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Young people start to "rectify" mall assassins

young people

By davidPublished 2 years ago 11 min read
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After the hot search for "ice cream assassin", some consumers found out that there are "assassins" everywhere.

One of the most shocking is the "snack assassin".

A short video blogger said in the video that he went to a shop called "Shang Yao Haifeng" and did not expect that two plums would cost more than 50 yuan.

In the video, he said that because he couldn't see the price tag clearly, he asked the clerk if the price was 160 yuan/catties (500g), and the other party responded that it was 160 yuan/tael (50g).

The blogger then asked if it was possible to buy just one. Under the reply of the clerk's "two starting sales", the blogger bought two plums, which cost a total of 51.2 yuan.

Source: Wu Er GO

For a time, the words of 1600 yuan/catties were on the hot search, and shocked netizens shared their "stabbed experience" on social platforms, all because they misread or missed weighing in grams and miscalculated The experience of being "hurt" by snack shops such as plums, chocolates, fudge, and dried vegetables in the mall.

Fanfan has been stung by snack assassins. She said that she once passed by a shopping mall and saw Huamei shop, and wanted to buy some to try.

She restrained and took a little. The clerk quickly packed it and put it on the scale. It cost more than 50 yuan. After carefully asking the price, she found that it was 18.8 yuan/50g, but she thought it was 500g.

The "Snack Assassin" here just finished stabbing, and went to the fruit and dining area, and the "Assassins" were secretly preparing.

A few days ago, a video that was widely circulated on the Internet showed that a woman picked two peaches when she was shopping in a shopping mall.

At first she thought she had heard it wrong, so she confirmed to the waiter, "Is it 92 yuan for two peaches?"

After getting a positive answer, she quickly asked the clerk to take one less and paid 48 yuan.

Then she went to the salad light food store in the mall and asked for a small avocado salad, but she paid 69.5 yuan and bluntly said "I can't afford it".

"Fruit Assassin" and "Salad Assassin" in the mall

Ah Zhen had a similar experience. Once he came home from a shopping mall to buy some snacks, and found a deli.

Seeing the cooked food in the window, he was greedy and asked for a little of each. As a result, the aunt grabbed two big handfuls at once. After weighing, he asked him to scan the code to pay directly. The payment page showed more than 100 yuan.

Only then did he discover that there were small price tags in the upper right corner of the glass cabinet, duck heart 28 yuan/200g, chicken feet 39 yuan/150g... After being stabbed by 100 yuan duck goods, he claimed, "Later I ate duck heart bibimbap for three days."

What Yoyo encounters is the "Oden Assassin".

When shopping, she and her companions wanted to eat some snacks, so they walked into the Oden shop in the shopping mall. The clerk asked "what would you like to eat?"

"It cost more than 30 yuan to get 3 skewers, and the taste was not even as good as that of a convenience store, so we hurriedly checked out and went out."

In addition to the "food assassins", there are thousands of "accessory assassins" lurking on the first floor of the mall.

A consumer in Hangzhou complained on social platforms that he forgot to wear a rubber band to tie his hair when he was shopping in the mall a few days ago. He picked up a hairpin at the jewelry booth and paid for it, and it cost 99 yuan.

"The more I think about it, the more angry I get, because the hairpins are hung on the wall in rows, and there is no obvious price tag. After the settlement, I feel that the bricks of the past few days have been moved in vain."

What made her even more angry was that when she was about to drive out of the mall later, she found that the parking fee for less than 3 hours was 88 yuan. "It's really hard to prevent."

The routines of "Mall Assassin"

The main reason why these "mall assassins" can "sting" consumers is that some merchants do not clearly mark the price or the price is vague, and they "stab" consumers suddenly.

So, what are the common price ambiguity strategies for merchants in shopping malls, especially food merchants?

The most common is to mark the unit price according to the number of grams. It is difficult for consumers to judge the actual price paid just by looking at the listed price.

On social platforms, most of the users complained because they did not notice the bulk weighing unit of measurement and the total price after weighing was too high.

A person in the retail industry said that the 50g unit of measurement was used to sell tea and tonics in the early days, such as scented tea and Cordyceps, but he believes that this does not apply to zero food.

"The amount of snacks in 50g is very small", and the "g" of 50g is very similar to "0". If you don't pay attention, it is easy to mistake it for a pound (500g). Now, as long as the more expensive things are weighted, they will be 50g/100g. Makes it look cheaper.

The other type is that the price tag and the product are difficult to correspond one-to-one, so that consumers inadvertently spend more.

Recently, Li Xiao went to the supermarket to buy watermelon. When a watermelon was settled, she found that it was over 100 yuan. In her impression, only a few dozen yuan can achieve "watermelon freedom".

The reason is that she didn't see the price tag.

"When buying watermelons, three or four types of watermelons are placed together on the booth, and only the unit price is marked on the sign above. The watermelons are big and small, and it is difficult to compare the corresponding prices one by one. I thought it wouldn't be very expensive, but I didn't expect it to be a miscalculation."

