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Comment by johnklos | Hacker News Reader

Indeed! It's amazing how often people just simply don't care.

Trader Joe's, for instance, makes signs for their produce with crazy prices. Five bananas for a penny! Yes, you read that right! They either don't understand decimal places, or they don't realize that it's not legal to advertise incorrect prices.

Their signs clearly say .19¢. I pointed it out to them, and they looked at me like I'm crazy.

Perhaps they'll care when I insist they sell them to me for that price, then complain to the county's Office of Consumer Affairs if they don't.

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This reminds of the internet classic VerizonMath: http://verizonmath.blogspot.com/2006/12/verizon-doesnt-know-...

Can one be nostalgic for articles like this? Every few years I see this linked and I read the whole thing every time.

Very much so. I can't believe it happened over 15 years ago!

Ha, never heard of this before. I had to hunt the audio down (found it at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MShv_74FNWU) but it was definitely worth it. Very funny! Thank you!

Perhaps they'll care when I insist they sell them to me for that price, then complain to the county's Office of Consumer Affairs if they don't.

I don't know about American law, but here in the UK you would lose that complaint. A price label is what is known as an "invite to treat", and a store is under no obligation to sell the item to you at that price. If they say it's a mistake they can and you have no right to say otherwise.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invitation_to_treat

How far would they have to go before they ran afoul of some sort of false advertising claim?

Presumably any legal system would treat the intent as the primary relevancy. In this case it is abundantly clear what the intent was (note that even the person complaining gives an explanation for what the store intended and thus is clearly not at all confused about the intent).

That sounds impossible to deal with. So you pick your groceries based on price presumably and then when you get to the register they can be something totally different? So as they are getting rung up you would have to say "no thanks for that one, please put it back" on every price you are not in agreement on?

Considering the recent news that online groceries can change prices (even dramatically) after you've ordered them, so supermarkets apply prices on the day of delivery, and you're on the hook for any difference... this doesn't surprise me one bit.

Technically, yes, but practically obviously not because people who run shops aren't completely stupid.

Interesting, looks like laws differ in subtle ways for these kind of agreements. For reference in the Netherlands any offer you make is legally binding, though the deal has to make at least some sense to both parties (as well as satisfy a few other conditions).

A price of 1/5 ct would probably be considered too low to be sensible and would not be considered binding.

American Law is almost universally the opposite - HOWEVER it doesn't completely unlimit it - you'll see signs at grocery stores that say something like "in the event of a price error, the store must give you the item at the listed price refund the difference"

For example, Wisconsin:

98.08 Price refunds; price information. (1) A person who uses an electronic scanner to record the price of a commodity or thing and who sells the commodity or thing at a price higher than the posted or advertised price of that commodity or thing at least shall refund to a person who purchases the commodity or thing the difference between the posted or advertised price of the commodity or thing and the price charged at the time of sale.(2) A person who sells a commodity or thing and who uses an electronic scanner to record the price of that commodity or thing shall display, in a conspicuous manner, a sign stating the requirements of sub. (1).

https://glitchndealz.com/glitch-laws-by-state-pricing-error-...

> Perhaps they'll care when I insist they sell them to me for that price, then complain to the county's Office of Consumer Affairs if they don't.

Did you actually do either of these things?

I contacted Trader Joe's corporate just today. If they don't do anything, I'll contact the Office of Consumer Affairs.

Ignorance of math is a bad thing!

You are a bad person for doing this. For using the law for personal whimsy instead of remedying or preventing real harm to people. Grow up. Life isn't an internet joke.

Please don't cross into personal attack. If there was one way to make this subthread even worse, that would be it.

I think that intentional ignorance of intent is pretty awful as well. You know full well that bananas aren’t being sold for 0.19 cents each.

That's an interesting take. So the implied intent is more important than their actions, even after (or particularly after ) they're told they've made a mistake and asked to fix it?

If it's just a mistake then they are not bound to sell it for that price. Especially if everyone else can easily recognize it as a simple mistake of where the decimal is.

Some states have laws [1] to this effect:

> The store must honor the price in the advertisement, even if it is wrong, until they correct the misrepresentation using the same advertising medium and/or by corrective signs in the store.

> Items sold in a grocery store must ring up at the lowest displayed price. Food stores that are in the waiver program must offer consumers one of the items free if it scans higher than the lowest advertised price.

[1] https://www.mass.gov/guides/a-massachusetts-consumer-guide-t...

How does that work with sales tax not being included in the displayed price?

The website is an explanation of the law, not the actual law itself. I'm sure the actual law does not require sales tax to be included in the displayed price.

Since he specifically mentions grocery stores, groceries aren't taxed.

TIL that's a thing. Illinois has a lower tax rate on groceries but still taxes them.

Also, grocery stores sell a lot more than just groceries.

Cool, TIL grocery taxes exist.

State sales tax laws are all over the place; in many states the general idea is "don't tax necessities" which leads to silly things like buying a sandwich is tax free (like socks in Minnesota), but if you ask them to warm up the sandwich BEFORE sale it is taxed. If you ask them to warm up YOUR sandwich after sale, it's tax-free.

Or it could be a state like Oregon where there is no sales tax on anything.

Is this actually a misrepresentation?

Does anybody reading the sign not understand what it's trying to communicate?

The sign is perpetuating the idiocracy epidemic.

Which interpretation is idiotic? Being able to take in complex signals from the environment and form an instructive opinion is the foundation of human ingenuity. Given that the bananas obviously aren't on sale for $0.0019, it seems idiotic to me ignore alternative explanations for the sign.

