The Price is Right?

 

In our Marketing Research class, Omar announced that major companies will display different prices online depending on various factors.  Why had that never occurred to me before?  I did a little research and found an article in the Wall Street Journal about it.

Part of me feels infuriated but then another part is screaming, "Genius!"  Of course I understand that a Big Mac costs more in Jackson Hole, WY than it does in Bozeman, MT.  Why wouldn't those same pricing tactics be used for online goods/services?  This seems like a very sophisticated way to for a company to be focused on segmentation and targeting. 

Immediately I start wondering how I can use this information to my own advantage.  I'm selfish like that.  My husband and I need to book airline tickets to Durban, Africa this August (words of advice:  drinking too much at a fundraiser makes bidding on that African Safari seem like a brilliant move).

The information provided in the article claims that the location of the device makes a difference.  

  

 

It was also determined that the type of device being used to search was a factor.

 

Browsing history is also taken into consideration.

 

 

 

This means there is only one thing for me to do.  Does anyone have an antiquated PC with all the cookies deleted that is set up in the lowest income area of Montana that I could borrow? 

Lullaby and Be Terrified??

Fairy tales have been always been a part of our culture.  Who hasn't heard about Cinderella, The Three Little Pigs, and Robin Hood?  But have you ever heard of Heinrich Hoffman's 1845 bedtime classic Struwwelpeter?  And I thought Brothers Grimm was scary!

I remember being at a Girl Scouts meeting where we were learning about Germany.  The guest speaker, a holocaust survivor, decided to regale us with a fairy tale from her homeland.  ABSOLUTELY HORRIFYING!  This particular story was about a child that lacked proper hygiene and refused to cut their nails.  Ultimately someone graphically cuts their fingers off.  Yep.  I am pretty sure I quit Girl Scouts shortly after that.
 


That's what little girls get for playing with boys!

 Here are some other morals found within the book: A girl plays with matches and burns to death. Another child who won't stop sucking his thumb has them cut off. A boy refuses to eat his soup and starves to death. But the violence in Struwwelpeter is not unusual for children's books from the early nineteenth century. 

Chapter 14 of Consumer Behavior describes how myths function in a culture.  I believe these stories  provided both a sociological and psychological function for the culture of that time period.  These stories definitely involve binary opposition by assuring young readers that if they don't obey their parents something really AWFUL will happen to them. 




Cry your eyes out!

Personally, I am glad that our culture has "softened" and we don't feel the need to frighten our children into behaving.  Believe me, telling them that if they don't behave then their electronics get taken away is scary enough.

Sweet dreams!



Paramount lesson of firearm safety:
 Evil rabbits will steal your guns if you're negligent...

College Tuition Ain't Got Nothing on Summer Camp!

When you are done paying off your student loans I would recommend saving for your future children's Summer Camp expenses.  WOW!  Most are listed at around $250/week but some (of course the ones my daughter likes most) are $400 and up!!

Cute Ad highlighting the plethora of choice options

But that is not the real problem here.  The larger problem as a consumer of these services is that fact that there are so many choices!  I took time off of work to attend Bozeman's annual Summer Camp Roundup.  I left with a bag FULL of pamphlets and registration forms for various options around town.  There is art camp, horse camp, nature camp, swimming camp, gymnastics camp, animal shelter camp, theatre camp, survival camp, bible camp, and actual camp camp.  And so much more!!

Geez.  No pressure here!

I literally spent hours with these pamphlets spread around my kitchen counter and trying to map out my daughter's summer experiences.  "Do you like this one or this one?"  To which she responds, "I like them both!"  This conversation repeats itself the entire afternoon.


This experience made me think of the dilemma Barry Schwartz had in the book The Paradox of Choice when he just wanted to buy a pair of jeans.  Are we really better off by weighing all our options and scrutinizing every decision?  Ultimately, I am sure my daughter would have just as much fun swimming and she would riding horses.

Even with the chapter Keeping Doors Open from Predictably Irrational fresh in my mind, I still could not eliminate options from the table.  I agree with the authors advice that we should just "flip a coin and move on" yet I still kept our options open.

Finally we made the selections and filled out the piles of release forms.  Still unable to make a firm decision in one direction, we chose a little bit of this and a little bit of that.  Here's to hoping they offer Summer Camp loans......

I'll write this blog tomorrow....

Why put off until tomorrow what I could do today?  Because I am human.  That's what we do!  For Consumer Behavior, we have been given the assignment to complete 12 blog entries by the 22nd of April.  That sure sounded like plenty of time in mid-January.  I realized today that we only have 2 weeks left!!!  Plenty of time still??

In the book Predictably Irrational there was an entire chapter on the problem of procrastination and self-control.  Based on his experiments, students who set up mini-goals and deadlines to meet the demands of a larger project were significantly more successful than those that attempted to finish the large project all at once. 

He explained that it was also important to recognize our individual weaknesses in this area.  That kind of sounds like an addiction to me.  First, you must admit you have a problem.  OK OK! 

 

Hello.  My name is Heather, and I am a habitual procrastinator.  I need to complete the remaining 3 blog posts in the next 2 weeks. 

 

Perhaps I will start tomorrow....

 

 

 

Yes, they ARE all staring at you!

As a mother, I avoid shopping the cereal aisle with my children in tow AT ALL COSTS!  I have convinced my son that "Rainbow Cereal" (i.e Froot Loops) only exists in lands 'far far away' (i.e Vacation).  Ok, maybe not the best parenting tactic, I admit. 



I saw a study recently on cereal box marketing called Eyes in the Aisles: Why Is Cap’n Crunch Looking Down at My Child?  This reminded me of the topic in Chapter 10 that discussed children as decision makers. 

Basically, researchers studied 65 different kinds of cereal in 10 different grocery stores.  Of the 86 characters, 57 were marketed to children, and those were the ones that gazed downward to lock eyes on kids.  The researchers said this marketing strategy of having cartoon characters lock eyes with children may influence their connection with a brand, fostering loyalty and inspiring their interest in the products.

But wait!  This "trick" doesn't only apply to children!  They tried a similar experiment on college students as well.  They let them choose between two different boxes of Trix.  One had the rabbit staring directly at them and the other had the rabbit gazing down.  They found the students had a significantly better connection with the brand when there was eye contact involved.

You have been warned.  Now if they could only give spinach eyes to stare at me while I shop.....