Haggling with the "People of Wal-Mart"

Haggling

Roddey Player

The art of haggling, whether trying to buy a car, TV, etc…, has been perfected by some, and absolutely failed by others.  I’ve had plenty of experiences with both of these groups growing up in a retail environment, and I believe I have seen the complete opposite of the spectrum.  Recently, I went to Wal-Mart, and was held up in line for ten minutes because there was a customer there that was attempting to get a better deal on a TV and DVD player while I was waiting in line for the cashier.  This severely frustrated me because I never look forward to go shopping for longer than I have to, but after a couple minutes, I began to enjoy myself watching a person who clearly didn’t know how to get herself a better deal, try to get a better deal from a cashier that clearly didn’t have the authority to give her a better deal, even if the customer was in fact, an expert in the art of haggling.

This problem brought up a question in my mind about how do people know when it is ok to haggle or not.  Is there some unwritten code about where you can or cannot try to get yourself a better deal? It’s understood that in the process of buying a car, it’s very acceptable to haggle and potentially knock thousands of dollars off the original price, but why is it unacceptable to do this at Wal-mart while buying a TV to maybe knock off 20 dollars? Was it just a “people of Wal-mart” skit in hilarity, or was there something more behind this exercise in futility?

I work for a consumer electronics and appliance store as a sales associate, and just about every sale I make, I have to experience haggling in some form or another by people dragging their feet mumbling about getting a better deal at store X or corporation Y.  There are built in price drops for that possibility, and even though there will be a slight dent in the commission earnings for the salesperson, the consumer can take 50 dollars off of a couple hundred dollar ticket.  We certainly do not advertise this fact, so how do people know that we could give them a better deal if they try to talk the seller into it by being difficult while in the store.

In case you’re all wondering, (which I’m sure you are…) the customer left the TV and the DVD player on the register, along with the rest of her potential purchases, and stormed out of the store, yelling at the person paid to watch the door and say “have a nice day,” on her way out.  This frustrated the cashier, who looked like she was about to cry afterwards, and the manager, who was called out to help.  The differences in this case against cases of haggling that I saw all summer, are completely dissimilar, although this one was quite entertaining to not be a part of.