Given the following options, which would you choose?
A) Visit a local store, handle the merchandise, pay $50.00 for it, and leave the store with it in your hot little hands, or
B) Order the same merchandise off the Internet sight unseen, pay $40.00 for it, and have it in three days?
Clyde will confirm for you that I’m an Option A person.
I used to think this preference was part of my addiction to instant gratification: when I want something, I want it now. In reviewing recent purchases, though, I discovered (with some surprise) that a craving for instant gratification isn’t necessarily what drives my decision-making.
Take, for example, one of the last Tarot decks I purchased. It’s been available on Amazon.com for a loooong time. Given our proximity to Memphis (where many Amazon.com shipments originate), I could have ordered that deck online and had it here at the house in two to three days.
Instead, I spent several months waiting for the deck to turn up in one of the bookstores we frequent when visiting Atlanta. I wanted the deck — but I wanted the real-world experience of shopping for and finding it in a store. I wanted to hold the package and read the marketing copy. I wanted to feel its weight in my hands. I wanted to carry it to the register, interact with the counter help, tote the deck out to my car, and tear into it while still sitting in the parking lot.
That experience is something Amazon.com can’t offer at any price.
So: when the time came to start creating the artwork for the bare walls of our new condo, I began by visiting local merchants. I was shopping for two very specific things:
1) I wanted to get an uncut sheet of my Bright Idea Deck cards mounted and framed.
2) I wanted to create several poster-size enlargements of several digital photos, and get those matted and framed, as well.
The results of my shopping trip shocked me. Two employees in a local framing shop spent more than an hour measuring my uncut sheet of Tarot cards, asking questions, and checking prices. The cost for matting and framing the sheet? $650.00.
I couldn’t help myself. “Are you crazy? Six hundred and fifty dollars for a basic black frame and white mat?”
They considered this. “If you’ll have three items framed, we’ll offer a 70% discount on all three.”
My second stop: a visit to a local company that specializes in printing poster-size enlargements of digital prints. The price for one ink-jet printed poster-sized print? Fifty bucks.
Back at home, feeling frustrated, I turned to the Internet. In seconds, Google plopped me at FramesByMail.com, where I ordered a custom-made basic black frame, double mat, and sheet of plexiglass for $127.00.
Two clicks of the mouse later, I discovered that Sam’s Photo Center offers poster-size prints of digital photos for twenty bucks. It took me five minutes to upload my files, select a size, pay for my order, and enter my shipping address.
No hassles. No frustration. Significant savings. (And a much more pleasant shopping experience, given that local shopping, for me, currently involves hauling my fat butt around on crutches.)
Suddenly, surprisingly, I’m an Option B shopper.
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