Posted on 06/30/2002 9:56:54 AM PDT by LarryLied
Katherine Albrecht has seen the supermarket of the future, and she doesn't like it.
"I've actually held in my hand the prototype next-generation shopping `loyalty' card -- a radio transmission-driven LED (light emitting diodes) shopping card," says the New Hampshire schoolteacher and mother of small children. "There already exist radio frequency devices in shopping carts so they can actually track your movements around the store. They're used in combination with the shoplifting cameras," says Albrecht, founder and head of Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering (www.nocards.org/).
Well, so what? If the market finds out I buy cat food and therefore sends me a coupon when it has a special on cat food, who gets hurt? Sounds pretty symbiotic to me.
"Right now they're at a two-tier price structure, one price with the card and one without the card," Albrecht explains. "They want to move this up to something called 'consumer-specific pricing' -- you and I will each be charged the maximum amount they've determined you will spend; it's actually kind of smart in a devious way. Already they've figured out they can mark the peanut butter on the shelf $4, mark it down to $2.29 if you have the card, and about 10 percent of the time that jar of peanut butter actually sells at $4 to what they call the `non-price-sensitive customer."
But once these stores have built up the kind of individualized data bases that a couple years of scanning our cards will give them, they're already planning to go much further, Albrecht reports.
At that point, in the not-so-distant future, "As soon as you walk into the store they'll read the chip in your (next-generation) card, while it's still in your purse or wallet. They've developed sensors in the floor; they track you around the store so not only do they know who you are and where you're moving, they know what kind of a shopper you are.
"You, on the other hand, they know you only buy peanut butter every six months, so what if we offer him peanut butter at $1.89?
"The special display on your shopping cart will start flashing when you enter that aisle, telling you there's a $1.89 special on the peanut butter, but that's for you alone; no one else entering that aisle that afternoon may be offered that price. If you buy it, that's the lowest price you'll ever be offered, because they know you'll pay that.
"The next time they'll try $2.29, then $2.59 ... . You'll never get it any lower than what you've paid in the past.
"But I'm what they call a 'price-inflexible shopper' -- they know I have to buy peanut butter every week or else my kids will scream, so they won't offer me any special discount at all ... . "
And even that's just the tip of the iceberg, Albrecht warns. Does anyone think your supermarket won't make its shopping card data available to firms with government grants studying excess obesity and the effectiveness of various programs to manipulate entire populations into improving their nutrition -- starting with special surtaxes on "junk food"?
Government medical and dental programs have already linked to similar shopper monitoring programs in England, she warns. After all, shouldn't someone who follows his doctor's orders and cuts down on salty foods move up in line for that rationed surgery, ahead of someone who ignored his doctor and kept buying junk food?
Some stores are even experimenting with systems that replace the card by simply scanning the customer's registered fingerprint, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer confirms.
Savings? Within a short time after the card programs are introduced, the "special-discount-with-card" price becomes the old, pre-card price, Albrecht says, while the "without-a-card price" can be jacked up to as much as twice the pre-card levels.
At that point, those 10 percent of transactions that proceed without a card-scan are "pure gravy for the store," she reports.
"I used to think that 10 percent was just a number, but increasingly I can put faces with that statistic. ... I got (a) call from a woman who said her son is developmentally disabled, he's retarded. But there's one thing he's able to do for the family: Every week he goes and buys exactly the same groceries. Same brand, everything.
"The first week after they introduced the cards he went in and bought his groceries, but he didn't understand what the card was all about, so when he got home he had spent an extra $8. The 10 percent is the developmentally disabled, the homeless who can't be bothered with a wallet, and it's -- I hate to say it -- the privacy advocates who are so proud of themselves because they won't sign up for the cards ... . "
Here in Las Vegas? Trader Joe's and Wild Oats have no card programs, Albrecht reports. Albertson's, which used to advertise itself as the "no cards, no hassles" store, started testing a card program in Dallas-Fort Worth, and introduced the cards in Northern Nevada last week.
Smith's, a division of Kroger's, is "one of the worst" when it comes to corporate dedication to the new card technology, Albrecht says.
Which leaves Raley's.
"There's a stated policy not to introduce these cards, and it does have to do with privacy issues," explained Raley's spokesperson Carolyn Konrad from her office in Sacramento last week. "At Raley's we really didn't like the way it felt when one person in line got one price and the next person in line got another price."
Albrecht would love to set up a CASPIAN affiliate in Las Vegas; contact her at kma@nocards.org or 603-465-9093.
Me? I used to carry a Smith's "Fresh Values" card. As of this week, I've started driving the extra two miles to Raley's.(
They know about people like you and have taken action. Every other month, Winn Dixie awars points for every dollar spent (the regular sales are on too). Spend $200 and get 10% off on a one time shopping trip. $300=15%, $400=20%.
I used to buy meals everyday or every other day. Now my freezer has enough for two weeks in it.
How could I pass up pot roast for 99 cents a pound and 2 half gallons of Breyers Ice Cream for $4?
"Right now they're at a two-tier price structure, one price with the card and one without the card," Albrecht explains. "They want to move this up to something called 'consumer-specific pricing' -- you and I will each be charged the maximum amount they've determined you will spend;
The future is here today in online transactions. Amazon.com has already been found to be doing this.
A beer at the Astrofield now costs $6. That's higher than at a stripjoint or even a high fallutin' bar.
Just think if that little card could relay those purchase prices back to the home base!
$72 for a case of beer!
Maybe it could also note that you tipped a dollar; you didn't feel that you had paid enough for your beer!
Something akin to this has already been pitched by those promoting digital broadcasts. Different advertising could be transmitted to your neighborhood depending on the demographics or even within your house.
Politicians would "love" it because they could always hold "your position" on the issues.
I avoid Randalls because of their price gouging.
I question if "max pricing" could ever be implemented. There is typically a posted or stickered price on groceries. Walk up customers are still going to want to know how much something costs and they may not buy much at the "max price". Selling merchandise to someone for higher than the posted price can cause problems.
There have already been lawsuits because the register price doesn't match a posted price (the registers don't always have the correct data and the shelves aren't always correct). To bill the customer this way is considered a deceptive trade practice.
I think that I got all of these incidents (digital tv, amazon.com's pricing, and maybe even the issue of cash register pricing) from Wired online. I've fallen out of the habit of checking their daily articles.
I don't know if it's actually been attempted, but in his book, Business at the Speed of Thought, Bill Gates indicated that soft drink machines could be rigged to do quite a few things, including sending an order in when they got down to a certain level and raising or lowering the prices depending on the temperature. It's been a while since I read his book, but I believe he did mention individual pricing structure depending on what people are willing to pay. It's already done on cars and houses, as well as the loans for each of these, and most large appliances have a built in fudge factor. I got Best Buy to knock $200 off of a stove. It's just that on small ticket items it really hasn't made any sense to dicker over the price.
Would also mention that it's rampant in wholesale. That's one of the big reasons Walmart can sell stuff for less than a small businessman can buy it for.
Yeah no sh!t. I am disconbobsterlated. I think I'll start growing my own beef. And tobacco. And hops. I reckon that's about all I need... Bwahaha...
Well, DUH! Of course you have to use cash for it to work.
Carolyn
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