A perfect response.
Bravo hear hear great post.
Does that mean that everyone who is discounting their items for Black Friday is normally overcharging by 10%? Iād rather sell at my not-overcharged price all year and refrain from discounting it on random days chosen by another country. But each to his/her own.
I do wonder though how many US sellers follow other countriesā retail patterns? Do they also have January sales like we traditionally do in the UK?
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I donāt think Leslie is saying that people who discount 10% on BF are overcharging by 10%.
We are talking one day here, or 4 days if you count CM and the week end in between.
My prices are as low as I can do them for but if it meant picking up a few visits or possible sales I would give a small discount for a couple of days.
Yes Christine, they do. They usually start on Boxing Day (in Canada), or January 2nd in the US. They are called January Sales or White Sales . This has been the case for at least as long as Iāve been around and Iām almost 60.
And no, I donāt mean that everyone charges 10% more than they need to just so they can drop the price. I am saying that retailers, both small and large factor discounts, write-offs, etc. into their pricing strategy as it is a cost of sales. This would cover returns that canāt be resold or lost (some people self-insure for items that are lost in the post) and discounts when they wish to go on sale.
I think that some people just donāt get it. Whether it is another countryās custom or not isnāt the issue here. The internet is global. If another country (in this case the US with 316+ million in population) is holding a sale across all their internet venues, then no matter where you are based if you donāt offer similar you are more likely to lose sales during that period. If you are running a business then wouldnāt you rather be on equal footing to others? As @HandcraftedbyPicto stated and with which I agree, if it means a few sales, a small discount is warranted.
I do understand what youāre saying Leslie, @ManiacalMosaics, I just donāt agree with you. I understand that large retailers use sales to shift stock at certain times of the year when sales are are generally a bit slow for them, and they obviously can afford to do it as their margins are massive, and they actually negotiate lower costs from their suppliers for these bigger sales events anyway, so theyāre not losing much of their margin. I do know about retail margins, product costings etc as Iāve worked in industry most of my life as an accountant, so that is bread and butter to me, but the fact remains that Iām not a big retailer, I donāt buy finished goods from suppliers and canāt negotiate lower prices from them, and I keep my margins small to encourage people to buy all year round. I know I canāt compete effectively with the big retailers, so I consider it pointless trying. A few extra sales at low/no profit isnāt going to help grow my business if itās targeting the wrong market - I prefer to sell to buyers who arenāt looking for a bargain, but who instead appreciate that handmade is special enough to pay the price Iām asking.
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Well I suppose the proof is in the pudding, so hands up all those who made extra sales on Friday after dropping their pricesā¦
I didnāt make any sales at any price on Black Friday which was fine by me - I sold lots at full price all weekend at a physical craft fair 
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So far itās been a Fair Friday, a So So Saturday, and a Cyber Sunday. It went mad for sales for me yesterday 
Actually, the whole weekend has been pretty good, to be honest. Iāve got an absolute ton of work for this week now. And, no, I didnāt reduce my prices at all.
I didnāt do any sale items neither did I sell any thing at the weekend however Iāve just received a sale, the first for December so after a rotten week this has put a smile on my face.
I had a crazy awesome weekend. Yesterday was the busiest day Iāve had since Iāve been in business. I didnāt do any discounting.
Probably annoyed the people behind me in the post office queue this morning because I had two enormous bags full of packages to send!
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I had to ask my despatch clerk (Bob) to help with my packages today as, if Iām packing more than 4 at a time I panic in case the labels go on the wrong parcels. So yes been a good weekend for me and no discounting.
Correction - I let a customer at the Victorian market on Friday have 2 Ā£11 suncatchers for Ā£20 but only because he was very nice and nothing whatsoever with Black.)
Interestingly I call āChristmas timeā Yuletide! and consider this the traditional name for it, especially given Iām Pagan and not Christian! I love āHoliday Seasonā too and āHolidayā actually translates to āHoly Dayā , which given āChristmasā - or ā Christ Massā celebrates the birth of Christ in the Christian calendar, is a holy day, would see this as perfectly logical!..I donāt realy care what it is called ; it is a time of year that reminds us of peace and goodwill - no matter what our religion, race or the country we come from.
As for discounting - I personally donāt do it as my product range is small and my business model is too complex to explain! Mx
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yah another sale just came in I did a little happy dance
