By working at Sportchek for over two years, I’ve come to see the genius of the “Buy One, Get One Half” promotion. It has many intentions, but one of the main ones is to discriminate between customers.

For Sportchek in this case, the BoGo 50% sale captures parents buying shoes for their children. Targeting specifically those customers, the deal offers 25% for two pairs of shoes to families, and excludes certain customers whom aren’t looking to get more than one shoe. However, in many cases the BoGo 50% sale is significantly cheaper for the retailer than simply offering 25% on the promoted items. Really, the sale offers at most a 25% discount across two items, yet people don’t seem to view it that way. Countless people mention at the checkout that they were only looking for one pair of shoes, but they, “couldn’t pass up the deal”. Let’s say that a customer buys two pairs of shoes, the first pair costs $130, (as is common for most Nike shoes, and other brands of runners) and the second pair costs $70 (a common price for many “casual” and “walking” shoes), naturally, the discount is applied to the cheaper shoe. Some simple math reveals that the total discount is around 17% across both shoes. With this promotion, not only does the retailer discriminate between customers, but it also manages to squeeze extra purchases from some, while simultaneously convincing those extra spenders that they’re getting more value than they truly are.