Grocery Store Sale question

[TC]

Does anyone know if it's illegal to put items on sale that have been doubled in price?

One of the grocery stores that we go to in town, had a big buy one get one free sale. We got the paper and decided to go, the prices were not listed in the paper, just the items that were on sale. We get there and notice that every item on sale had actually been doubled.

For instance : Hormel Chili was buy one get one free @ 2.19 for a small can (normally they are 1.00 or 1.10 )

Bar S Bacon was buy one get one free @ over 4 dollars per package. Normally at most it's 2.25....it's a cheap brand

Fruit Loop for the smallest box was buy one get one free @ 3.95 per package. (the little box is never that much)

Chicken breasts were 3 something a pound...buy one get one free (for this one I actually have a package from last week, were they were marked 1.19 per pound)

Can they do this and advertise it as a sale? I called the manager when we got back, and he said he was sorry, but the corporate office assigns the sales price, and he has no control over it. I asked if he knew they were marked up and he again just stated that he had no control over it.

I agree that its a private company and they can charge what they want, but should they be able to "kinda lie" with the promise of a sale.

[Geary_Johns]

Ok, name the store!

I would call your state attorney general’s office and talk with them about it.

[blufford]

Yep they can do it. Its done all the time. As time goes on I think that fooling the customer is becoming more acceptable. Don't shop there.

[ninny]

There is an article in today's paper that is written by Richard Alderman, University of Houston law professor that deals with a similar situation.
Someone wrote in asking if it were legal for a store to charge more than the list price. They had bought an item in a store and found a cheaper price under the store's price tag.

His response was:

"As far as the law is concerned, a store may charge what it wants. In my opinion, however, covering up the list price and charging more may violate the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act. This law prohibits a store from misleading or deceiving customers."

He goes into further detail that I wont list but he seems, in my opinion, to think that the store may have violated this law.

He has a website: www.peopleslawyer.net that you can post a question.
Another website where you can file a complaint is: www.texasccc.com

Might give either of these sites a ring and see what his response is or else call the atty. gen.'s office and file a complaint.


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[Cindy in NY]

I would call your state's attorney general's office. I believe they caught Penney's doing this with their jewelry prices a few years ago.

[Oldcountryboy]

A couple of years ago my wife and I was on the lookout for a good but cheap mattress. We had gone into a furniture store and checked out there prices and decided they were just a little too expensive for us. About a week later they advertised a big sale and were slashing prices. So we went back and this is what we discovered.

They were not having a sale at all. We looked at the very same mattress in hopes of getting it cheaper but what we found was that they had written a bigger price above the original price and slashed it to make it look like it was much cheaper. When in fact it was the very same price as it has always been.

People were buying this stuff up thinking they were getting a good deal on furnitures. We left without buying any mattress again.