ADVANCED FASHION MARKETING:
PRICE COMPARISION OF ON-LINE RETAIL SITES

Standard:  Pricing Merchandise

Benchmark:  The student will understand pricing terms and strategies and perform computations related to pricing theory and practice.

Indicators:

• Differentiate between price, market price and selling price.
• Identify factors affecting selling price.
• Evaluate pricing considerations and strategies.
• Explain various pricing techniques.

Activity:  Students should visit three on-line retail stores to collect prices on ten different items/products.  Each of the items/products has to be the same brand name, size, color, etc. 

All items should fall into one of the following categories:

1. Apparel
2. Accessories
3. Cosmetics

After locating pricing information, students should use excel (or similar program) to create a chart of their research.   Student charts should include name and web address of retail site, type of goods including brand name, color, size, etc., product prices, and shipping charges.

Remind students that they MUST be comparing items that are the same, not just similar.

Time:

1 block period (90 minutes) for Internet work.
Suggestion: take students to the school computer lab.
½ block period (45 minutes) for discussion of pricing terms.
½ block period (45 minutes) for small group work and class discussion. 

 

Discussion:  Ask students to select three or four of their price comparisons for discussion.  Write a few examples on the board. Define and discuss the following topics:  price, market price, selling price, price competition, non-price competition, odd-even pricing, and promotional pricing.

In small groups, students should address the following questions.  Re-group as a class to discuss the answers. 

   1.What factors do you think account for the price variations? 

   2.What surprised you the most?

   3.Would it be valuable for the customer to “shop around?”  How much time was spent 
      on each site?

   4.What specific pricing strategies did you observe in the sites you visited? 

   5.What additional services (if any) did the on-line stores provide to their customers? 
      What was the “value” of those services?   How did these services affect the price?
 

Resources:  Wolfe, Mary. The World of Fashion Merchandising.  Illinois:  Goodheart-Willcox, 1998.

SOLS:  Math AII.2, AII.20, AII/T.2, AII/t.20, COM.3, COM.22, COM.23.

Tricia Poythress
Langley High School
McLean, Virginia