OT-Price fixing now OK

Ah, deja voo all over again.

Bring back the fifties and sixties with the gas wars.... Half the people here probably don't know what a gas war was.... NO its not bush's little escapade in the Mid east.

John

This is not true. Manufacturers may , not must , set minimum retail prices. And may if a retailer sells below the minimum price, cut the retailer out from receiving any more product. This is likely to be done mostly with products as the Apple I- phone and things as perfumes where the image is what is being sold. Not likely for things as commodity items as candy bars.

Dan

Gas is taxed by the gallon, not as a % of price. So, why should they care if the station gives it away?

Jon

When I retailed a hot-selling top brand of computers in the 1980s, the manufacturer literally had an heavy Italian guy named Tony, who traveled the country visiting dealerships and "leaned" on you if you were discounting. They couldn't dictate a price in writing in your dealership contract, since that was illegal (then), but this guy was very clear that it wasn't allowed, and you were only allowed to sell at full list price.

Resale price maintenance is very widely practiced, even though it (was) illegal in the US.

"White goods" (appliances).

Hi-Fi equipment back in the day.

New cars, trucks, farm implements, etc.

IBM brand PCs in the heydays of the 1980s.

Cigarettes. Cameras.

The list is endless.

It will be widely, not universally, practiced if it is legal.

Much more likely! When price-fixing was legal in the 1960s, things like candy were highly regimented in price. Stores sold the same products at the same price.

This is one reason why there was no discount retailing like Walmart until the 1970s. The Walmart era coincided with the extinction of state-level "fair trade" (price fixing) laws that worked around the federal unconstitutionality. "We sell for less" is their motto, and now SCOTUS sez it's illegal!

Is there nobody here who remembers the 1960s in America?

Levis set the price for a pair of their jeans, and every retailer had to charge that same price. Prices were printed on retail packages by the manufacturer, not stuck-on by the retailer. There was no discount retailing in the sense of the same brand-name pair of pants sold at any lower price that list price. The stores that called themselves "discount" just sold cheaper brands, not Levis.

It depends on where you buy it.

Some states are of the get as much tax as I can ... spend... and changed it from gall> cncfixxer1 wrote:

I do remember the 1960's in America. And I guess we will get to see how this plays out. I think there is more global competition now. Container ships have reduced the cost of shipping and the internet has made people aware of foreign brands. But maybe the consumer can be made to believe that Levis are worth than Costco's Kirkland brand.

Dan

azotic wrote in article ...

WTF do you think Wal*Mart and the other category-killing Big Boxes have been doing for years?

It is THEY who dictate the prices to the manufacturers these days.

Till they reach a price so low that no one will even try to build to their price.

But long before the price hits that level, the quality of the product will be zilch.

In many smaller towns Wall Mart has already killed off the competition. So there is no choice in the market place. Nowhere else to shop.

There is nothing in this world that cannot be built a little cheaper and with less quality. Those who buy on price alone, will forever be the victims of this practice.

Unfortunately, there are always dozens of uninformed small companies looking to replace those that cannot keep up......believing that scoring a Wal*Mart deal will punch their ticket to success, and untold riches.

But, what many small businesses have learned is that the worst thing that can happen to a small company is to sign a contract with Wal*Mart ( or Home Depot, Best Buy or ANY of the so-called "Category Killers")

Dozens of small companies have been forced into bankruptcy by building new facilities and buying larger equipment in good faith to service their Wal*Mart contract, and to provide the volume and cost-per-item numbers sought by Wal*Mart and the others, only to lose the contract in an annual review - long before the expansion costs can be amortized.

Home Depot is famous for driving a company to the brink with increasing demands against decreasing margins, then buying the company out for a fraction of its actual worth.

HD now owns a substantial percentage of its "vendors". Try to compete with that either as a vendor or a retailer.

Better yet, imagine buying from a vendor that is owned by the competition.

Remember when Wendy's realized that Pepsi and Burger King were a part of the same company and switched to Coke?

If I were running a small manufacturing company today, I would go after the businesses that manage to compete with the "Big Box" stores - the "Mom "n" Pops" - and guaranty them exclusivity on my product - assuring them that they will NEVER see my product on the Wal*Mart or Home Depot shelf.....much less retailing for less than they pay for it wholesale.

WHat do you consider fair? One local station has to pay more per gallon than several new stations down the street sell it for. PJ's station has been there for over 50 years, and the ones getitng a cut on the wholsale price are only a couple months old. He showed me what he pays for gasoline and as he said, he only makes 10 cents per gallon. That is about 1/3 cent per gallon.

The new gas stations have a lot higher overhead, so the only way they can sell so cheap is to be subsidiezed by corporate in an attempt to force the older stations to close. Another station has been sold four times in the last three years.

No, you reach a point that the design and materials are so crappy that it can't be built.

For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

gee. whda thunk? bad business plans kills thousands of businesses every year. Warner cable, AKA Time-Warner cable, aka brighthouse put a lot of contractors out of business in the '80s by paying all their bills at least 180 days late. That was the reason that HBO invested in the first scrabling equipment.

Who cares? Dave thomas is dead, and the company stinks almost as bad as Burger kink.

Obviously you're in no position to make that decision, so you're just speculting on what you might do.

There is also a choice in what the company buyers look for.

I wanted some powered speakers for my TV. (old age is starting to suck)

I found a set of 5.1 home theater speakers at Wallmart for $40. Ok, great! And they actually worked! For 60 days. Then the power supply fried WITHOUT blowing the fuse.

All right, that's what I get for buying cheapies, right? (Durabrand)

Well, Wally World stands behind their stuff... So I took it back and got the top o line RCA setup for $107.

This set has it's own DVD player - which frose up on the first movie. And every movie I tried.

So it went back too.

NOW, as it turns out - NOBODY else offers these particular models. They are exclusively Wally stuff. Even the RCA unit!

Cheap Chinee Chit...

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

So we are both shameful fools.

But ain't gonna be no third time.

Richard

Many years back, Brother's FiL had a small town repair shop/used car lot/towing business/wrecking yard. As an added service, he had gas pumps by "T" Co. After several years, "T" built a modern 2 bay service station at the other end of town and informed him that he could lease this station or he would have no more deliveries by any supplier to his old facility. Shortly after he moved in, he was told to stop selling cars and move more gas for less profit, also he couldn't operate his towing service from that location. After two years, he had gone from a 12 hour operation to 24 hour, had his lease rate doubled and his margin cut by 50%. He retired from the business to operate his wrecking/towing/car sales from the old shop and the shiny new "T" station stood vacant till vandals eliminated it. Gerry :-)} London, Canada

There is no "fair" in Capitalism ...it's supply and demand. Just like us ...if we see a chance to make more money then we do. What really gets me angry is when the oil companies are allowed to raise the domestic crude ...stuff they pull out of the Old USA drilled a paid for with taxpayers write offs ...to the same price as OPECs oil. They don't even have to ship it over here

But at what price?

exaco?

You know what's funny? A few years ago BP bought a bunch of stations around here, now most are sitting empty. I guess that they figured we'd like the "British" part, along with bad service and higher prices.

I know people who swore by Wal-Mart when Sam was alive. Now, you'd have to hold a gun to their head and drag them into one of those lousy "superstores. Why don't thay lay the damn thing out in a square, and have more entrances and check outs? Who wants to walk a half mile to find what they want isn't on the shelf, then another half mile to the exit, while putting up with employees who don't give a damn. Considering that Sams club is owned by the same company, the difference in employee attitude is amazing.