Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

bnnbloomberg.ca

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 341 posts

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#121

Post by asdff »

0des wrote: post #53
jvalencia wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Offer $5 & $10 coins

This isn't a Chuck E. Cheese, paper notes are just fine. Nobody asked "what about the guy who makes the yokes" when John Deere took his first spin.

This is America. Tons of industries exist because they became outmoded but instead lobbied for protective legislation to ensure that what happened to all the horseshoe makers and stable owners won't ever happen to their industry, like car what dealers have done to make sure Ford has to sell their cars through these sleezeball third parties.

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#122

Post by OJFord »

14 wrote: post #44
paulpauper wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

by charging huge markup on per unit cost by reducing quantity. 3 pills of Tylenol for example for $1 instead of a bottle which may have dozens for $6 . The brands create special mini-sized packages specifically for dollar stores. Big business.

With often same great sized packaging only with smaller amounts inside. Very wasteful. Deodorant, chips, pills, etc all look like a normal sized bottle but in reality is a smaller size for dollar stores. I have also heard things like canned goods of say a brand of soup they have special made for places like Costco that demand higher quality ingredients where the dollar store would get lower quality versions. Perhaps…

(Not from around there) Costco demands higher quality ingredients? I thought it was a low-end cheap bulk/wholesale place?

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#123

Post by idiotsecant »

fanniemae wrote: post #72
0des wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't a Chuck E. Cheese, paper notes are just fine. Nobody asked "what about the guy who makes the yokes" when John Deere took his first spin.

Paper notes are extremely expensive to maintain because they can't stay in circulation long before they're worn out and need to be replaced. We really should be using $1, $2, $5 and $10 coins

The GAO actually did a study on this in 2019! They determined that for the first time since they started tracking the issue this is not true. Paper bills are overall cheaper than coinage now. I can't link right now but it's GAO report # GAO-19-300

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#124

Post by jdofaz »

waynecochran wrote: post #22

Along these line why is the US still minting pennies? At some point we could just start rounding to the nearest nickel (or dime). Also, why is gas always ab extra 9/10 of a penny? Reminds me of paying 3123 RON for a Big Mac in Romania -- that last digit is just noise at the consumer level.

>Also, why is gas always ab extra 9/10 of a penny

Others have replied to the why, but it is technically 9 Mills. The thousandths unit was established in the Coinage Act of 1792 as the smallest unit of the dollar.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mill_(currency)#United_States

This is some useless trivia that I know for some reason :)

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#125

Post by spicybright »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #32
waynecochran wrote: post #22

Along these line why is the US still minting pennies? At some point we could just start rounding to the nearest nickel (or dime). Also, why is gas always ab extra 9/10 of a penny? Reminds me of paying 3123 RON for a Big Mac in Romania -- that last digit is just noise at the consumer level.

> why is the US still minting pennies? A lobbying group funded by the producer of the blanks used to make pennies opposes penny abolition [1]. There is no similarly-motivated group promoting it. (Citizens to Retire the Penny exists, but their last news item is from 2019 [2].) When the U.S. eliminated the half cent it was worth 14 cents [3], so there is a good case of nixing the nickel alongside the penny, whenever we…

Not to mention other countries have done this with little issue.

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#126

Post by gkoberger »

I don't think that people in this thread appreciate how prevalent grocery shopping in dollar stores is. In the US, half of shoppers buy groceries from a dollar store. They do it because it's literally all they can afford anything else. There are more dollar stores than Walmart, Starbucks and McDonald’s combined.

"Kyle Dishman can’t afford to shop at the local grocery store anymore. Instead he goes to Dollar General, where he can make $40 stretch into a week’s worth of groceries and the occasional can of motor oil for his Chrysler 300."

Sources:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/08/20/growing-n...

https://www.mashed.com/224027/think-twice-before-buying-food...

EDIT: Of course not all things cost $1, but it's certainly weighted in that direction. You don't go to a dollar store for nice things; you do it because it's the only option for you. A lot of the responses seem to want to debate how poor people are making choices, and I think that misses the point.

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#127

Post by asdff »

MattRix wrote: post #29
waynecochran wrote: post #22

Along these line why is the US still minting pennies? At some point we could just start rounding to the nearest nickel (or dime). Also, why is gas always ab extra 9/10 of a penny? Reminds me of paying 3123 RON for a Big Mac in Romania -- that last digit is just noise at the consumer level.

We stopped minting pennies here in Canada in 2012. Pennies are still legal tender, but cash purchases are rounded to the nearest 5 cents. I don’t think anyone here misses the pennies.

See that's the thing. If we didn't have pennies, companies couldn't ask their customers to fund as much of their tax writeoff every year when they ask them to round up for some random cause.

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#128

Post by toxik »

123pie123 wrote: post #112
tshaddox wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also great for someone with an occasional sweet tooth and insufficient willpower to have junk food at the house. Sometimes I just want 4 Oreos and I’ll happily pay a huge per-unit markup to avoid eating the whole box.

ever so often I get that crazy look from the store assistant when they offer me (something like) double what your're buying for a few pence more and I say no thanks - typically I'm holding my belly whilst saying no

Imagine if bartenders offered alcoholics 20% off if they bought two

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#129

Post by dragonwriter »

OJFord wrote: post #122
14 wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With often same great sized packaging only with smaller amounts inside. Very wasteful. Deodorant, chips, pills, etc all look like a normal sized bottle but in reality is a smaller size for dollar stores. I have also heard things like canned goods of say a brand of soup they have special made for places like Costco that demand higher quality ingredients where the dollar store would get lower quality versions. Perhaps…

(Not from around there) Costco demands higher quality ingredients? I thought it was a low-end cheap bulk/wholesale place?

Costco is not low-end; it is inexpensive, but that is because its revenue model is near-zero margin on items with its profit derived from membership charges, focuses on large package sizes, etc. Reputation for quality is part of what helps it sell memberships, so its important.

Re: Dollar Tree says US$1.25 price point to become new standard

#130

Post by asdff »

kingcharles wrote: post #114
quickthrower2 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They should abolish coins. There is probably less need for them (who wants to carry them!) now the technology to accept notes in machines. Maybe the people who make the note readers can lobby to abolish coins.

I have to wash my clothes at the laundromat. Get annoyed every time I have to shovel $6 of quarters into the machine, one-at-a-time.

I've asked my landlord if they would let me buy back the quarters from them since it's such a pain getting them in a coin shortage. They didn't respond. Rent is already in the thousands, really my landlord should just stomach the $8 they get off me from the laundry room a month and just make it free. I'd honestly pay my landlord even higher rent if I didn't have to deal with getting rolls of quarters.
Post reply on HN