One of the companies I work for (a closeouts/clearance wholesaler) has a standing policy of selling nearly everything at half of the average retail price. There was a time where we would look up retail pricing on, for example, a task chair, and it would average $100 in big box stores. We would mark it $50 and advertise it as "half our competitor's prices". We had tons of customers demanding to get discounts off of our "retail" price or they would no longer shop with us.

Eventually we figured out that if we marked it at the full retail price of $100, then put a tag on it that said "take 50% off", it would sell like crazy. We make the same amount of money per sale, but we sell much higher volume due to customer perception of sale prices. Now we price all merchandise that was previously subject to the half-retail rule with the same strategy.

The CEO was Ron Johnson. Alex Blumberg did an interview with him on his Without Fail podcast where he briefly talks about his time at JC Penny (along with Target and Apple). The whole interview is good, but JCP starts around the 28-29 minutes.

https://www.gimletmedia.com/without-fail/the-man-behind-the-...