed IF DS > PSL Then Driver Guilty of Speeding

How would you like it to read?

PSL = Posted Speed Limit DS = Driver's Speed IF DS > PSL Then If Driver has been driving the route every day forever then Driver Not Guilty of Speeding Else Driver Guilty of Speeding

================

Nice, but you forgot to close your loop with an ENDIF or something. :-)

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

Oh, but they wouldn't reduce the size of their containers. They've said that. They'd raise the prices.

It seems like only about three people in this thread understand the reality of the situation: People as a general rule shop for cheapest price, period. They buy the cheapest "gallon" of paint they can find, because it's cheaper, plain and simple.

It's only later on when, "Hey this isn't a gallon! It's 3-3/4 quarts! I've been ripped off!" No, you're not being ripped off, you're an idiot for not doing your homework!

Reply to
mkirsch1

Oh, but they wouldn't reduce the size of their containers. They've said that. They'd raise the prices.

It seems like only about three people in this thread understand the reality of the situation: People as a general rule shop for cheapest price, period. They buy the cheapest "gallon" of paint they can find, because it's cheaper, plain and simple.

It's only later on when, "Hey this isn't a gallon! It's 3-3/4 quarts! I've been ripped off!" No, you're not being ripped off, you're an idiot for not doing your homework!

======================

It would be interesting to know what those three people do for a living. I always ask, because I suspect their work is completely disconnected from the financial issues of their employers.

Reply to
JoeSpareBedroom

That's a great idea as long as the labels for all the packs of sugar (lets say) use the same units for the price per unit. The laws may vary form state to state, but what I have seen often is Brand X's unit price in cents per ounce and that of Brand Y next to it in dollars per pound. Of course one can do the conversion, but that surely isn't what the instigators of unit pricing had in mind.

(At least if they do that kind of thing in a sensible country that uses the metric system it's only a matter of adding one or more zeros or moving a decimal point.)

Moreover, the stores often don't post revised unit pricing labels when an item is on sale: the shelf tag still shows the regular price.

Perce

Reply to
Percival P. Cassidy

The speed limit illustration demonstrates another result of decentralization and letting every little tin-pot community make its own rules. When I was growing up in UK there was only one speed limit: 30mph (with some clearly posted exceptions, such as within x feet/yards of a hospital entrance, where it might have been 20mph or less). So it was

30mph or unrestricted. If there was "a system of street lighting" (defined, ISTR, as a system of lights spaced not more than x feet/yards apart -- so a solitary street light miles from anywhere didn't count), the speed limit was 30mph unless otherwise indicated. If there was no such "system of street lighting," there was no speed limit, unless otherwise indicated -- and that indication had to be repeated by miniature speed-limit signs spaced not more than x feet/yards apart. None of this one speed limit sign hidden behind bushes at the township limit and a police officer lurking around the next bend with a radar gun. (Later they introduced a 40mph speed limit, some areas going from 30mph to 40mph and some going from no limit to 40mph. BTW, one survey showed that drivers often slowed down on going from a 30mph zone to a 40mph zone: a 30mph limit was too low to be taken seriously, but 40mph was reasonable.)

In New York I used to drive one stretch of road quite often. The road conditions and population density were about the same, but the speed limit varied from 40mph to 25mph to 35mph to 30mph, depending on the whim of the particular village's legislators. Ridiculous!

(I just remembered that in one or two places in the USA I have seen advance warning signs reading "New Speed Limit Ahead.")

Perce

Reply to
Percival P. Cassidy

Damned sure I'll protest. Good chance I'll beat it also based on historic renderings of most traffic courts. .

Reply to
Edwin Pawlowski

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