Minimize Pricing Spoilage

“If you have to ask, you can’t afford it” is a motto of luxury purchasing exclusivity. An adaptation of the phrasing to become “If you choose to ask, you won’t enjoy it for as long” fits research findings about the relationship between price knowledge and consumption satisfaction. Researchers at Vanderbilt University, University of Minnesota, and Simon Fraser University find that a purchaser’s attention to the price of a product or service accelerates satiation. Their enjoyment decreases faster than if having used the identical item without attention to price. The reason, conclude the researchers, is that the usage experience becomes less of a pleasant break from monitoring needs and more of a motivator to monitor expenditures.
     To keep from being a killjoy, retailer, introduce the price gently. You’re less likely to spoil the subsequent consumption experience when you, for example, state the cost after the quantity: “70 rolls for $29.99” draws more buyers than “$29.99 for 70 rolls,” as well as prolonging the pleasure from eating all those rolls.
     Shoppers do engage in willful ignorance, where they prefer to delay getting information—in this case, price. If it looks as if the customer doesn't want to think about the price because it's painful, avoid mentioning it, and if asked, say the price slowly. Researchers at HEC School of Management-Paris and at University of Pennsylvania find that this makes the shopper less sensitive to the cost. So if the tariff is $148.29, instead of saying "one forty eight twenty nine," say, "the price of this item is one hundred forty eight dollars and twenty nine cents." Maybe this tactic works because you don't notice the sour taste of the medicine when it goes down slowly.
     Or facilitate acceptance using familiarity.
     Which of these fetches the most favor from folks seeking flapjack flavor?

• 4 Pancakes: $3.87 
• 4 Pancakes: $4.13 
• 4 Flapjacks: $3.87 
• 4 Flapjacks: $4.13 

     The correct answer is the last of the alternatives. Researchers at University of Miami, Virginia Tech, and Baruch College say the explanation lies in alliteration—the use of the same initial sound in words within the same group. The three “f” sounds in that fourth choice lead to positive evaluations because the similarity of the sounds makes the phrasing seem more familiar; what is familiar is easier for the brain to process; and what’s easier for the brain to process is liked longer, everything else being equal.

For your profitability: Sell Well: What Really Moves Your Shoppers

Click below for more: 
Ease Customer Pain About Item Prices
Put Large Quantity Before Odd Price
Ally with Alliteration
Relax Cost-Sensitive Shoppers via TRP Trips