Adjust Text Size

Mall Jewelry Store ‘Sales’

Written by Nickel - 4 Comments

I’ve always been amused by the fact that mall jewelry stores seem to run perpetual sales, with pretty much everything selling for 70% off pretty much all the time, but this takes the cake… I just saw a Zales commercial on TV, and a bit of their fine print caught my eye… “Original prices may not have resulted in actual sales.”

In other words, they likely haven’t even tried to sell their wares for the ‘regular’ price. Rather, they just mark it way up before they mark it down. Apparently they’ve gotten in trouble for this sort of behavior at some point — why else would they run a disclaimer effectively admitting that the ‘deal’ that they’re offering you has been greatly exaggerated?

Disclaimer: Discover is a paid advertiser of this site.
Reasonable efforts are made to maintain accurate information. See the Discover online credit card application for full terms and conditions on offers and rewards.

Published on December 20th, 2005
Modified on August 24th, 2011 - 4 Comments
Filed under: Miscellany

About the author: is the founder and editor-in-chief of this site. He's a thirty-something family man who has been writing about personal finance since 2005, and guess what? He's on Twitter!

Related articles...

» Shady Jewelry Store Advertising Tactics
» One Year Ago This Week (2006 Holiday Edition)
» From the Archives (December 16th – December 22nd)
» Beware the Effects of Price Anchoring
» Weekly Roundup – 06/08/07
» When to Haggle
» State Sales Tax Holidays
» The Best of FCN — Selections from 05/06

Was this article useful? Please sign up to receive our content via e-mail:

You will receive only the daily updates, and can unsubscribe at anytime.

4 Responses to “Mall Jewelry Store ‘Sales’”

  1. 1
    FMF Says:

    Welcome to the jewelry “business”. My experience here is that if you don’t know what they’re up to, you can REALLY get taken.

  2. 2
    Nick Says:

    This reminds me of a dry cleaners down the street which has “20% off everyday!” permanently written on their storefront.

    As for jewelry, the only piece of jewelry I’ve ever gotten in a physical store instead of online is my wife’s engagement ring and that was only after extensive research and shopping around online and in stores. It was the only time I’ve ever seen a B&M jewelry store beat all of the online sellers for the same type and quality of merchandise … even with the perpetual 40-60% off!

  3. 3
    Blaine Moore Says:

    I have not done a whole lot of jewelry buying; our engagement ring came from a family hand me down, and the work done on it was a friend’s recommendation at a jeweler. Doing the sizing was much cheaper than the buying, I’d think…

  4. 4
    jim Says:

    My mom once told me that jewelry is marked up at least 300%, so when it’s 50% off, they’re still making a huge profit. We had friends who were jewelers so I assume that’s where she heard it from.

Leave a Reply

Top Cards by Category

Earn 100 Reward Dollars after you make $1,000 in purchases in the first three months of Cardmembership.

Earn 25K Membership Rewards(R) points after you spend $2,000 during your first three months of Card membership.

Consumer friendly credit card with a great low rate of 7.25% and save on interest charges. No balance transfer fees and no annual fee.

The new Discover it card is out to change the way people think about credit cards. No annual fee. No overlimit fee. No foreign transaction fee & no pay-by-phone fee. No late fee on your first late payment. And Discover won't increase your APR for paying late.*

The new Discover it card is out to change the way people think about credit cards. No annual fee. No overlimit fee. No foreign transaction fee & no pay-by-phone fee. No late fee on your first late payment. And Discover won't increase your APR for paying late.*

Consumer friendly credit card with a great low rate of 7.25% and save on interest charges. No balance transfer fees and no annual fee.

Limited Time Offer: Get 25,000 Membership Rewards(R) points after you spend $5,000 in the first three months of Card membership. Enroll and select a qualifying airline to receive up to $200 annually in statement credits for incidental fees, such as checked bags and in-flight refreshments, charged by the airline.

The new Discover it card is out to change the way people think about credit cards. No annual fee. No overlimit fee. No foreign transaction fee & no pay-by-phone fee. No late fee on your first late payment. And Discover won't increase your APR for paying late.*

Previous
Pause
Next

FiveCentNickel User Survey