After reading Darren’s blog “Are Boxing Day Deals Really as Special as they are Advertised???”, I have a same feeling that more and more companies are becoming dishonest now. They just play with consumers, give them a fake deal and pretend consumers get a lot of benefits from purchasing.

Compared to this Boxing Day case, what I have met in China is much more tricky. In Shanghai, some shopping mall have similiar events like BOXING DAY at the end of each year. Before the event, companies will secretly raise the price of their products and during the event, give consumers a big discount which they can’t reject. For example, companies raise the price of their products by 20% and give consumers 30% discount. The actual price consumers will pay equals P*1.2*0.7, which is 0.84P. Obviously, consumers will only get 16% actual discount, not what companies promise, 30% discount. However, most of consumers will never pay attention this detail. Companies earn both reputations and sales through this method.

There is another interesting example in China. Some stores are claiming CLOSING SALE all year. Once I passed by a store, the store was announcing by a big speaker “Closing in one month, everything must be gone. Great sales!” Two month later, I passed by this store by accident again, the store was still announcing there “Closing in one month, everything must be gone. Great sales!” I was suddenly lost, how could you play consumers like this? You totally lost your credits. You were cheating.