There's a sound principle- "Think before you buy a 'sale' item in bulk." Often times I think you're right- people buy it to get a "good deal," because the unit price will be lower if you do it that way; but doesn't that urge you to spend more than you normally would?!

I think so.

My wife and I went to Costco about a week ago. We ended up buying a box of Nutrigrain bars that will last us for 3 months! Do we ever really eat Nutrigrain bars?!

... nope.

We're just as guilty as anybody else. A big, red SALE sign is hard to resist!

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Thanks for discussing my post!!

My issue is when a store advertises a sale and you get there and realize there's no sale.  They just tell you its a sale hoping you won't know the difference.   Kohl's does this all the time.

And stay away from "going out of business" or "store liquidation" signs.  Generally they don't mean savings!

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I always flip back the "sale" tag to see what the tag underneath shows as the price.  You would be surprised at how many times they are identical.

I've found that most "sales" are advertising tricks.  Think about it:  how can these car dealers and furniture stores be having the "sale of the century" three times a year?

In my state they have a "tax free" weekend before school starts.  Most items in the stores are not reduced an additional amount because the retailers are hoping to benefit from the increased traffic.  I am always amazed at the number of people who make school and clothing purchases without calculating that 7% off a listed price is not a great deal.  If that was the advertised sale price in a newspaper ad they would not normally have bothered to leave their homes.

A furniture store that I visited while shopping for a coffee table advertised a "Manufacturer's Sell Off".  A  few weeks earlier I had seen a coffee table I liked but it  was out of my price range, so thinking that it would be "on sale" I went to check it out.  Amazingly nothing was on sale, they just changed all the sales tags, but not the prices.  When I complained to a sales associate, she told me most customers were complianing about their so called "sale".

This really is some great advice!!!

Sales can be misleading, especially when it involves high-markup items such as furniture, mattresses, and jewelry.  Often times a retailer's so-called "sale price" would be an everyday price, but hyped just to lure people into their stores.  One mattress company, a chain that operates their own factories, often mentions in its radio, TV, and newspaper ads about the tricks major-brand mattress retailers use to mislead their customers into their so-called "sale prices".  Other commercials boast that the "factory" company still manufactures "two-sided" mattresses, while major-brand mattresses are made one-sided, "in order to cut costs".  However, some of these one-sided mattresses use advanced technology to maintain comfort, while the "factory" store's competitors, who sell the one-siders, say that the "factory" mattresses are made with old, outdated technology.  More to confuse the customer.  (I own one of the "factory" mattress sets, and I have been charged a fair price and have slept comfortably on it for over 3 years now.)

As for "going out of business" and "store closing" sales, the stores' inventories are often sold to liquidation companies.  I have purchased items from many such sales, and often times, prices are raised before the "20% off", "30% off", ""40% off" discounts are applied.  Once, when K mart was closing stores here, due to their bankruptcy a few years back, I compared prices on items at a K mart that was closing with another K mart that was not closing...the sticker prices on the closing store's items was at least 25-35% HIGHER than at the K mart that was not closing.  Once the so-called "discounts" were applied, the price was only slightly less than at the non-closing K mart.  Only when a "store closing" or "going out of business" sale is in its final days, when most of the store is stripped and the remaining merchandise is at least 60% off or higher, can bargains be found...but by that time most of what's left is junk.  Other tricks retailers and liquidators would use for store closing/GOB sales is moving the better merchandise to stores that are not closing, and moving "clearance" merchandise from the non-closing stores to the closing stores.  Lastly, some unscrupulous retailers, usually mom and pop, would post "GOING OUT for BUSINESS!!!" sales...you are led to believe that the store is closing, but it's actually not...note that on the signs, the words "GOING", "OUT" and "BUSINESS" are in HUGE letters, while the word "for" is in small lower case letters.  After such sales, the store would close for a few weeks or months, then the same owners would reopen under a different name, and pull the same stunt later on.  "Going Out Of Business" and "Store Closing" sales can be a crapshoot...sure you can get bargains, but other times you wonder if you could have gotten a better value on the same merchandise elsewhere.