Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/zbw/espost/204666.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

If You Think 9-Ending Prices Are Low, Think Again

Author

Listed:
  • Snir, Avichai
  • Levy, Daniel
Abstract
9-ending prices, which comprise between 40%–95% of retail prices, are popular because shoppers perceive them as being low. We study whether this belief is justified using scanner price-data with over 98-million observations from a large US grocery-chain. We find that 9-ending prices are higher than non 9-ending prices, by as much as 18%. Two factors explain why shoppers believe, mistakenly, that 9-ending prices are low. First, we find that among sale-prices, 9-ending prices are indeed lower than non 9-ending prices, giving 9-ending prices an aura of being low. Second, at first, 9-ending prices were indeed lower than other prices. Shoppers, therefore, learned to associate 9-endings with low prices. Over time, however, 9-ending prices rose substantially, which shoppers failed to notice, because the continuous use of 9-ending prices for promoting deep price cuts draws shoppers’ attention to them, and helps to maintain-and-preserve the image of 9-ending prices as bargain prices.

Suggested Citation

  • Snir, Avichai & Levy, Daniel, 2021. "If You Think 9-Ending Prices Are Low, Think Again," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 6(1 (Forthc).
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:espost:204666
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/204666/1/Complete%20Manuscript%20-%20Snir%20and%20Levy%20-%20JACR.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bernardo Guimaraes & Kevin D. Sheedy, 2011. "Sales and Monetary Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(2), pages 844-876, April.
    2. Knotek, Edward S., 2024. "The roles of price points and menu costs in price rigidity," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    3. Levy, Daniel & Lee, Dongwon & Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Kauffman, Robert J. & Bergen, Mark, 2011. "Price Points and Price Rigidity," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 93(4), pages 1417-1431.
    4. Sergio Meza & K. Sudhir, 2010. "Do private labels increase retailer bargaining power?," Quantitative Marketing and Economics (QME), Springer, vol. 8(3), pages 333-363, September.
    5. Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Levy, Daniel & Ray, Sourav & Bergen, Mark, 2008. "Asymmetric Price Adjustment in the Small," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 55(4), pages 728-737.
    6. Levy, Daniel & Müller, Georg & Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Bergen, Mark & Dutta, Shantanu, 2010. "Holiday Price Rigidity and Cost of Price Adjustment," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 77(305), pages 172-198.
    7. Robert B. Barsky & Mark Bergen & Shantanu Dutta & Daniel Levy, 2003. "What Can the Price Gap between Branded and Private-Label Products Tell Us about Markups?," NBER Chapters, in: Scanner Data and Price Indexes, pages 165-225, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Daniel Levy & Andrew T. Young, 2021. "Promise, trust, and betrayal: Costs of breaching an implicit contract," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 87(3), pages 1031-1051, January.
    9. Blinder, Alan S, 1991. "Why Are Prices Sticky? Preliminary Results from an Interview Study," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(2), pages 89-96, May.
    10. Levy, Daniel & Snir, Avichai & Gotler, Alex & Chen, Haipeng (Allan), 2020. "Not all price endings are created equal: Price points and asymmetric price rigidity," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue forthcomi.
    11. Levy, Daniel & Young, Andrew T., 2004. ""The Real Thing:" Nominal Price Rigidity of the Nickel Coke, 1886-1959," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 36(4 (Specia), pages 765-799.
    12. Young, Andrew T. & Levy, Daniel, 2014. "Explicit Evidence of an Implicit Contract," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 30(4), pages 804-832.
    13. Dutta, Shantanu & Bergen, Mark & Levy, Daniel, 2002. "Price flexibility in channels of distribution: Evidence from scanner data," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 26(11), pages 1845-1900, September.
    14. Eric Anderson & Nir Jaimovich & Duncan Simester, 2015. "Price Stickiness: Empirical Evidence of the Menu Cost Channel," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 97(4), pages 813-826, October.
