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forestoyesterday at 7:20 PM5 repliesview on HN

> the 8 oz will be on sale but only if you buy at least 2 or 3, its incredibly frustrating.

Have you tested this by buying just one, and checking the price on the receipt?

I ask because someone once told me this was illegal in the US; that a shop was allowed to display the sale price only for a larger quantity, but they had to honor the same price per unit if you only bought one. (I think we were discussing produce at the time, in case that matters.) I've long wondered if that was true or just an urban legend.


Replies

bryanlarsenyesterday at 8:59 PM

My grocery store does both. If the label says "Sale: 2/$5, Was: $3.99" and I buy one, I get charged $2.50. If the label says "2/$5, Single item: $3" and I buy one, I get charged $3.

vikingerikyesterday at 9:43 PM

Most likely that pricing rule was/is at a more local level. The national level in the US doesn't have anything like that, but there are some states or cities or counties that can and do.

sidrag22yesterday at 8:03 PM

iirc yes it did not apply on purchase as well, on the label it is always also explicit about cost if not bought in those quantities(2 for 5 in any quantity is still sometimes the actual offering). I am assuming my memory is correct because its baked into my shopping experience to ensure i am reading the label correctly now.

Meijer is slowly becoming a bad offender of these types of things, Jewel has been horrifying for years, to the point where i avoid their store entirely. The final straw was this limit applied to gallons of milk.

lmmtoday at 12:37 AM

> I ask because someone once told me this was illegal in the US; that a shop was allowed to display the sale price only for a larger quantity, but they had to honor the same price per unit if you only bought one.

No, WTF? That's not a thing, why would you even credit such obvious nonsense?

dylan604yesterday at 7:28 PM

The computers are not dumb. If you do not purchase the correct number of items, the discount is not applied. Also, if you do not have a member/loyalty account, you do not get those discounts. They now have a new level that requires you to have their app for "digital" coupons that are on top of the loyalty prices. There are many times where I don't input my number in until the very end, and then see it calculate all of the deductions. Sometimes it's not much, but I've seen it drop $30 from the "member" price discounts.

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