Be Careful…. American is No. 1 Sales
Today I saw a very interesting advertisement in a local newspaper. The ad is about a new car model from one of the largest car manufacturers. It is published in one full page. There is a picture of a very nice car in the middle of the page. Just below the picture, there is price information; it is written “from $13.000*” (I forget the exact price).
I said to myself, wow… it is a very good price for such a nice car. But wait a second… there is * sign next to the price. There must be something wrong (just like many advertisement from American). Ok, I look at the bottom of the page. There is a paragraph written in a very small font so that we can hardly read it. It is written that the price of $13.000 is for different model. The model shown on the picture is about $18.000.
What the h*** is that? They put a picture of a product and then write the price below it, but the price is for different model. Am I too stupid or are they too smart? Yeah… I hate this kind of marketing. Unfortunately, this kind of ad is very often in North America. Another thing that I don’t like here is the fact that they exclude tax from the price list. If we see price list on American shops, we can expect that we will pay more. Not to mention, there might some other hidden costs.
When I live in Germany, if we buy something, the price we have to pay is what we see on the price list. An interesting fact, they have a law that requires every restaurants to put their food price near the entrance door. The purpose is, of course, to allow the customers checking the food price before they eat in that particular restaurant. The written price must already include tax. This is actually very good practice, especially from customers point of view.
Well… every country has different way of selling something. My advice, if you see an advertisement in North America: read carefully the small text at the bottom of the page. You will find the “truth” there. If you buy an expensive products, like car, make sure you know the final $$$ you have to pay. Don’t get surprise at the end…. 