We were driving back from a fishing trip on the weekend (pictures soon!), and Dave Gagnon explained to me the latest scam from gas stations in Vancouver. As Erin asked in huh?, what's up with saying that gas prices will be lowered by 3.5 cents/litre at the pump?
It think there are some interesting aspects of the story. The first is that this wierdness is caused by the Sears introduction of a gas station out in the fraser valley. They offer "3.5 cents/litre lower than competitors advertised price". So the competitors basically raised their advertised price by 3.5 c/l to prevent having to cut their pump price.
The 2nd interesting aspect is that there's competitition that ought to be driving prices down, but isn't.
And now there's a gap between an "advertised price" and the "price you pay". There are laws against having "sales" where you can never buy the good at the "unsale" price. This isn't quite the same, but feels very similar. What constitutes the "advertised price"? Is it the big numbers? Or the big numbers + the big sign saying "3.5 c/l off at the pump"? I thin it's the 2nd because the big sign is an "advertisement".
Finally, not all the gas companies are doing this. Petro-can has a little scam that I'm sure will cost them. They only take off the 3.5c/l if you use a petro-canada card. So the unknowing folks that think they'll get 3.5c/l off but don't use petro-can card get hosed by 3.5c/l.
All of this just makes me tired of the marketers. Enough of these silly little complications and scams. Just put the single price for your goods out and compete on that. And lower your price by saving on the marketing $$
