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Comment by Jun8 | Hacker News Reader

This was idiotic on the CEO’s part, surge pricing is universally loathed by customers, only grudgingly tolerated when done by Uber/Lyft.

OTOH, equating dynamic pricing with surge pricing (which the public does) is not entirely correct: you can dynamically price down, too, eg run time-limited campaigns in the store. This is the killer app of electronic shelf labels that’s currently underutilized.

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I don't understand. In the first paragraph you say it was stupid because consumers hate it. Then on the second paragraph you say it's underutilized elsewhere.

Why is it underutilized in your favorite use case and shouldn't be utilized in the CEO case?

I think he means the companies should emphasize that prices can go down too. Like 'get a burger, fries and shake for $0.75 at off times!'

My guess is they had no plans to do the low part of dynamic pricing though.

I'm surprised they never considered calling it "dynamic discounting". Of course they'd need to raise prices so the CEO doesn't lose profit per burger (even with a discount).

Exactly. No one loves "surge pricing"m everyone loves "happy hour."

I don't entirely understand the difference between dynamic pricing and surge pricing - couldn't one achieve the same revenue numbers by setting the base price to the "surge price" and offer dynamic discounts? I.e. Surge sales?

Dude was CEO for less than a month before trying this bullshit. It’s just what MBAs do, and they’re the sole reason behind what we’re starting to call enshittification. He went into that job with that idea, and I can guarantee all his other MBA snakes are thinking about ways to implement this.

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