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When to buy things
Example:
Clothing
When to buy: Thursday evenings, six to eight weeks after an item arrives in stores.
Hitting the mall on a weekday ensures you'll get a good selection. "On the weekend, you'll only get picked-over stuff because the stores don't have time to restock," she says. By Thursday, most of the weekend sales have begun, but everything available is on the floor.
Here is much more, and no I do not vouch for the advice. We are supposed to buy plane tickets on a Wednesday morning, 21 days before the flight. In my view, the best time to buy books is mid-October or November. Don't count on a better price but the selection will be above-average for seasonal reasons. The best time to browse through CD racks is early December when they are full up for Christmas. I wouldn't know about buying anything else, except perhaps Mexican amates; for that I recommend late winter, when they are being painted for arriving "spring break" tourists. The article is cited at a round-up at www.2blowhards.com.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on October 6, 2006 at 07:01 AM in Education | Permalink
Comments
Buying airline tickets cheap on Wednesday at midnight is a myth.
Posted by: Gary at Oct 6, 2006 10:18:46 AM
As a former assistant buyer for a department store chain I can tell you that the shopping on Thursday advice is good, but the timing of markdowns some number of weeks after arrival is harder to estimate. We had a pretty strict budget for how much money we could knock off the real price (not usually the original ticket price, because we'd do a fake 25% off as soon as they got on the floor for marketing purposes) in any month. If you owned a lot of a real dog it needed to be marked down faster than usual, but the money available to do so wasn't always there. There was a lot of gamesmanship in balancing these opposing forces.
For things that are hot sellers markdowns make sense only later in the game, when the lingering left\overs are hard to merchandise in coherent blocks or may be inconvenient sizes, but with the reduced quantities these weren't big issues financially. We usually marked them down as "gap fillers" when our big needs left us a bit of room under the cap.
Posted by: Dylan at Oct 6, 2006 12:38:14 PM
Who still shops in malls?
Posted by: marginallyinteresting at Oct 6, 2006 1:33:49 PM
Is there any real-life person outside of Hollywood who picks their clothes by looking at the catwlak? Maybe so, but I've certainly never come across such a person.
Posted by: Anono at Oct 6, 2006 3:21:38 PM
On cars, I'd add that I've had very good luck in the late afternoon on the last day of the quarter, if you have cash or some sort of pre-arranged financing that doesn't involve the dealer.
Posted by: J at Oct 7, 2006 9:41:08 AM
It is interesting to talk about when to buy things.
For GOOD priced summer clothes, EVERYONE knows that you always wait until after July 4th to get all the good sales.
For GOOD priced fall/winter clothes, EVERYONE knows that there is usually a lot of sales for winter clothing, but always good sales especially after Thanksgiving.
HOWEVER-most people do their shopping online these days.
Hey-who WOULDN'T want to be in the comfor of their own homes, in their pajamas leaning back relaxing in their favorite chairs ordering clothes?
I know I would!
Posted by: Shannon at Oct 12, 2006 11:38:25 PM
Posted by: at Oct 14, 2008 12:03:47 AM
