So getting an ad with a sale price is a bad thing? You certainly still have the choice of following up on the ad or not. It's boils down to being responsible for your control over impulses and purchases.
Maybe it's run differently in other parts of the country but all the cards I've gotten were mailed to the house ... not issued in the store.
At any rate, I didn't think I'd get much traction, but I figured I'd at least raise the issue.
Back to woodworking. I posted some bowls, candlesticks and a pen tonight. Not that any one here is a likely customer. And I found an acceptable public domain icon for the category.
Bill
While I am a privacy advocate, I'm not sure what dangers there are on pure loyalty cards. Store-based credit cards do allow purchase tracking of individuals, and yes they do analyze your purchase habits.
Stores like Home Depot, Lowes etc., like to be able to target offers based on your previous purchases. But they already have your credit information.
A big danger with any store that uses credit cards is the danger of their database being hacked (like TJ Max). That's my biggest concern.
A pure loyalty card is a different issue. If there's no credit card info associated with it, then they can analyze your purchase habits as an individual (which is easy), or they can try to correlate your name and address with other database entries (which is very very difficult).
Think about tracking a woman's name before and after marriage, and the many variations. Think of nicknames, juniors, etc. It's hard to correlate data based on names and addresses.
I think it's more likely that tracking of an individual account gived them insight of "typical" users.
For instance, I have two loyalty cards for a bookstore. I only use one, but get e-mail to both. The account I don't use gets better coupons.
But as I use it, it tells them which coupons I respond do. I'm much more likely to buy a paperback book when I have a 25% coupon (w/no minimum purchase), than if I have a %15 coupon with a minimum purchase of $20.
When I worked in Haz-Mat response one of my duties was to inspect the local gasoline terminal. LARGE tanks filled with gasoline piped in and stored by Ashland Oil, no other company. A tank truck would come in and fill up with gas and then go to a series of pumps almost identical to a self serve gas pump. The driver would put the nozzel into the tank and swipe a "credit" card through the machine at which time the pump would dispense a preset mix and amount of additaves to the tank. The mix would depend on who it was going to, Gulf, Shell or Mom and Pop etc. and grade of gas. The people who ran the tank farm told me that you bought the same "gas" no matter who you bought gas from, but you could only get the additives from one brand depending on which additives you wanted. JMTCW
If they track what I buy at the grocery store, it's gotta bore the crap out of them.
Besides, I'm starting to think that in many retail corporations these days the mentality is well on its way to being too damn stupid to use the results of any "tracking", not to mention that they routinely fool/screw themselves if that's the case.
For instance, last night I bought Atlantic Salmon, normally around $8+/lb, for $4/lb because it had been mis-tagged "Catfish", and rang up that way at the register, not to mention there was another $1.60 off "catfish" for cardholders.
I mean, if you work in the meat department and can't tell the difference between salmon and catfish??
Similar things happen two or three times a week at this one store. As I mentioned before, recently at this same store we "saved" over $400 on 36 bottles of wine because they repeatedly, and mistakenly, included a $17 bottle of wine in the display at the front of the store for their "Six pack wine special" for cardholders.
And that was the third time they've done the EXACT same thing in the past year ... a "savings" to me alone of over $1200 for the three occurrences.
At those savings, they can track away all they want ... besides, preponderance of junk mail these days is pre-approved credit card offers and tool catalogues from places where I've purchased online, nothing on wine, or catfish, yet. ;)
No kidding and an excellent example of your observation that you run into a lot of people that are educated way beyond their intelligence. Typically in the past, a store or relatively small company would contract with an outside computer company to handle all their computing needs and inventories. As the computer became more accepted in business the tasks were turned over to the store employees but the out side company still controlled/provided the software and how the computer would operate. Many of those in management positions would be clueless with what to do with all that available data the was at their disposal. Many grocery stores are just now starting to catch up with where the automotive industry was 20 years ago concerning the use of the computer. It's funny to walk into a store and realize what is going on and what you are watching is how we used to do it in the old days.
A classic case of not being procedurally organized and not having a safe guard in place to prevent costly mistakes.