    15. Edward S. Knotek, 2011. "Convenient Prices and Price Rigidity: Cross-Sectional Evidence," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(3), pages 1076-1086, August.
    16. Anderson, Eric & Malin, Benjamin A. & Nakamura, Emi & Simester, Duncan & Steinsson, Jón, 2017. "Informational rigidities and the stickiness of temporary Sales," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 64-83.
    17. Paul B. Ellickson & Sanjog Misra, 2008. "Supermarket Pricing Strategies," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(5), pages 811-828, 09-10.
    18. Anil K Kashyap, 1995. "Sticky Prices: New Evidence from Retail Catalogs," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 110(1), pages 245-274.
    19. Virgiliu Midrigan, 2011. "Menu Costs, Multiproduct Firms, and Aggregate Fluctuations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 79(4), pages 1139-1180, July.
    20. Haipeng (Allan) Chen & Daniel Levy & Avichai Snir, 2017. "End of 9-Endings and Price Perceptions," Working Paper series 17-04, Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis.
    21. Jean-Pierre Dubé & Sanjog Misra, 2017. "Personalized Pricing and Consumer Welfare," NBER Working Papers 23775, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    22. Thomas Mathä, 2009. "Regional Mc parity: do common pricing points reduce deviations from the law of one price?," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 145(1), pages 155-166, April.
    23. Monica Wadhwa & Kuangjie Zhang, 2015. "This Number Just Feels Right: The Impact of Roundedness of Price Numbers on Product Evaluations," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 41(5), pages 1172-1185.
    24. John Huston & Nipoli Kamdar, 1996. "$9.99: Can "Just-Below" Pricing Be Reconciled with Rationality?," Eastern Economic Journal, Eastern Economic Association, vol. 22(2), pages 137-145, Spring.
    25. Jungsil Choi & Kiljae Lee & Yong-Yeon Ji, 2012. "What type of framing message is more appropriate with nine-ending pricing?," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 603-614, September.
    26. Ngobo, Paul-Valentin & Legohérel, Patrick & Guéguen, Nicolas, 2010. "A cross-category investigation into the effects of nine-ending pricing on brand choice," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 17(5), pages 374-385.
    27. Bradley J. Ruffle & Ze'ev Shtudiner, 2006. "99: are retailers best responding to rational consumers? Experimental evidence," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(6), pages 459-475.
    28. Chahrour, Ryan A., 2011. "Sales and price spikes in retail scanner data," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 110(2), pages 143-146, February.
    29. Judith A. Chevalier & Anil K. Kashyap & Peter E. Rossi, 2003. "Why Don't Prices Rise During Periods of Peak Demand? Evidence from Scanner Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(1), pages 15-37, March.
    30. Hackl, Franz & Kummer, Michael E. & Winter-Ebmer, Rudolf, 2014. "99 Cent: Price points in e-commerce," Information Economics and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 12-27.
    31. Chakraborty, Ratula & Dobson, Paul W. & Seaton, Jonathan S. & Waterson, Michael, 2015. "Pricing in inflationary times: The penny drops," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 71-86.
    32. Snir, Avichai & Levy, Daniel & Chen, Haipeng (Allan), 2017. "End of 9-endings, price recall, and price perceptions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 157-163.
    33. Schindler, Robert M & Kirby, Patrick N, 1997. "Patterns of Rightmost Digits Used in Advertised Prices: Implications for Nine-Ending Effects," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 24(2), pages 192-201, September.
    34. Manoj Thomas & Vicki Morwitz, 2005. "Penny Wise and Pound Foolish: The Left-Digit Effect in Price Cognition," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 32(1), pages 54-64, June.
    35. Ater, Itai & Gerlitz, Omri, 2017. "Round prices and price rigidity: Evidence from outlawing odd prices," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 188-203.
    36. Mark Stiving, 2000. "Price-Endings When Prices Signal Quality," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 46(12), pages 1617-1629, December.
