In a Lincraft store in Sydney earlier this week I noticed they sell their A2 cardboard for $2.49. This is in a business which promotes itself as being a discount outlet offering good value.
I’m sure there are Lincraft shoppers who would say that the same product in a newsagency would be more expensive when, in fact, most newsagents would have exactly the same product at a lower price.
My questions today is what is your price for A2 cardboard? Anyone asking me is told $2.20 is a fair price for a quality product. depending on your location and other overheads you could go higher as I know a couple of newsagents do.
The difference between newsagency businesses and Lincraft is that we do not promote ourselves as being a discount business. If shoppers are to believe the marketing of the two types of businesses we should be more expensive. But we are not.
So, should we price to meet shopper expectations? If we did this with the cardboard and other products we’d increase our prices, make more money and probably not lose any sales.
Newsagents who price low to show they are competitive are often giving away margin unnecessarily in my view. try it out with your cardboard. Raise your prices 10% and see what happens over three months. If unit sales are the same, raise them again.
There are some items people purchase from you because of convenience. These are the items which will carry a higher price. When pricing them, think about it as subsidising other items off of which you do not make what you want.
I stock Canson and am happy to do so. I charge $2.50 which as far as I can see is quite acceptable to my customers in my regional town. I know I could source lower priced stock in another brand however I think my customers really prefer Canson now.
1.70 for Quill which is ordinary quality.
Sold Canson at $2.50 but changed back to Quill due to poor supply. Did not change the price and sales have not suffered while we make an even better margin.
2.00 here for canson
We don’t sell card these days but as with everything we do sell some advice I received years ago still comes to the front of brain.
Buy 5% better and sell for 10% more. Your GP’s (gross profit & general practitioner) will love you for it. Made me laugh when I heard it and for some reason I have never forgotten it, plus it makes a heap of sense on low price point items.
$2.50 Quill, put it up from $2.00 last year made no difference to sales.