Product Pricing 101.

I was speaking with my bizz-owning daughter the other day about product pricing.  She's a marketing whiz and comes by it naturally.  And I was a marketing whiz, if I do say so myself, and am alway happy to help.  Following the call I got to thinking about a time way back in 1956 when I learned all I ever needed to know about product pricing.  And for a marketing and sales executive-to-be, that was a valuable lesson which I carried with me on through life.  Please let me share it with you and see if you don't agree...  

I've been wearing glasses since I was two years old.  In fact, my Mom told me they were made of pink plastic.  She also said I made a habit of burying them in my sandbox.  So it was usual for her to take me to the optometrist for my annual Rx update.  And the trip we took one day when I was 13 served as the basis for this story from my storied past...

I come from a little town called Chillicothe, Missouri.  It's 100-plus years in age is but right uptown in terms of marketing savvy.  In fact, sliced bread was invented there back in 1925.  It's true.  I'll be writing about that one day soon.  And my glasses doctor proved it when my Mom asked him, Bob Smith we'll call him (I'll grant him anonymity in case any of his family still lives there), how much my new glasses were going to cost.

"$13.00, Mrs. Cassity," Mr. Smith said.  When my Mom didn't say anything, Smith said, "For the lenses."  Mom was a bit stunned, I think, so she didn't comment.  Smith then said, 

"Each."  

I watched this repartee from about three feet away.  The magnitude of it all didn't really hit me at the time, but I was still glued to the back-and-forth.  Mom's breath finally returned to her body and she started to say something, Smith spoke first, again:  "Frames extra."

And there you have it, fellow Pilgrim!  A Master Class in how to pull a screw job up close and personal.  This guy was a first rate scam artist, and I made myself a promise that one day I'd get into his pocket.  Deep.  

And one day I did...

My buddies and I were shooting 9-ball at the bowling alley.  It featured 6 nice Brunswick pool tables and there was a $Money game there to be had on any given night.  And on one of those nights 7 or 8 of us were playing quarter-quarter nine-ball.  That's where we shoot the nine balls off the table in rotation.  The guy who pockets the #5 collects a quarter from each of the other players.  And the guy who makes the #9 does the same.  

Sounds pretty low rent, right?   Do the math: you "run the table" and the 7 other players owe you $0.50 each.  That's a quick $3.50.  As in, about 5 minutes quick.  And we're talking 60 years ago.  When $0.75 a hour was the minimum wage.

So you play that penny-ante nine-ball game for say, 7 or 8 hours, and your pockets are bulging.  And in the middle of all this, our Mr. Smith shows up.  We'd heard this cat thought he could play, and now we'd all find out.  As for me, I knew my ship had finally come in.  

The day I'd waited for had finally arrived.

I should mention about here that I'd started playing pool at the age of 13, and by the time I was 16, I was the best I had ever seen.  And anyone else I knew had seen, also.  I was a phenom, as they say.  No brag, just fact.  That made it hard for me to get a game with anybody for high stakes.  Quarters back and forth across the green baize was about it.  But I was always looking for higher stakes, and always looking for a fish.  Just like Smith was looking for the day he pencil-whipped my Mom over a new pair of glasses.  And tonite would deliver me both.

The $Quarter-Quarter nine ball stakes we started with at 8:00 p.m. quickly morphed into $Dollar-Two Dollar by about 11:00, and then $Five Dollar-Ten Dollar by 1:00.  And then by 3:00 in the morning, there was nobody left in our game but Smith and me.  

Just the way I had always wanted it.  Time to turn the screws.

The stakes were soon $20.00 on each of the 5 and the 9.  Remember, that's back when you could buy a brand-new Chevrolet for $2,500.  So deep into the night I had about $2,800 of Bob's money.  And he was sweating bullets.  And the crowd that had gathered to watch the carnage were hooting and hollering as each ball fell.  As he began to straighten up from one too-many beers he realized that he'd screwed the pooch.  As in, lost all his cash.  As in, please God, don't tell my wife.  

Remember, everybody knew everybody in this town of 10,000, so keeping secrets was impossible.  A whole bunch of cash, it was.  A lot more cash than he could reasonably afford to lose.  A lot more cash than anyone had ever heard about anyone losing in this neck of the woods.  And I was inwardly laughing my ass off.  

In technicolor.

So hoping to get back his cash, Bob pulls a Major League boner.  I had him cornered.  He offers up the pink slip to his two year-old, 1959 Oldsmobile Delta 88, 4-door sedan, two-tone blue, it was, against the cash he'd just lost.  A $3,000 car, when new, against $2,800 cash.  In essense, double or nothing.  If it sounds pretty dicey today, just think: this was 62 years ago, when $3k equalled about $30k today.  And I was only 18 years old.  

Well, as you'd expect, I peeled Bob like a grape.  I not only took all Bob's cash, I took his car.  I did give him a ride home, though.  It was a bright and shiny morning, about 6:30, when I dropped him off in front of his house.*  I'm just that kind of guy...

It was later that morning that I dumped all the cash on our breakfast table for my Mom and Dad to see.  They were dumbfounded!  My Dad smiled like a Cheshire cat, having been a pool hustler in his earlier years.  Chip off the old block, and all that.  He actually told my Mom, "See, I told you he'd be okay!"  

My Mom?  I gave her $2,500 to cover most of my college expenses.  I also gave her a crisp $100 bill and told her to buy herself a new dress.  Courtesy of Bob Smith.  The optometrist.  

I then sold the Olds and turned the cash into a brand-new, 1962 Chevrolet Impala SuperSport, 409 cubic inch, 409 horsepower, honduras maroon,  black bucket seats, 4-speed, 3:70 positraction.  While the Beach Boys song was on the charts.

I rode this success for several years.  I don't recall ever having to justify myself to my parents after that.  I'd go off on educational tours all over MO, IL, IA, KS and AR.  By "educational," I mean I educated them.  Sort of a different take on hustling.  With me, a college student/pool hustler, I'd call that a Major Victory, wouldn't you?

And oh yeah, I became a marketeer in later life, trusted by a succession of companies to price and brand their products and services.  I doubt they'd have ever believed where my expertise actually came from...