    37. Nakamura, Emi & Steinsson, Jón, 2011. "Price setting in forward-looking customer markets," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(3), pages 220-233.
    38. Knotek II, Edward S., 2008. "Convenient prices, currency, and nominal rigidity: Theory with evidence from newspaper prices," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(7), pages 1303-1316, October.
    39. Jeong, Ji Youn & Crompton, John L., 2018. "Do subjects from high and low context cultures attribute different meanings to tourism services with 9-ending prices?," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 110-118.
    40. Stiving, Mark & Winer, Russell S, 1997. "An Empirical Analysis of Price Endings with Scanner Data," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 24(1), pages 57-67, June.
    41. Levy, Daniel & Dutta, Shantanu & Bergen, Mark, 2002. "Heterogeneity in Price Rigidity: Evidence from a Case Study Using Microlevel Data," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 34(1), pages 197-220, February.
    42. Shuba Srinivasan & Koen Pauwels & Dominique M. Hanssens & Marnik G. Dekimpe, 2004. "Do Promotions Benefit Manufacturers, Retailers, or Both?," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(5), pages 617-629, May.
    43. Sam Peltzman, 2000. "Prices Rise Faster than They Fall," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(3), pages 466-502, June.
    44. Pradeep Chintagunta & Jean-Pierre Dubé & Vishal Singh, 2003. "Balancing Profitability and Customer Welfare in a Supermarket Chain," Quantitative Marketing and Economics (QME), Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 111-147, March.
    45. Carver, James R. & Padgett, Daniel T., 2012. "Product Category Pricing and Future Price Attractiveness: 99-Ending Pricing in a Memory-Based Context," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 88(4), pages 497-511.
    46. Emi Nakamura & Jón Steinsson, 2008. "Five Facts about Prices: A Reevaluation of Menu Cost Models," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 123(4), pages 1415-1464.
    47. Besley, Timothy J. & Rosen, Harvey S., 1999. "Sales Taxes and Prices: An Empirical Analysis," National Tax Journal, National Tax Association;National Tax Journal, vol. 52(2), pages 157-178, June.
    48. Utpal Bhattacharya & Craig W. Holden & Stacey Jacobsen, 2012. "Penny Wise, Dollar Foolish: Buy-Sell Imbalances On and Around Round Numbers," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 58(2), pages 413-431, February.
    49. Kenneth C. Manning & David E. Sprott, 2009. "Price Endings, Left-Digit Effects, and Choice," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 36(2), pages 328-335.
    50. Basu, Kaushik, 1997. "Why are so many goods priced to end in nine? And why this practice hurts the producers," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 41-44, January.
    51. Geoffrey Pofahl & Oral Capps & H. Alan Love, 2006. "Retail Zone Pricing and Simulated Price Effects of Upstream Mergers," International Journal of the Economics of Business, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(2), pages 195-215.
    52. Martin Eichenbaum & Nir Jaimovich & Sergio Rebelo, 2011. "Reference Prices, Costs, and Nominal Rigidities," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(1), pages 234-262, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Levy, Daniel & Snir, Avichai, 2022. "Potterian Economics," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 1, pages 1-32.
    2. Snir, Avichai & Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Levy, Daniel, 2021. "Stuck at Zero: Price Rigidity in a Runaway Inflation," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue forthcomi.
    3. Snir, Avichai & Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Levy, Daniel, 2022. "Zero-Ending Prices, Cognitive Convenience, and Price Rigidity," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 203, pages 519-542.
    4. Ray, Sourav & Snir, Avichai & Levy, Daniel, 2023. "Retail Pricing Format and Rigidity of Regular Prices," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 1-1.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Snir, Avichai & (Allan) Chen, Haipeng & Levy, Daniel, 2022. "Zero-ending prices, cognitive convenience, and price rigidity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 203(C), pages 519-542.
