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Cola Pricing Insanity
R. Alex Whitlock
This has got to stop.
I stopped by a convenience store on the way home to get a bite to eat and a Mountain Dew. The prices went as follows:
Can (12 fl oz): $0.79
Bottle (20 fl oz): $1.19
1-Liter Bottle (34 fl oz): $0.79
What's wrong with this picture? Why is PepsiCo giving out such deals on the 1-liter bottles? I know it isn't this particular convenience store and I know it isn't a fluke because I've been seeing this coming incrementally for some time now. For a long while the 20oz were $1.09 and the 1-liter $1.15. Occasionally you could get 2-for-1 deals on the liter. But almost never on the convenient 20oz bottles.
While the utilitarian in me says that I should just get the 1-liter bottle, there are two problems with this: First, I don't want that much, but if I buy it I'll drink it and that is to be avoided. Second, the 1-liter bottle doesn't fit in my car cup-holster-dealie-bob.
Ah-ha! So in actuallity I'm paying extra for the ability to put that bottle in my cup-holster-dealie-bob. It's a convenience thing. I suppose so. But the fact that they are willing to sell more for less is just rubbing their profit margins in my face ("Dude, this stuff is so cheap that we can make a solid profit by selling you 175% as much for 75% the price, but we're not gonna cause you're such a loser that you'll pay more and more for the 20oz bottle.")
Of course this has always been the case with the cola fountains, but that's never bothered me.
This, for some reason, I find the slightest bit frustrating.
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Observations
Actually Alex, it's because it's two different markets.
In the gas station, people are (mostly) looking to pick up 1-2 of them for travel - thus the 20 oz size is about the upper limit, since most car cup holders won't hold much bigger. Yes, soda-fountain drinks go larger, but they do so by being nearly triangular in shape and REALLY easy to tip over in order to slide the bottom into the cup holder.
Their competition, in this case, is the vending machine wherever you may be travleing, which is selling its 16 and 20-oz beverages for (normally) 75 cents to 1 dollar.
Once you're selling the 1- or 2-liter bottle (or for that matter a gallon of milk) you're competing with the price that people could get at the grocery store 2 minutes down the road. The grocery store sells theirs for 59-69 cents, therefore the gas station prices it about 10 cents higher (still selling the "convenience" but remaining competitive).
Bottom line, it comes down to expectations. Those who are looking for a drink-to-go are expecting to pay between 50 cents and 1 dollar for it. Those who are looking for a 1- or 2-liter bottle are looking to pay, at most, $1.25 for it.
It gets even more absurd when you realize that the same person paying that 79 cents for a 12-oz can of soda could buy an entire 12-pack of same for somewhere between $2 and $2.50, thus paying approximately 20.83 cents per can.
And of course, those of us who actually pay attention to prices are considered, "Dorks."
Heh... I remember when convenience stores were cheaper than coke machines AND coke machines were less convenient cause their dollar-holes were messed up.
I suppose I get what you're saying, though. Do the grocery stores sell them (1-2 liters) cold, though? If not, that's more than difference in convenience, that's another difference in markets. If they do, that makes sense.
Regardless, it really must come to a stop cause it annoys me a little and the world should put a stop to things that annoy me.
(or I could just stop getting soft drinks at convenience stores, but let's not go nuts here, okay?)
I think it's even more sickening that they sell bottled water for more than their processed drinks. As Penn and Teller put it in an excelent episode of Bullshit!
"They figured out how to charge you more for Coke without the syrup."
Kavey, I actually almost made a reference to that very thing (not P&T, but the same general observation)!
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