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Mass merchandisers mislead customers over cartridge pricing

Issue #0817/2 – In-store merchandising materials can be very misleading. TCPglobal has uncovered a couple of outrageous examples of apparently deliberate attempts to make consumers believe that the in-store offer is good value and that they are getting a good deal. One of the stores involved is Asda, a Wal-Mart company.

Asda HP57
Here we find some genuinely discounted products, falling either close to Manufacturers Recommended Selling Price (MRSP) or up to 18% below. For instance, Hewlett-Packard’s HP.57 tricolour cartridge, with an MRSP of £25.99, is priced in at £21.34 in Asda – a 17.9% discount.
However, the Lexmark #33 cartridge is a completely different story. Although it is priced slightly below the MRSP of £15.93 at £15.04, after a knock-down from £15.94, the implication is that the consumer is making a £9.05 by not buying the cartridge from PC World.
Asda Lex33

So, Asda is actually selling the cartridge at a minimal 5.6% discount from MRSP but claiming that PC World is selling it at £24.99 – 57% above MRSP and 66% above Asda’s actual price. The accompanying photo is too small to read the section where the claim is made, so an enlargement has been provided to clarify the claim.

This sounded so unlikely that we checked out the price at PC World and were told that the in-store price is £15.99 (5 pence above MRSP!) – and yes, they are in stock for collection!

(All inc. tax> HP.22 HP.57 Lex #33
MRSP £12.99 £25.99 £15.93
Asda £12.26 £21.34 £15.04
PC World £12.99 £21.99 £15.99

Mass merchandisers have a long history of selling ink cartridges at prices above MRSP or List, and of not passing on savings to customers when the manufacturer reduces pricing. Essentially, they are a law unto themselves and will price a product at whatever level they feel they can achieve the sales they require. But, misinformation is not the norm and to claim that a competitor is selling a product at a price that is 57% higher than the actual price is absolutely shameful.

Without the deliberate misinformation, WH Smith in the UK is also guilty of misleading customers into believing that they are buying a good deal when they offer cartridges on a ‘Buy 1 get 1 half price’ deal.

WHS HP57

However, here the price charged for the individual cartridge is just so high that even the price under the special offer is unbelievable.

WHS HP22
WH Smith’s advertised price on the HP.57 is a staggering £44.99 – 73% above MRSP! This brings the price per cartridge on a purchase of two cartridges down to £33.74 - 30% above MRSP.
Similarly, the HP.22 cartridge is priced at £25.99 on the shelves (exactly double the MRSP!!). Under the special offer, buying two cartridges would only bring the price down to £19.99 per cartridge – still 54% above Hewlett-Packard’s MRSP!
(All inc. tax) HP.22 HP.57 Lex #33
MRSP £12.99 £25.99 £15.93
WH Smith £25.99 £44.99 £33.99
= each cartridge £19.49 £33.74 £25.49
WHS Lex33
But – taking the crown for ‘overpricing of the year’ – is WH Smith’s billing of the normal price of the Lexmark #33 cartridge. This is sold at £33.99 for a single cartridge, bringing the cost per cartridge down to £25.49 on a purchase of two.
This means that the shelf price for a single cartridge is a stupendous 113% higher than Lexmark’s list price and, under the offer, the price per cartridge still works out at 60% above list price.
When I can buy this product for £14.08 at PC World Business, why would I pay £25.49 each for two cartridges or, even worse, 33.99 for a single cartridge??!
~End~

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 29th, 2008 at 12:00 am and is filed under Supplies, Pricing, Issues. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.