Sofa for sale! But can you trust the discount?
Just seen an advert for Harvey’s The Furniture Store’s sofas. The small print flashed on screen and I thought I’d spotted something, so using the joy of hard-drive recorder instant rewind there it was. Very naughty ‘price framing’ indeed…
What you see in the ad…
You see a woman sitting in a recliner sofa, with a discount Tinkerbell-esque fairy bouncing around and a big sign above it saying:
Extra 10% off. Now £399.”
What you hear…
The voice over says:
This luxuorious recliner has an extra 10% off, now £399 – hurry and beat the VAT increase.”
What the small print says…
In the bottom left hand side it says:
Was £899,
£459,£399,£449.”
In other words, this sofa that’s been ‘reduced further’ used to be priced at the same price they’re selling it for now, and was INCREASED after that, only for the company to decrease it again now and promote that as a sale.
What we don’t know is how long it was ever at those past prices (rather a short time at the more expensive ones I suspect). The clever use of the strikethroughs in the small print is meant to make you only focus on the £899 price and see a long list of other prices (probably required for legal reasons) but hidden in there is the truth.
Related past blogs:
The marketing genius of Tesco double points
Genius marketing: Part 1 – free credit on your mobile
Genius marketing: Part 2. DVD bargain buckets – priced for browsers not seekers
