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Post by revisedartlily on Jan 1, 2011 9:26:41 GMT
I always said I wouldn''t have another one after our last experience 20 years ago. It was so ugly, people trying to bargain me down from $1 to 50c on baby clothes that were nearly new, stuff being nicked etc.
However, with MIL's death we have so much stuff to dispose of. Have given all the fabulous clothes to the charity shops and lots of stuff away. But there is still loads, so next week we will go for it. Am already dreading it.
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Post by aubrey on Jan 1, 2011 11:02:12 GMT
Good luck.
I'd never try to bargain at a garage sale or even a market. The one time I did it was accidental - actually, two times. Both accidental (just asking about something, or making conversation; and the thing was either reduced, or thrown in with another thing I had bought).
Bargaining seems a bit off to me. When I worked in a place selling bubble wrap, we always used to get people from some countries who tried to bargain. We thought, it says in all our guides to your places that you're supposed never to accept the first price: doesn't it say in your guides that the first price is the price, and we don't like bartering? I always wanted to say, "You're not in a bloody Souk now!"
It was worse when people wanted to have the VAT off, in return for not having a receipt. I thought this was a bloody cheek - how were we to know they weren't VAT inspectors? We did give discounts, but never let people off VAT.
(Anyone Japanese got a discount: for the poor reason that some Japanese people did, and I could never be sure that the Japanese person standing before me wasn't one of those: this being a way of saying that I sometimes got them mixed up with each other. But I didn't mind giving them discounts, as they were all so nice. One very young woman (she was probably about 40, but looked 16) once gave me some amazingly good Japanese chocolate biscuits: nearly all chocolate, in the shape of a tree stump, with a little bit of biscuit.)
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Post by aubrey on Jan 1, 2011 11:11:52 GMT
God, I went on a bit there, didn't I?
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Post by revisedartlily on Jan 1, 2011 11:30:56 GMT
No, you were interesting and I loved it. Thank you!!!!
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Post by Weyland on Jan 1, 2011 12:24:00 GMT
No, you were interesting and I loved it. Thank you!!!! Seconded. |
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Post by Patrick on Jan 1, 2011 12:38:27 GMT
I think it's a great shame we don't "bargain" anymore. It used to be part of our culture, and perhaps it's a sign of our cowering attitude towards rules and regulations that we've ended up as we are. It's also partially why the title of "Rip Off Britain" has been applied so readily over the years. My achievements in this area have happened by accident too. There's a shoe shop in the next town along (Independent) that shares my surname. Buying a pair of boots there a couple of years ago I handed over my debit card and jokingly said "Any chance of a discount for family?" - and they did!
The Welsh are great bargainers. I think the ability to sell their Grandmother is in built into their genes for some reason. The Wicked Welsh Witch of the West I once lived with battered a double glazing sales person down by £1500 once. It was acutely embarrassing at the time. Although perhaps an indication of how much the things cost to make!
If you're buying a telly or other electrical item they say you should always try for a discount - Our chain stores are quite capable of knocking a few tenners off - it's just that people never bother asking. Better to chip away at their profit margins than let it be sent to some political party or whoever the boss donates millions to.
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Post by jean on Jan 1, 2011 15:17:17 GMT
I think it's a great shame we don't "bargain" anymore. I don't - I hate it! I think there should be a level playing field so that the cheekiest people don't always get the best deals and the polite and diffident (like me) don't always end up paying for them. (Good bubblewrap story, aubrey. If you want somewhere to go on a bit, what about here?) |
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Post by housesparrow on Jan 1, 2011 15:33:14 GMT
Shopkeepers hate it too, Jean. They loathe being asked for discounts, especially when they charge someone full price and are then told "Oh, you knocked something off for a freind/relation/neighbour last week, I assumed you'd do the same for me."
Just imagine if people tried to do that in the supermarket queue. And where would we be if we were able to negotiate with automatic tills?
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Post by aubrey on Jan 1, 2011 16:19:06 GMT
There's a weekly overheard conversations piece in the Guardian, and one was of a bloke on a mobile phone, talking while paying for an item at PC World and trying to get something knocked off (he was at the till: not the right place to haggle): anyway, he didn't get his discount, and said into the phone, "I'm at PC World - they wouldn't give me a discount - it's a dead loss here - as bad as Argos."
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Post by Patrick on Jan 1, 2011 16:34:02 GMT
Well, at the last minute is probably not the best time to do it - but nevertheless the large retailers do have a flexibility of price that means you should at least have a go, they make extortionate enough profits off the back of (probably) slave Labour elsewhere so why should they keep it? Anyone heard the tales of the factory in the far East where they make a load of Apple stuff and other top end laptops, phones and PC's? Where they all sleep upstairs from where they work on long shifts for little pay? The factory where a number of "staff" threw themselves off the roof one year to escape the drudgery of their lives there? That's why it's your duty to get something knocked off your purchase from Curry's or PC World etc. Because the retailers don't deserve it!
