Hacker News Reader

Comment by duxup | Hacker News Reader

The secondary market can be really weird too. I recall someone studying the TV secondary market and found used TV selling for awfully close to and sometimes more than the equivalent new. It made no sense ... but it was happening.

The local auction company near me too gets some wild weird bids that I see. Seems like there's an endless amount of people willing to take chance.

View on HN

Shouldn't be too surprising after the lessons learned from JC Penny. The emotion of feeling like you're getting a deal is motivating regardless of the truth of the matter. Buying on the secondary market inherently gives you that feeling, which apparently is worth a significant markup.

Oh man I used to just shop at JC Penny almost exclusively. I remember when they stopped the sales. I stood in the store and just knew they were screwed. There was just no way the existing customer base was going to suddenly change behavior.

Interesting. One of the reasons I prefer shopping at Trader Joe's instead of Albertson's is that they don't have constant stupid sales all the time. (Also because TJs is usually 30% cheaper.) Maybe groceries are different?

Parent is right. "Discount buyers" are their own camp, and aren't buying on price, objectively—they're buying on perceived savings. Note that I say _perceived_.

If you had a group of discount buyers shopping for chips, and split it in two groups …

- Group A sees a bag of chips marked down from $5 to $3

- Group B sees the same bag of chips for $3 as "retail price"

… you can expect to see more chip sales coming from Group A. Heck, you'd expect A to beat B even if the discounted price was _higher_ than the retail price.

Now throw "limited time offer" or "first 50 people" in to the mix and watch them fly off the shelves …

Lately in grocery stores I get this sort of feeling when I look at prices. I look at it and hey that is pretty decent looking price. And then I read the small print that has the non-sale regular price. And slight mental math oh I would save 50 cents on something I don't really need just now... Pass!

Certainly it is about expectations. JC Penny was all about the sales. That's when you knew to shop. So they trained their customers for it and suddenly abandoned it and people didn't know what to think.

It's the people. If you shop for "fun", then you probably like sales. It's a game.

If, however, you don't like to shop, and you do it solely to acquire things, you probably don't like sales.

Very clearly, Ron Johnson was in the latter category, while JC Penney shoppers were in the former.

https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/j-c-penney-apologize...

Grocery store sales are the worst, because of how often they force you to buy absurd quantities, like 5 12-packs of canned sodas.

Force, you ask? Yes, basically. The prices will be like $9.79, or "Buy 2, get 3 free". So you can buy 1 for basically $10, or 2 for $20, or 3 for $30, or 4 for $40, or 5 for $20.

Recently cheese was $1.99 but "only if you buy 3." If you buy 2 they were $3.49 each. At least soda keeps a long time, but it's irritating to have to stock up on perishables or have to pay double.

I understand why it failed and I realize that I am not a typical consumer but I loved when JC Penny eliminated sales and just charged a flat price. I don't shop for clothes often, I don't want to wait for sales or figure out which coupon is slightly better, I just want a no hassle transaction.

They also killed their Big and Tall clothing line (The Foundry) last year which was my go-to for plain shirts in tall sizes.

Was it before or after you could easily price check online by simply pointing the camera on an item?

I buy mostly second hand but that is just because I hate waste. I still take a look at price as new and make a lower offer, giving the link of the cheaper as new item if that is the case.

Prices can vary so much in 6 months/1 yesr that they truly think they offer a low enough price.

There's definitely a strategy to it. You want to avoid generally appealing things (like TVs and common electronics) for the reason you described, but the opposite end of the spectrum (niche ones) are often great.

We got two of the highest-end Toto bidet toilet seats for 60% off retail, still sealed in the packaging. Baby-related items were also pretty heavily discounted and still good.

It is taking a chance, but the chances seem to be pretty good. So far the worst we've seen is a baby swing that needed a little elbow grease to solve a minor assembly issue. It was something like 80% off retail.

We moved away from their closest warehouse so we haven't bought a lot recently, but IMO anything that reduces waste and implicitly reduces the cost of returns to retailers (by increasing the price these auctioneers pay for the goods) is good.

If there's a way for the seller to take cash in payment, one completely rational explanation for what might be happening is money laundering.

> selling for awfully close to and sometimes more than the equivalent new. It made no sense ... but it was happening.

Listed for or selling for? I think there's an assumption on CL or Facebook marketplace that you're going to get bargained down 20% regardless so might as well start a little higher.

Also, the things that are actually listed for a good price tend to disappear much faster. So when you're looking at search results, you're mostly seeing the higher priced items that haven't sold yet.

FIRM! I KNOW WHAT I HAVE! I yell, trying to sell my stereo from the mid-2000s at MSRP.

Yeah, as it's grown in popularity I've noticed this too. I often times stop myself and think, it's probably better spending the extra 10% or so to get a manufacturer warranty.

I was assuming it was from resellers, but maybe it's just the idea of getting a "deal"

I remember way, way back in the day the "used" PC parts you'd order on ebay would wind up getting bid so high they'd be sold for more than a brand new "latest and greatest" model.

That’s still pretty true. Good condition used items on eBay often seem to go for near MSRP - even if it’s easy to get a new one below MSRP from regular retailers!

It’s interesting what eBay has done to the used market in general. Before the internet, it was a rule of thumb that something second hand (from e.g. local classified ads) would be no more than 50% of the retail price.

I think that eBay drove prices up by opening the market nationally (and internationally), so that people who _really_ wanted anything could find it - and the large discount previously necessary to guarantee sale in a small, local, pool was no longer necessary.

I wonder if there have been studies down on this.

For international it made sense, because not every retail would ship internationally, but a private seller on the eBay might. Otherwise, I don’t see why a national buy would choose a used item from ebay over a new one from an online retailer.

I've heard that Americans prefer used house than new home because it's already tested (and fixed). I understand that the strategy isn't applied for video card, but is there any other thing that people prefer used one?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com