What a Knee Slapper — You Never Save When You Spend

When I go to the store to pick up some routine items needed in any household, once I have finished shopping, I head to the check-out line. The cashier then scans all of my items, bags them, tells me the amount to pay, and then nonchalantly mentions, “You saved $X.xx today.”

Proud of myself for saving $X.xx today, I walk enthusiastically to my car and load my purchased items. I can’t wait to get home so I can brag to my wife about how I saved some money today. Then, as I start the car to leave, a nagging thought enters my head.

How?

The motor’s running and I’m still sitting motionless in my parking spot. I ask myself the question again. How did I save $X.xx by spending more money? Isn’t that some sort of oxymoron? After all, my wallet is empty.

As it turns out, I didn’t “save” anything. If I had, the money I spent would still be in my pocket. Money is a tangible product. You either have it, or you don’t.

Someone, somewhere, had a brilliant idea to market their wares by holding a sale where you “save” off the everyday low, low, price of whatever.

The word itself means “to reserve for future use, hold back, or store up instead of spending.”

Furthermore, you can’t save time, or daylight, or space. Neither can you save a piece of cake or pie, or ice cream. You may get lucky, and there might be some left for when you want to eat it, but you can’t save it because then you’d be able to eat it again.

Everybody wants to save something. When retailers finally recognized this, what happened? Shoppers all over the world were bombarded with savings from a variety of sources: coupons, blue-light specials, early-bird specials, box-tops, and others.

Big-box retailers performed study after study to dissect their customers’ spending habits. They identified a startling trend: Most people are obtuse when it comes to their purchases. The next step the retailers took was to draw customers into their stores with the illusion of savings. Think about Walmart, Target, Home Depot, McDonald’s, or thousands more retailers who implemented the same strategy into their sales efforts.

Turn the television on today and you can see all kinds of advertisements from insurance companies, car dealerships, doctors, dentists, and any other variety of occupations that also employ this means to draw more customers.

When is a savings not a savings?

With the invention of computers, John Q. Public has an opportunity to level the playing field. We can more easily research products and services before going to the various outlets to pick out supplies.

Armed with new and up-to-date information about which retailers offer the best deal, or the lowest price has turned us into savvy shoppers. Overnight, we went from gullible, unintelligent shoppers to being revered as sharp, shrewd negotiators for the items we select.

The tactics businesses use to attract customers work well, as long as they are used with integrity. “Caveat Emptor” applies to everything, be it furniture, clothing, milk, eggs, cars or jewelry, for example.

Problems arise when different items are advertised as the real thing, but end up being fake. I was once offered a new car when, in fact, the motor had 30,000 miles of wear and tear on it. Nothing piques a customer’s ire faster than deception.

As consumers, it is our responsibility to be skeptical of any and all statements about the quality, quantity, or performance of anything we buy. Our resulting experience may be completely different from the way and means a product was tested.

Therefore, it is imperative we be informed of this possibility at the point of sale. Otherwise, we may expect a similar performance from the same item when how we use it never matches the way it was tested.

Don’t be fooled into thinking you “saved” anything the next time you go shopping. If you do, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment.

Thanks for reading this!