Price vs. Value

Everything in Australia is over-priced. I mean everything. Even Switzerland is cheaper. Comparing goods between the UK, the US, and Australia, the immense price difference is ridiculous (with the possible exception of urban real estate).


There's no escape from the prices. Even online shopping is terrible; when anything overseas detects the location, the prices are ridiculous once again.

 

We produce the goods necessary. We (read: convervatives and businesses) export everything overseas for regular prices, and charge Australians an extra third. We're actually in a good position, but business lobbies have kept prices high (apples were only allowed to be grown in Australia because the farming lobby wanted high prices, using quarantine as an excuse, until New Zealand took it to an international court of trade).

 

For higher value items, I generally prefer to pay more and get a longer life out of it. I'll also be a bit more discerning than just looking at the price (there's a lot of artificial inflation that certain brands are able to get away with because of their reputation) - I'll research the hell out of it and compare several brands.

As for food, I'll generally go with the cheaper option if there's no difference in quality, which is more often than one might think. I interned at a ice cream factory and we made ice cream for our own brand (market leader), and for supermarket house brands. They are the same.

 

There's a book; simply called "Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture" by Ellen Ruppel Shell, which is a real eye-opener to the ultimate wastefulness and environmental disaster that ensues from cheap things that don't last. For example what she wrote about IKEA is amazing (it's not a manufacturing company, it's a design and marketing company, everything it sells is made "elsewhere" = cheap). Reputable movers when learning there's an Ikea bookshelf or whatever will not guarantee that the item will survive moving!

I prefer quality, nothing frustrates me more than using something that falls apart after a few uses and then has to be replaced: ultimately costing me more (including time, gas and aggravation) than if I had bought the "pricier" quality item in the first place.

 

For me, it depends on the type of product.

With high value items that should work as well and as long as possible I tend to go for the higher priced product (like my computer and laptop (Apple) or my car (old but top-of-the-range Peugeot)). In the end it's always worth the higher price, because like you said: the cheap stuff breaks so much faster

But when it comes to stuff like, let's say, laundry detergent, I buy the more affordable option. I can buy a 4€ or a 10€ bottle (of the same size) but the more expensive one isn't any better.

With food I usually go down the middle road. The super cheap stuff has weird ingredients in it I don't want to eat, but the averagely priced products usually are great quality.

 

My good old Jewish mother has a saying: “Only the rich can afford to buy cheap”. In that sentence, there is so much to be said. It’s true. When you buy something cheap, it will maybe work once or twice. However, the loss of quality for each subsequent use is exponential. We bought some suitcases at an outlet store, because my Dad was fed up with paying hundreds of dollars for small suitcases. The only problem is the small suitcases he paid hundreds of dollars for have still held strong, after being in more flights than a pilot. The ones we bought in the outlet store lasted perhaps five round trip flights. Now we own Tumi suitcases.

In terms of food and produce, I always get the name brands. I know it’s good quality, I know what I’m getting and I know I’ll like it. Take for example yesterday. I wanted to get some crisps (Chips, for you Americans). I insisted on the Pringles. My mother kept assuring me the generic brand that comes from the Netherlands, that say “Zout Spaander” instead of “Crisps”. It’s quality, people. You can’t imitate quality.

 

Data, great thread! I go for value and quality. I've been in the metal working trades since high school. I couldn't afford top line tools then so my Dad would by them for me as Christmas and birthday gifts. Almost 50 years later and I'm still using them. A quality tool also feels better in your hand. Just like the Snap-On & Mac tools you want. They'll last your entire career and have a life time guarantee so you only buy them once. That diesel in your M-B has been around for about 70/80 years and is still being made. Various forms of it have powered not only cars but ships, construction equipment, stationary power plants, motorized weapons and more.
I don't mind spending on quality but not just to buy a name

 

I buy what I can afford, and that isn't much. I'm fortunate to have a good laptop and phone, but in regards to food shopping, unless the cheapest product is particularly objectionable, I buy it. Perhaps I could afford a little more, but I prefer to spend/save on more important things.

 

I tend to buy the cheapest stuff lol. I don't really care about value and bla bla. I hate shopping.

 

Depends on what it is. I usually go for price though.

 

Food cheap. I even prefer the generic brands more often than not taste wise. Now things like tvs, computers etc I would go with a brand that is recommended by my dad or I have exp with. If I can buy in bulk I will get name brand food/household supplies. Since generic brands don't tend to be in bulk so I save with the name brand.

P.S. Generic hot dogs are disgusting.

 

Gahhhh, generic food brands. Why? Quality is so important. It’s like your putting all these terrible things in you body, voluntarily. Preservatives and saturated fats and high fracture corn syrup.... Ah, I feel sick even thinking about it.

 

Actually, I find the situation can be as bad with Big Name Brands as far as stuff you don't want to ingest. Recently, I indulged myself in the thrilling experience of looking at stewed tomatoes at my local grocery store, and I found the one "name brand"carried had high fructose corn syrup. I THINK I recall seeing the store brand having sugar, although it could well be GMO sugar beet sugar. Still...I put that ahead of HFC.

Meanwhile, if there had been a "store brand" organic stewed tomato, that store brand would likely be even more ahead of the Big Name Brand, and possibly slightly cheaper.

Stepping away from the grocery store (although this also probably applies to some stuff there): hiaving a brand name is not necessarily any guarantee of quality. We have many "old brands" dating back who knows how far that, in reality, are in today's world nothing more than a name that is getting raped on a daily basis. All quality associated with that brand was gone before Reagan left office.

Some brands apparently no longer even exist as a company; all that is left is the name which is available for use to anyone willing to pay the right fee. If I coughed up a million or whatever, I could probably get a license to slap some brand names on a dog turd.

 

Very true about older brand names, we enjoyed a thread a few months ago about my inheriting my grandmother's "Revereware" copper-lined dutch oven and frying pan, these things were made in the 50's, I believe, and they're simply indestructible. The newer stuff may carry the name but comes nowhere near to what these things are worth.

This is the issue with fixed prices, we take it as natural that you don't negotiate the price on smaller things, but you should try, what goes into a price is primarily a story, and a whole set of assumptions about value...fascinating thing, price is; basically the cost is generally what people are willing to pay, which is a proxy for value.

We should be far more educated about the value of things, this requires discernment and a bullet-proof fail-safe bullshit detector.

 

I like saving money, but if something has a reputation for doing the job well and/or lasting a long time, I'll pay whatever for the good stuff. It's no blood out of my heart, really, if something costs twice as much now but lasts three times as long as the cheaper thing.

Food, on the other hand, I'm picky when it comes to food quality. I go out of my way to buy better quality food regardless of price. Some of the things people put in their bodies, knowingly or not, just to save a buck at the grocery store... *shudders* I don't want to think about it.

 

Walmart is the exemplar of the consequences of "Cheap". Just read yesterday that some Walmart somewhere is having a food drive...for their own employees!

 

I try not to shop at Walmart. It's kind of evil, driving smaller businesses out and not paying their common people a decent wage. I read somewhere recently that minimum wage in Australia is over AUD$15, while people in the US only make US$7.25, but that's a discussion for another time. The point is, I try to avoid ''cheap.'' Inexpensive is fine. On sale for a good price is great. But cheap? No, cheap doesn't really work for me.