    2. Levy, Daniel & Snir, Avichai & Gotler, Alex & Chen, Haipeng (Allan), 2020. "Not all price endings are created equal: Price points and asymmetric price rigidity," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue forthcomi.
    3. Ray, Sourav & Snir, Avichai & Levy, Daniel, 2023. "Retail Pricing Format and Rigidity of Regular Prices," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, pages 1-1.
    4. Daniel Levy & Dongwon Lee & Haipeng (Allan) Chen & Robert J. Kauffman & Mark Bergen, 2011. "Price Points and Price Rigidity," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(4), pages 1417-1431, November.
    5. Ater, Itai & Gerlitz, Omri, 2017. "Round prices and price rigidity: Evidence from outlawing odd prices," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 188-203.
    6. Diego Aparicio & Duncan Simester, 2022. "Price Frictions and the Success of New Products," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 41(6), pages 1057-1073, November.
    7. Giulietti, Monica & Otero, Jesús & Waterson, Michael, 2020. "Rigidities and adjustments of daily prices to costs: Evidence from supermarket data," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    8. Marcial López-Pastor & Jesús García-Madariaga & Joaquín Sánchez & Jose Figueiredo, 2020. "Demand Impact for Prices Ending with “9” and “0” in Online and Offline Consumer Goods Retail Trade Channels," International Review of Management and Marketing, Econjournals, vol. 10(6), pages 58-78.
    9. Aparicio, Diego & Rigobon, Roberto, 2023. "Quantum prices," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    10. Knotek, Edward S., 2024. "The roles of price points and menu costs in price rigidity," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    11. Edward S. Knotek & Doron Sayag & Avichai Snir, 2019. "The Effects of Price Endings on Price Rigidity: Evidence from VAT Changes," Working Papers 19-24, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    12. Diego Aparicio & Roberto Rigobon, 2020. "Quantum Prices," NBER Working Papers 26646, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Snir, Avichai & Levy, Daniel & Chen, Haipeng (Allan), 2017. "End of 9-endings, price recall, and price perceptions," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 157-163.
    14. Levy, Daniel & Snir, Avichai, 2022. "Potterian Economics," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 1, pages 1-32.
    15. Chen, Haipeng (Allan) & Levy, Daniel & Ray, Sourav & Bergen, Mark, 2008. "Asymmetric Price Adjustment in the Small," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 55(4), pages 728-737.
    16. Hahn, Volker & Marenčák, Michal, 2020. "Price points and price dynamics," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 115(C), pages 127-144.
    17. Chakraborty, Ratula & Dobson, Paul W. & Seaton, Jonathan S. & Waterson, Michael, 2015. "Pricing in inflationary times: The penny drops," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 71-86.
    18. Levy, Daniel, 2007. "Price Rigidity and Flexibility: New Empirical Evidence - Introduction to the Special Issue," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 28(7 (Specia), pages 639-647.
    19. Daniel Levy, 2007. "Price rigidity and flexibility: new empirical evidence," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(7), pages 639-647.
    20. Núñez, Héctor M. & Otero, Jesús & Trujillo-Barrera, Andrés, 2023. "Wholesale price rigidities and exchange rate pass-through: Evidence from daily data of agricultural products," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Behavioral Pricing; Psychological Prices; Price Perception; Image Effect; 9-Ending Prices; Price Points; Regular Prices; Sale Prices;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M30 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Marketing and Advertising - - - General
    • M31 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Marketing and Advertising - - - Marketing
    • L11 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Production, Pricing, and Market Structure; Size Distribution of Firms
    • L16 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Industrial Organization and Macroeconomics; Macroeconomic Industrial Structure
    • L81 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Services - - - Retail and Wholesale Trade; e-Commerce
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • D22 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Empirical Analysis
    • D40 - Microeconomics - - Market Structure, Pricing, and Design - - - General
    • D90 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - General
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:zbw:espost:204666. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/zbwkide.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.