So as you all know on Amazon Prime day I purchased a microphone that normally retails for over $180 for about $50. While I bought it initially for a friend as he expressed interest in it, he became wishy washy about it as he mentioned he was trying to save up for other things. Therefore, because I got such a great deal I decided to sell it to anyone that wanted it. In my mind, this was a high quality microphone where anyone looking to buy it knows what it is worth. Overall, I felt $90 would be a fair price where I would be gaining a little for my efforts and the person buying it would be saving a lot.
As expected, I got a ton of responses initially and eventually sold it to a person. While the transaction was very smooth, I was asked how much I paid for it. While I know the psychology that arises when people know you are making a profit, I decided to say it anyways as to me it is still a very good price. The person then frowned a little bit saying how I am charging them more than what I paid. I just reaffirmed that they would have paid way more and they then agreed that they are saving over $100. We all went about our day afterwards.
Would you be inclined to simply lie in these cases to prevent the awkwardness? For myself, I would only ask that question more for the legitimacy of the product such as knowing the guy didn’t steal it off a truck or something. Example, if someone bought a smartphone for one cent due to an error that a company honored I wouldn’t care about him making a profit as opposed to how much I am saving. Or likewise, if he got it as a free gift and simply doesn’t want it.
It just reaffirmed to me more that if you are trying to convince people to be savvy shoppers then a big key is to try and educate them on how much businesses make for a purchase. Knowing how much profits people make is simply a better motivator than focusing on the savings for many.