Oh how I despise HAGGLERS!

[Sarlon]

I sometimes ENJOY haggling, Theres a store here in town that I often go to. I chat with the owner (small mom and pop store), often bring in my friends who have never been there before and often splurge on a new dragon.

Now I will go in there quite willing to pay full price (sometimes I can't afford full price but shes nice), and we get to chatting, and she knows my love of dragons as she carries mostly oriental things (kimono's, vases, all sorts like that), and have gotten sometimes as much as half off from the actual ticket price.

Shes been in business 25+ years now, and sees me often...I don't demand anything and have actually helped her sell things on ebay.

Case in point....a VERY nice fairly LARGE dragon statue, VERY nicely crafted....but it was $50...WELL out of my price range at the time...and I was christmas shopping.

She gave it to me for $25 ^_^

[I_Hate_SCs]

The other problem is that if you do it for them once, you are telling them it's OK to do it again, and again and again. Each time it will get worse and more ridiculous!

Exactly. You'll give them a valid discount now for a chip or a crack in a product, but next time they shop at your store they'll say "But last time you gave me a discount, gimme gimme!" when the item they want discounted has a speck of invisible dust on the inside of it!

[Mike Taylor]

Certain international customers that I deal with also seem to think they can get a bulk discount by buying certain products in quantity. Frequently for me, the product they are looking to buy is an iPod. My employer has a contract with Apple that is such that the prices are so set in stone that not even employees get a discount on them.

[Mara-chan]

I had a guy say this to me as I was crossing the parking lot to enter my store. (keep in mind we're a major office supply store and I was in uniform).

<SC> You have <item, I forget what> in store for $80. Will you take $40?
<me> Um... no.
<SC> *storms off* No wonder you people are doing so bad in this economy.
<me> *totally confused* huh?
<coworker> Did he just ask you for a discount? He just tried us too.

First, Staples is actually doing the BEST of any of the office supply stores in this economy.
Second, we wouldn't be if we gave half off of our items. Not many items have 50% markup.
Third why would you ask a working IN THE PARKING LOT for a discount?
Fourth, If one worker said no, why ask another?

[mattm04]

Certain international customers that I deal with also seem to think they can get a bulk discount by buying certain products in quantity. Frequently for me, the product they are looking to buy is an iPod. My employer has a contract with Apple that is such that the prices are so set in stone that not even employees get a discount on them.

With Apple if they say sell iPods or whatever at X you will sell it at X or else you will never sell Apple stuff again. Apple in a nutshell.

[smileyeagle1021]

With Apple if they say sell iPods or whatever at X you will sell it at X or else you will never sell Apple stuff again. Apple in a nutshell.

that and on the actual iPod stores are doing well to have 10% mark-up... I worked at a place where the employee price was store cost plus 10%... the iPod I was going to buy ended up costing MORE on the employee price than retail (needless to say I purchased it on a separate purchase without my employee card )

[Mike Taylor]

With Apple if they say sell iPods or whatever at X you will sell it at X or else you will never sell Apple stuff again. Apple in a nutshell.

Exactly! The same rule applies to game consoles and handhelds from Nintendo, Microsoft, and Sony.

[Dreamstalker]

With Apple if they say sell iPods or whatever at X you will sell it at X or else you will never sell Apple stuff again. Apple in a nutshell.

Games Workshop has a similar contract IIRC (cannot discount past a certain amount). GameStore owner would regularly demand that I break contract to sell the stuff...no. The sellers that have X [typically an older item that nobody wanted anyway] for $5 are individuals. As it's fairly obvious which store we are, they will find out.

[Pagan]

SC: But.... but you can't sell things for the listed price.

I would've loved to hear his reasoning on this.

Military Discount Day (where they expect us to not only GIVE AWAY our product, but give us the discount using the military status of a FAMILY MEMBER, not themselves)

To be fair, sometimes is does apply to the immediate family members.

[Danno]

I had a guy say this to me as I was crossing the parking lot to enter my store. (keep in mind we're a major office supply store and I was in uniform).

<SC> You have <item, I forget what> in store for $80. Will you take $40?
<me> Um... no.
<SC> *storms off* No wonder you people are doing so bad in this economy.
<me> *totally confused* huh?
<coworker> Did he just ask you for a discount? He just tried us too.

First, Staples is actually doing the BEST of any of the office supply stores in this economy.
Second, we wouldn't be if we gave half off of our items. Not many items have 50% markup.
Third why would you ask a working IN THE PARKING LOT for a discount?
Fourth, If one worker said no, why ask another?

You're being way too logical about this. Markup doesn't exist to that guy.

I'm firmly convinced that many people have a child's conception of economics: Whatever you sell an item for is exactly how much profit you make. Sell something for $10 and you make $10! Prices are purely arbitrary, set at the amount the person doing the selling wants to make.

So you see, you should've been happy to make $40 on a sale rather than nothing! How stupid of you not to sell things for a half or even a tenth of their normal price and avoid receiving money!

[Becks]

You can haggle on many things second hand
<snip>
Of course these are general guidelines, there are bound to be exceptions.

True.

I'm sure there are some secondhand stores where a person can haggle.

I, however, did not work at one such.

You know, I don't even haggle at garage sales.

[CrazedClerkthe2nd]

You know, I don't even haggle at garage sales.

Then you are in a large minority, most people I know will try to get ridiculously low prices on stuff (i.e. a nice crystal platter for 10 cents) at yard sales and such.

[Hon'ya-chan]

Right now, i'm having the same problems with any Twilight books.

At one point, we ran out of 3 of the 4 titles, and all we had left were some slightly beatup copies of Twilight. No other store in the system We put them onto the floor just to get rid of them.

The "winner" had to be the person who asked for a 75% discount cause there was a tear on the cover. I told her that either she gets the book now, or I can sell it to another person who's desperate enough to pay full price.

She bought it begrudgingly.

[Mara-chan]

True.

You know, I don't even haggle at garage sales.

If someone had a brand new car at a garage sale for 50 cents, my grandma would try to talk them down to a quarter...


...and usually get it too.

[BJD]

Government Sanctioned Haggling?

Unfortunately haggling annoys me to no end.

Back in 1995 David Tsubouchi was the Minister of Community and Social Services (responsible for welfare and similar support programs) in Ontario, Canada. At one point during his tenure, he actually suggested to the media that people in low income situations should "learn to haggle" and he used the example of "asking for a discount on dented cans of tuna".

You can probably imagine the uproar that this lead to and a number of store owners ended up giving media interviews talking about how they had caught people denting cans on purpose or removing labels before going to the cash register to engage in a little bit of "government sanctioned haggling".

BJD