alt text

three rows with a barbecue on the left and William Wallace in Braveheart on the right.

In the first row, captioned Wednesday, the barbecue is labelled “$899.99” and Wallace says “hold”.

The second row, captioned Thursday, depicts the same.

In the third row, captioned Black Friday, the there is a label with $1099.99 struck through with “$899.99” written underneath, and Wallace charges.

edit: grammar

  • I take screengrabs through the year of products I’m interested in and keep records. So I tend to see when they raise their prices in early November, only to drop it to just above the original price for their Black Friday “deals”.

    Really there needs to be changes in consumer law to tackle this. We either lost a bunch of legal protection after Brexit, here in the UK, or the retailers realise they can get away with it. Amazon is really bad at this. So are the really big tech retailers.

  • @RotatingParts@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    English
    261 year ago

    The only way to know if a Black Friday price is good is to know the usual “regular” price of the item. That takes planning to jot the price down a month or more in advance and then wait to see what the Black Friday price is. It’s all a game.

    • jaamulberry
      link
      fedilink
      141 year ago

      Also using plugins like camelcamelcamel can help with this. Shows you a graph of history for prices

      • @keylogthis@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        English
        31 year ago

        I use Keepa, same type of thing, and I’ll just set it to notify me when it reaches the desired low price again. I rarely buy anything unless it’s on sale prices now.

  • @tilcica@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    1851 year ago

    in slovenia we just passed a law that requires shops to state the price change of an item in the last 30 days :)

    • Vincent Adultman
      link
      fedilink
      51 year ago

      Brazil’s consumers rights department listed itens prices so stores can’t fake advertise them. Countries with regulations: ok, we can do Black Friday, but…

      • Jamie
        link
        fedilink
        51 year ago

        I like how for all the problems Brazil has, the consumer protection laws are consistently some of the best around.

    • @ximtor@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      131 year ago

      I think its a thing here in norway as well. Thats why they just increase the price in early october, just a month ahead of black week bullcrap. Have seen plenty of electronics “super discounted” to the same price they had in september/october

      • @Mnemnosyne@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        111 year ago

        It might actually work if the requirement was a year instead of 30 days.

        Also mandate minimum font size for it and that it must be displayed along with the current price anywhere the current price appears.

        • @Localhorst86@feddit.de
          link
          fedilink
          91 year ago

          I honestly think 1 year would be too far back to be actually relevant to the current price, but I can see a 3 month period being a good middle ground.

      • @ohlaph@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        61 year ago

        Big items I usually start watching a few months out. If I see a store or brand that pulls tthis garbage, I simply go elsewhere. If I can’t find it on offer, I buy it regular price at the smaller retail store.

    • @ximtor@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      291 year ago

      I think its a thing here in norway as well. Thats why they just increase the price in early october, just a month ahead of black week bullcrap. Have seen plenty of electronics “super discounted” to the same price they had in september/october

    • GregorTacTac
      link
      fedilink
      91 year ago

      Oh wow that’s cool! I’m from Slovenia too and I didn’t know that.

  • kamen
    link
    fedilink
    51 year ago

    That’s why you don’t buy in a rush but rather track the price of something you’re interested in buying over a couple of months.

    • @MrShankles@reddthat.com
      link
      fedilink
      3
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      What’s up with this product price of $99 for a “re-usable straw” that listed near the beginning for me

      It’s list price is $99,999 with an average of $68,267.48?! I obviously wouldn’t be purchasing from that vendor for many reasons; but how easy is it to manipulate prices for a website like this? Or maybe it’s a vendor that’s trying to make the website seem useless? Or just a one-off?

      Idk, it caught my eye right off the bat though lol

    • Einar
      link
      fedilink
      31
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      For anyone who is unaware of what this refers to, it is this website:

      https://camelcamelcamel.com/

      The website describes it’s services like so:

      Our free Amazon price tracker monitors millions of products and alerts you when prices drop, helping you decide when to buy.

  • Dettweiler
    link
    fedilink
    English
    221 year ago

    That exact model was $599 in October. I would know, because I bought one.

    It’s actually a really great smoker, but the app is terrible.

  • Years ago, in October I wanted to buy a new TV, my wife said we should wait for black Friday but I just bought it anyway. I keep checking the price day after day and the price of it keep rising slowly every day, until black Friday when it had a 40% sale off and was still more expensive of what I paid two months before.

