Oct
21
Written by:
host
10/21/2007 12:56 PM
In a global economy is there any way to justify the huge difference between Canadian pricing and US pricing on many goods.
There seems to be a growing backlash from major brands / manufacturers to the re-appearance of the Canadian cross border shopper. US based car dealers being told to "don't sell to Canadians". What kind of gobbelygook is that? We may even be able to accept this in terms of them protecting Canadian dealers but at the same time prices should be in line.
What is the possible argument for US pricing on some products being so much lower. Well perhaps the greater volume available in the US. 30+ million people in Canada and 300+ million people in the US could be one argument. That doesn't truly make sense though. If you take that approach then prices should be lower in California and the eastern states and places with lower populations like the midwestern states paying a premium. That however is not the case. When you visit the Home depot dot com site it doesn't discriminate based on your state, but if you are Canadian then you go to home depot dot ca where yes the prices are quite different.
Ok, even if you accept the volume idea for the price difference does it really make sense that there is up to 50 % or more in some cases of a price difference. I really don't believe this to be the case. More plausible is the price setters maintaining obscene profits from Canadians. Turn over any recently published book and take a look at the printed US price and the printed Canadian price. Even allowing for last year's exchange rate it makes no sense.
Here are our choices, we can choose to pressure the merchants to lower prices and bring them in line. That is the nature of competition.
By the way, although I applaud Zeller's on cutting some prices, a reported 250 products out of how many they sell?