>> Given that the bananas obviously aren't on sale for $0.0019, it seems idiotic to me ignore alternative explanations for the sign.

"It's a banana Michael. What could it cost, 10 dollars?!"

You say "obvious" but I don't think that means what you think that means. Why is it obvious? Why would it be impossible that a store sells bananas at a loss in order to pull people in (what people in sales call a "loss leader")? If you don't buy bananas regularly, why couldn't you assume this is just a great deal?

If there were a sign advertising 5 bananas for a penny (or whatever) with no asterisk, fine print, or mention that "terms may apply", I would be livid if I couldn't take advantage of that price.

I'm only speaking from my own personal experience, but I've never seen bananas priced at less than 1c each in the grocery store. I've also seen people misplace decimal points frequently. So, based on the thousands of times I've been to dozens of grocery stores, I'm using pattern matching to deduce that almost assuredly it's more likely that a banana listed as costing "0.19c" refers to $0.19 not $0.0019. If you ever encounter a true sub-cent banana in a retail supermarket, feel free to reach out to me and I'll be the first to admit I was wrong.

I've frequently (more than once a year) seen "Free pound of bananas" coupons as part of circulars/loyalty coupons at supermarkets I've been to (sometimes not even requiring further purchase). I've worked in advertising and marketing for checks watch years and am familiar with all sorts of different offer types and sales models. Free or Nearly Free bananas would seem relatively reasonable, and if I didn't frequent the store enough to know they always have a "cute" sign with nonsense prices, I would still be livid if the price wasn't honored.

If you would like links: Here's a 5 year old piece about Amazon giving away bananas: https://www.foodandwine.com/news/amazons-free-bananas-disrup...

Here's a 2 year old coupon for free bananas from some couponing blog: https://www.thecouponingcouple.com/free-bananas/

Another blog, more free banana coupons: https://spoonuniversity.com/how-to/10-food-budgeting-tips-i-...

TL;dr- Don't put up bullshit pricing signs and assume people will understand the "joke", you're coming from a place of different cultural awareness and it will burn you when people like me get involved.

Yes, I've seen free promotions before (of bananas and many other items). But I've never seen sub-cent bananas. Again, if you see those, let me know.

It’s incredibly obvious. Just ask yourself, “How would I pay for 1 banana if a banana was 0.19 cents?”

It's not a mistake if they do it repeatedly and they continue to do it even after they're made aware of it.

IANAL but I did spend the past year working for a company that generated and printed strips and sale tags for several major retailers across the US. We had to be pretty careful with our security because if someone accessed our system and generated a sale tag offering high-end items for $1 our customers (stores) would be obligated to sell the item for the price displayed on the sign/tag.

This reminds me of this hysterically funny customer service call to Verizon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MShv_74FNWU

More of the backstory: https://verizonmath.blogspot.com/

12 minutes in... what a journey

Oh gosh. My dad did that all the time. Lots of bad memories of him keeping at yelling a t them until they agreed.

ok so as I understand it .19¢ must be 19% of a penny, 19 * 5 is 95, so 95% of a penny. If you add sales tax to that, if your state has one, doesn't that come out to 5 for a penny? Are you being facetious or is .19¢ the same as $.19 and my base expectation is wrong?

Shops commonly use .19¢ and $.19 interchangably, when they are definitely not. The poster you're replying to also realized this.

ok thanks for clarification!

> Shops commonly use .19¢ and $.19 interchangably, when they are definitely not. The poster you're replying to also realized this.

Honestly, I think the correct policy is probably just to interpret .19¢ as a syntax error.

This left me wondering: if Trader Joe's were forced to stick by their written price, how would they go about charging you the fraction of a cent? Is that even possible?

Ask gas stations. Every single gas station charges .9 cents at the end of the price.

Except Donny's Discount Gas!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mill_(currency)#United_States

Commodities are often quoted down to very small fractions of a cent, depending on what it is; you round using the normal mechanisms or have a separate agreement.

Trader Joes could sell for .19 cents and require a minimum purchase of ten pounds, for example.

Do you have a photo of this? I would love to see an example :)

I should've taken a picture of the bananas, but here's a picture of limes being sold for three for a penny:

https://www.klos.com/~john/limes.jpeg

Where does it say 3 limes for a penny? It clearly says 1 lime for $0.29? It says it 3 times in that photo, but I don't see the penny claim anywhere.

It says .29 cents not dollars :)

The painted part says “.29c”

No, the (painted) sign is saying .29¢, not $.29. It's a hundred times cheaper than $.29.

$ !== ¢

I wonder if they can argue that the "painted sign" is just entertainment; the actual sticker in the lower right is correct (.29$ and 29¢)

It says limes are 0.29 cents each on the sign, not $0.29.

That's a tad pedantic. They add the . so people immediately know its not $29, and that it's a low number. No one sells things for decimals of a penny. I think they gain more legibility than they lose on average by writing it that way.

Those are usually price per unit mass. (though the "/lb" might be very small.)

That's different though.

That method of representing price has been normalized.

We all know what it means.

That's different than miscommunication something.

My pet theory, is that putting 30c just 'feels' bigger to people. So a long time ago, everyone started putting .30c.

That's how many people write 19 cents. For some people a decimal point is the thing that goes between dollars and cents. Yes, not a very rigorous system, not something you'll see in engineering or science, but something I see on shop signs.

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