When is a 'special' not so special?

Today, I was doing our supermarket shopping and, like a lot of people these days, I had my eye out for 'specials'. I love a bargain as much as the next person. The problem is that 'special' does not always equal 'bargain'.

The particular supermarket at which we shop has a lot of specials where, if you purchase two of the same product, you save a certain amount of money - eg. "SPECIAL - 2 items for $4.00 - save 48c - Single price - $2.24" type specials.

Sometimes, however, it pays to look carefully at how much you will save and work out whether this makes it worth the additional up-front cost to purchase the two items. Today, I could have bought two tins of crushed pineapple for $4.00, where the price for a single tin was $2.02, so I would have saved a grand total of 4c. Call me a spendthrift, but I managed to resist the urge to grab that second tin! It really wasn't very 'special' at all.

There's the rub. How many times are we, as consumers, enticed by the 'special' signage alone, rather than reading the fine print to understand how special the special really is? I know I could have stockpiled that second can of crushed pineapple and saved myself 4 cents in the process, but I certainly couldn't class saving 4 cents (or 1%) as special. For me, a saving is 'special' when it's worth mentioning to a friend. Despite all this, I wonder how many cans of that crushed pineapple moved out of the supermarket today...

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