Business: marketing: a story about location

Self-tutoring about business: the tutor mentions an interesting story about perceptions.

I lived away some months last year. It was a lot to get used to, compared to living at home. Life was much simpler, yet some logistical things needed to be worked out. One was grocery shopping.

Typically, there is an expensive place to buy groceries, and also a much more economical place as well. People go where they go for their own reasons. However, living away, I needed an economical place: where was it?

Everyone I asked sent me to the same place – let’s call it Store A. Its name suggested that, indeed, it was a discount place. Inside, it looked like one, too. Yet, its prices were upscale. Alas: no-one else seemed to know that they were paying high-class prices for their groceries there. In fact, they were all convinced it was a good bargain to shop there.

A long three blocks away – so far you can’t see it from Store A – is another grocery store. Let’s call it Store B. Their prices aren’t cheap, but you can find deals there. Once my wife alerted me where it is, I always shopped there instead of Store A.

Therefore, Store B was a longer trek from my res room, and harder to find. However, it’s a much better store, in my opinion. I mentioned this to a few people, but they continued to shop at Store A. They were already familiar with Store A, it was closer, and they had already decided its prices were reasonable.

I, on the other hand, never returned to Store A after finding Store B: it was worth the extra three blocks to go to Store B, in my opinion.

Interesting, eh?