      • @MashedTech@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        11 year ago

        Oh… Im so sorry to hear that. Second thing I do is check the second hand stores near me. I have one that validates their products and offers a 1 year warranty on the second hand stuff I buy from them, and it’s kind of awesome. They even rate the quality.

    • @Evil_incarnate@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      231 year ago

      That’s why I live in the EU, and they have to include the lowest price in the last 30 days with the “discount” price.

        • @GoodEye8@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          51 year ago

          It’s a relatively new (became applicable in 2022) thing called price indication directive. The TLDR is what the other guy said, the only addition is that member states can set different rules for certain goods.

          • baltakatei
            link
            fedilink
            31 year ago

            Wouldn’t a loophole be to relist something to include some extra trinket with the main product (e.g. lens cleaner with a camera) and argue the “new” listing is something completely different than before?

            • @MrShankles@reddthat.com
              link
              fedilink
              51 year ago

              Or raise the price 31 days prior, and “drastically discount” it after. It seems like a cool policy in theory, but it also sounds like it doesn’t really have any teeth. Like a “political theater” kind of law. But who’s to say, maybe it could be someone’s poli-sci thesis some day.

              Or I’m just dumb and don’t understand something fundamental about it; I also except that

              • TheSaneWriter
                link
                fedilink
                English
                21 year ago

                It seems like a difficult thing to regulate. I hope that this can be a starting point that will be potentially expanded later as needed, but we’ll see.

      • @MrShankles@reddthat.com
        link
        fedilink
        41 year ago

        So if you raise the price 31 days prior, and then put the discount on, you should still be good to squeeze more profit!

          • @MrShankles@reddthat.com
            link
            fedilink
            21 year ago

            Maybe the 30 day decrease in profit would be worth the additional units sold later (possibly at a slightly elevated price), due to the marketing of a perceived “deal”.

            I guess there’s a lot of variables that could come into play (type of product, inventory, how many units need to sell over a time period to break even, etc), but it doesn’t seem implausible, so much as it does dependent. But idk, I still can’t figure out how the fuck magnets work, let alone accounting

      • Nah, it is. It’s the same as folks who scream about how easy it is to be scammed on Amazon. It’s rare and if you are getting tricked into buying fakes every order the problem is you.

        Shopping for deals really isn’t as hard as you all make it seem.

  • @irmoz@reddthat.com
    link
    fedilink
    701 year ago

    These transcriptions are getting incredible. I never would have thought it was possible to accurately convey a comic through text, while keeping the meaning and humour intact.

      • @idiomaddict@feddit.de
        link
        fedilink
        91 year ago

        You really did a great job, plus thank you for that website. Minor correction: struck through, not striked. Striked is only for baseball, afaik

        • @MrShankles@reddthat.com
          link
          fedilink
          41 year ago

          I kinda assumed it would still be “striked through”, or maybe “stricken through” because of the typographic term “strikethrough”. But “struck through” also seems like it could be correct

          I’ma need an expert typographical linguist to weigh-in on this matter. The world needs an answer

          • @idiomaddict@feddit.de
            link
            fedilink
            2
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            Struck is simple past, stricken is the past participle. It’s the same pattern as “write, wrote, written.” Striked through is not “right” here, but at the same time, it’s a totally valid way to say it in various dialects, so that’s right enough for most purposes. In my dialect, workers might have “striked,” but that’s also nonstandard.

            Just a regular linguist, which means I’m obligated to make it really clear that prescriptivism is bullshit, but does really simplify things for non native speakers

    • GigglyBobble
      link
      fedilink
      181 year ago

      This year especially it feels, prices actually went up for Black Friday. They don’t even care anymore.

      • ares35
        link
        fedilink
        4
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        there’s a couple decent deals on basic laptops… that aren’t shit-tier specs, either. that’s about all i’ve seen–but then, i haven’t been “looking” either. rent keeps going up, can’t afford anything so i don’t even bother to look at ads and sales on things that aren’t absolutely essential to simply exist.

        i do plan on going to wm on friday… but later in the afternoon–for a few groceries.

    • @MeatsOfRage@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      81 year ago

      It definitely does, I’ve already made out pretty good on a couple things but you have to know the actual price well in advance and shop outside of Amazon