Of course, the downside of haggling in those circumstances of course, is that the retailer will then just try and beat down it's manufacturing costs all the more - causing more suffering to those who put the stuff together.
So you can't win really.
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Post by Weyland on Jan 1, 2011 16:35:33 GMT
"I'm at PC World - they wouldn't give me a discount - it's a dead loss here - as bad as Argos." I worked at Comet for a while, and their policy is strictly no discounts, unless you want, say, six TVs for a b&b or similar, or you're buying a LOT of stuff in a single deal. And then it has to be decided by the branch manager and nobody else. I'm happy with that. Some customers can be unbelievably obnoxious in the bargaining department. Occasionally so bad that security had to be summoned to escort them to the door. But I see they've done away with on-site security now. Go figure. |
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Post by jean on Jan 1, 2011 16:37:32 GMT
the large retailers do have a flexibility of price that means you should at least have a go, they make extortionate enough profits off the back of (probably) slave Labour elsewhere so why should they keep it? Don't fool yourself that your paying less will somehow turn into a better deal for the slave labour! |
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Post by Patrick on Jan 1, 2011 16:52:56 GMT
the large retailers do have a flexibility of price that means you should at least have a go, they make extortionate enough profits off the back of (probably) slave Labour elsewhere so why should they keep it? Don't fool yourself that your paying less will somehow turn into a better deal for the slave labour!Hence my last paragraph.  |
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Post by jean on Jan 1, 2011 17:00:18 GMT
You can gain a little advantage as an individual customer, but only at the expense of other individual customers. That's no position for a socialist to take. |
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Post by riotgrrl on Jan 1, 2011 21:43:28 GMT
No. Haggling is WRONG. I refuse to do it.
You tell me what you want for something. I'll say yes or no.
That's how it should work.
I especially despise that school of thought that somehow, if we are abroad somewhere that everybody haggles, we should all do it 'because it's what's expected of us'.
My life is too short to spend ten minutes haggling with an Indian scarf-seller over an amount of money that's the equivalent of £1.
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Post by everso on Jan 2, 2011 0:11:34 GMT
I'm not keen on haggling, although Mr. E. will often ask for a discount.
Similarly, when I see "sale" items, especially at this time of year, it angers me because it's obvious how much profit retailers make on normal sales. You can bet that they aren't losing out on their sales items either, so just what is the normal mark up on goods?
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Post by revisedartlily on Jan 2, 2011 4:38:49 GMT
Problem is, now that so many "current affairs" style progs. have done stories on how easy it is to browbeat or charm (depending on one's style.. ;D) the seller into knocking a bit off, the retailers are now almost forced to add on a bit to allow for that. So, as Jean points out, those of us who don't haggle get the rough end of things.
I like the idea of a fair price for a fair thingy ( object or service).
I know a wealthy woman who boasts about how the Eastern European lady who cleans her house and has poor English skills, does it for nearly half the going rate. It is hard to not be very noisily horrid to her when she says this stuff.
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Post by housesparrow on Jan 2, 2011 7:53:59 GMT
Problem is, now that so many "current affairs" style progs. have done stories on how easy it is to browbeat or charm (depending on one's style.. ;D) the seller into knocking a bit off, the retailers are now almost forced to add on a bit to allow for that. So, as Jean points out, those of us who don't haggle get the rough end of things. The only time I ever ask for a discount is when buying walking gear. Millets, Blacks, Cotswold and other outdoor chains give 10% to Ramblers Association members, and some of the smaller shops do too. I hate asking, but the prices in the independent shops are usually more expensive anyway. I blame Alan Sugar and his "never buy at the first price" rule. Those poor shopkeepers! There should be a law against it. It leaves those of us who refuse to haggle with the choice of spending considerably more by supporting a local shop, or playing safe by buying from the big chains where haggling is not an option. |
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Post by Weyland on Jan 2, 2011 10:54:33 GMT
No. Haggling is WRONG. I refuse to do it. You tell me what you want for something. I'll say yes or no. That's how it should work. I especially despise that school of thought that somehow, if we are abroad somewhere that everybody haggles, we should all do it 'because it's what's expected of us'. My life is too short to spend ten minutes haggling with an Indian scarf-seller over an amount of money that's the equivalent of £1. Agreed 100%. I remember trying to haggle at a street market in 1968 Croatia -- in Split, it was -- for a hand-carved wooden letter-knife that probably cost about 6d (2.5p). The vendor just said "You like?! . . . You BUY!!" I bought. Still use it. |
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Post by aubrey on Jan 2, 2011 11:12:07 GMT
At the bubblewrap place we did not have a huge mark-up. people thought we did because our bubblewrap was quite expensive: but it was good bubblewrap; it was the kind that pops when you squeeze a bubble (with the cheap stuff the air would go into an adjacent bubble), and we had to explain this. We did sometimes sell stuff at less than cost.
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