>
My dad has stories of using that drip gas in Oklahoma when he was a kid. One included spending the nights at a well to keep an eye on it and having to start up some of the pumps on a cold night. Pull the spark plug out and heat it up with a lit match, screw it back in real quick and start cranking. I have used the match trick on several occasions on some of my 2 stroke yard tools.
That's true, because "gasoline" is basically a specific chemical compound.
But, as you noted, the difference, which can indeed effect "quality", is in what is added, or not added, down the line.
That said, as a kid we used to burn what was called "condensate" or "drip" (captured in 55 gal drums _at the well head_ from wells on the property) in the farm vehicles ... this "unrefined" gasoline obviously had NO additives whatsoever, but did the job.
AAMOF, my grandfather and uncles burned "drip" in their trucks to no ill effect that I can recall.
That is funny. A typical example of people just going through the motions. Both the meatcutter and the clerk did not notice (or know) the difference between catfish and salmon. Which has got to be some kinda cultural meltdown for a Southerner.
A question, do southern boys really eat salmon? Ain't it blasphemy to eat that Yankee fish? :)
I don't dare tell my wife about the great wine six pack special. She would drive all the way to Texas to take advantage of those kinds of savings.
And to think that you saved $1200 on wine this past year..........., and never invited any of us over.
Where is that famous Southern Hospitality? ;)
I never was much up on wine either but now that I have to closely watch my blood sugar I find that I can drink a lot more wine than beer or liquor. I usta prefer and only drank Fosters and straight whiskey. Now it's wine and sugar free popsicles for dippin. ;~)
If you live near the gulf coast you'll eat just about anything that comes out of the water. Even those minature Lobsters.
Krogers offers a similar deal. IIRC 6 bottles gets you a 10% discount.
Sheeeeit... that ain't yankee fish. That's Western fish, which is OK for us. Yankee fish is like the famed bluefish from the East River, which bears an amazing similarity to water soaked Charmin.
Welcome to my home. Now get out.
You're thinking Pacific salmon, there's also Atlantic salmon, but they're mostly farm bred these days.
East River blues taste that good do they? Improvement over the last one somebody put in front of me.
Try this Salmon recipe:
Salmon Wrap
Take a fillet of Salmon
Section in pieces small enough to wrap in Prosciutto slices Wrap each salmon section in at least 2 Prosciutto slices.
Cook on a medium hi heat 2 to 3 minute a side in 2-tblspn olive oil
1-tsp butter.Side serving suggestion
Microwave steamed asparagus or corn of the cob
French Bread and butter.
Markem
We never had salmon as kids because it simply wasn't available, and I never cared that much for it until I finally learned how to cook it ... which is to hardly do so at all. ;)
I now have it about once a week.
It was such a rip-off to the store that I felt kind of bad at first, but that didn't last very long.
As each day passes I'm more and more convinced that penalizing stupidity is about the only way to discourage it, and if you're that damn stupid to keep repeating stupidity even after it costs you, you need to pay through the nose!
In Texas if you advertise something at a price, you must sell it at that price and even offer rain checks unless it is clearly stipulated that quantities are limited. In all three cases all that was limited was the time, as in "offer good thru mm/dd/yy".
SWMBO actually got two rain checks, each signed by a manager on duty at the time, and they were honored after only a very brief struggle. ;)
They haven't made that mistake again for a few months now ... and believe me, I'm watching.
It must be rampant ... I was listening to Tom Martino in the truck this morning and damned if they weren't talking about the same thing: "corporate retail stupidity"!
Snip
Ok, I just got a image of your wife struggling on the floor with the manager of the store after having knocked down every can good on both sides of isle 13. ;~)
;~) Let me know if they do.
Yeah, is there anything bacon can't do?
That may be because I'm reliably informed the East River bluefish IS water soaked Charmin. Maybe yours was a local variety known as a Striper. They have whitefish and brownfish as well. Hell, they even got silverfish.
Man, that sounds good!
Definitely going to give that a try. Thanks!!
Most wine stores have discounts when you buy 6 or more.
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