The third is that when a consumer states how much he wants, the salesperson will definitely grab more and play a "game of face".

A consumer who used to work in a snack shop said on the social platform that the training in the store stated, "No matter how much the user wants, just shovel it to the end", betting that the user is embarrassed to say no, especially a couple. came together.

Why are there so many "assassins" in the mall?

The objective reason is that due to the impact of the epidemic, the number of shoppers and booths in the mall has dropped sharply, and the rent pressure is high, which requires "open source".

Chinese food industry analyst Zhu Danpeng told everyone that the cost of opening a store in a shopping mall is complicated, including front, middle and back-office costs. For some stores with high traffic, the cost of rent, labor, storage and packaging is also higher. This is for brands There are very strict requirements on the party's comprehensive strength and overall gross profit.

"Food packaging is divided into bulk and pre-packaged. Generally speaking, the unit price of bulk snacks will be higher because it has not formed a large scale, and coupled with the poor weight estimation, various factors will increase the unit price of bulk snacks in shopping malls. ." Zhu Danpeng said.

Li Yingtao, a senior analyst in the brand retail industry of Analysys, noticed that in addition to rent, the cost of offline store opening, entry fees, and large-scale festival promotional activities, etc., need to be amortized.

Aside from external factors, considering the broad customer base, snack shops in shopping malls will use higher pricing to screen out price-insensitive consumers. Chen Ming said, but some merchants' "single game" gameplay can easily lead to user dissatisfaction.

"There are so many voices against 'assassins' this year. An important reason is that many users who originally loved to compare prices online and were affected by express delivery and switched to offline consumption have been 'harvested'."

Li Yingtao also pointed out that offline channels rely more on word-of-mouth and repeat customers, and in fact, they should pay more attention to price management. For some brands with false prices, vague prices, or other ways to guide people to consume and buy, the market will supervise and crack down on them.

For merchants without clearly marked prices, from July 1, the "Regulations on Clearly Marking Prices and Prohibiting Price Gouging" issued by the State Administration for Market Regulation came into effect.

The regulations require that not marking or significantly weakening the marking of price conditions that are unfavorable to consumers or other operators, and deceiving consumers or other operators to trade with them is price fraud.

Some experts said that there may be a lot of room for "further regulation" as to what constitutes "clear marking".

Consumers, what are they "stabbed" by?

The root cause of "food assassins" being criticized is the mismatch between consumers' needs and expectations.

Once upon a time, going to the mall to buy snacks and dine-in met the needs of users for offline social interaction and experience to a certain extent. Even if it was a little more expensive, most people were willing to pay for it.

But when more and more "assassins" appeared, this joy was stabbed.

Fanfan also feels this way.

At that time, when she was passing by the shopping mall after working overtime, she entered a Huamei shop and wanted to go in and have a look. "Anyway, I worked overtime to make money today, just to reward myself and make myself happy", but she was stabbed at a high price.

"Many consumers enjoy high emotional value with the price of a cup of milk tea when they go shopping." Chen Ming analyzed, but when the cheap snacks in daily life such as ice cream, plum, and gummy are getting more and more expensive , the user is naturally a little difficult to accept.

"Consumers feel stabbed, and another reason is that their psychological expectations are constantly being broken." Zhu Danpeng explained that whether it is snacks or meals, consumers often eat, there will be a certain psychological price range, Unexpectedly high prices will shatter this expectation.

The most important thing is that many consumer goods are still unable to achieve high price equal to high quality, which is easy to cause consumer dissatisfaction.

"Actually, as long as the product is worthy of the money that consumers pay, and even feels that it is worth the money, even if the price is high." Li Yingtao said that consumers do not object to the high-rate pricing method, provided that the products and services have corresponding of high value to meet demand.

The popularity of the "ice cream assassin" continues to ferment, and there is another reason that cannot be ignored. That is, under the background of the epidemic, many consumers have begun to downgrade their consumption, and even begin to live with low desires. For them, "shopping assassins" are " Do the opposite", and it is a commodity that can be seen everywhere in the mall, and even does not need to pay special attention to the price.

We found that young consumers who have been scammed are initiating discussions on relevant topics on major social platforms, reminding everyone to avoid scams, and summarizing a set of methodology for rectifying "market assassins".

Youyou said that now on social platforms, young people are beginning to encourage each other, "if you meet someone who is expensive, you just say 'too expensive, don't'".

Her experience is that the more exaggerated and assertive she is, the less embarrassed she will be.

Ah Zhen summed up a set of experience in shopping in the mall after being stabbed. He said that first, it takes time to calculate the price clearly, buy things at the price, and recheck the price tag after buying it.

Secondly, directly tell the salesperson how much money he needs, and don't directly need the excess;

Finally, at the checkout, for goods beyond the acceptable range, put them back directly.

This may be the only thing that young people can do when they are faced with "shopping mall assassins". However, to a certain extent, "every time users bravely refuse to consume, they are actually rectifying and building their ideal consumption future." Respondents resonated with this.

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