The world’s biggest retailer has vowed to aggressively cut prices this holiday season as it tries to lift anemic sales at its U.S. stores. In October, it cut prices on a selection of toys and games, which it said boosted sales volume.The latest markdowns include a $500 cut on a Panasonic 42-inch plasma television to $1,294. Rival Best Buy Co. Inc. offered a similar Panasonic 42-inch plasma television for $1,708.99 on its Web site.
Wal-Mart announces price cuts on electronics – U.S. Business – MSNBC.com
Wow, it is already time to count down the days remaining before Christmas. Wal-mart is at work trying to increase sales volumes by offering incredible sale prices on certain items. One example of this is the sale of a 42 inch plasma screen television that they marked down almost $500 for a final price of $1294. Best Buy’s price on a similar item was $1708 accoring to the article. I am amazed by this: can their really be that much room on an item less than $2000 to mark it down $500 to even break even, let alone make a profit.
Wal-Mart has such great wealth that I think they can offer items at less than cost just to draw people into their stores. It is hard not to shop there; they have low prices, they have practically everything you could need from milk down to an oil change. My biggest question is how long will these low prices last? They seem to be building new stores everywhere, and other stores such as K-Mart seem to be closing everywhere. As the competition lessens, I wonder how fast the prices will increase. We need competition to keep the prices low, if Wal-Mart continues to swallow other companies, we will be at their mercy when shopping.
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Or you can look at it from the point(s) that Ehrhenreich makes: There are many people (namely Wal*mart’s workers) who are already at its mercy. You point out that Wal*mart has such great wealth that they can afford to cut prices. The question that begs to be asked is how they achieved such great wealth? At whose expense?
Comment by Jennifer — November 15, 2006 @ 4:50 pm