Going Out of Business Sales
Everything Must Go, Including your Budget!
You have probably heard the news; Circuit City is closing all of their doors. I smiled right along with Best Buy when I read the news, because like many, I thought I was in for some serious bargains. I went the morning the news was released looking for discounts on some electronic items I have been eying for some time and mostly because I was just curious how low they would go with their prices. To my surprise, the lines were huge, the discounts were mediocre at best, and people were spending like crazy.
Pretty much everything in the store was around 10 percent off, which can be a lot on big ticket items, but for the usual purchase, it’s not enough to get me to buy. In fact, the one item I almost bought I found at RadioShack for $10 less than the liquidation Circuit City price! What amazed me the most about the going out of business sale was not the bad discounts or the large crowd, but the amount of people frantically buying.
There must be something about the idea of a going out of business sale that gets people to spend unwisely. People were in line to purchase computers and TV’s that were still overpriced and most seemed to be doing it on a whim. Maybe sales like this give us a false sense of security in buying; they make us feel like if we don’t act right away, we will have to pay more later.
More than likely, Circuit City is going to try to get the most out of their remaining merchandise while they can and this does not mean huge instant price reductions. They must understand the consumer impulse to buy apparent deals. I think the time to go back is when the store is really nearing their last couple of days. This is when they are desperate to sell anything and everything or they will take a loss. Keep this in mind if you need any electronics, or the next time you find yourself in a closing sale hunting for items that you don’t need, but you have to have, because you don’t have them, because it’s normally too expensive, even though it’s still expensive, but it’s better than it was before, and you have the money to spend, which is why you’re in the store, even though you don’t know what you need, but when you see it you’ll know you need it, so you better buy two-type of scenario. $
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Comments
I saw a story that said that most companies going out of business hire a company to liquidate their inventory for them. A lot of times they mark up the prices and then mark them down some to make it look like you are getting a good deal.
In fact, they had found 1 store where the old prices were cheaper than the going out of business sale ‘discounts’. You don’t get real good deals until the store is real picked over and nobody wants what is left.
Thanks for reminding me though, I think I will head over to a circuit city to do some bargain shopping before everything is gone. I wanna see if they have anything I want.
When Frank text messaged me the other weekend about how CC was a disappointment I wanted to see how they were in Virginia (since he was in Maryland) and I couldn’t even get into one: they were all closed and I went to three!
If I get some time I might dig around online as those sales are usually the most responsive to competition. But again, unless its some insane one time deal, I would save the money anyway…
I couldn’t have said it better myself. Just because somebody is going out of business does not mean that their prices are automatically going to be worth all of us breaking the bank!
Way to be smart!