CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- When you go shopping, do you know how much you’re really paying for that item?
A website called Rather-Be-Shopping claims to have “cracked the codes” you see on the price tags, and it just might save you some money.
The price tags vary and so do the amounts of numbers listed on them, but what do they mean beyond just the price? Kyle James with Rather Be Shopping says those numbers are the hidden clues to saving you a lot of money. He claims the codes that will let you know mark downs and clearance, and full price and half price.
“I have been talking to current and former employees of these stores, and they are very open about how things are priced” Kyle told NBC Charlotte.
He even created a cheat sheet listing stores like Target, Home Depot, Office Depot, Sears, JC Penny, Kohl’s, Land’s End, Pier 1 Imports, Sam’s Club and Best Buy to name a few.
Using Kyle’s cheat sheet, we went to Home Depot looking for prices ending in .06, that means six weeks until next markdown, or .03 which means three weeks until it’s gone. We found lots of prices ending with .99, in fact most of them end in .99, and on the big items like appliances, it was just a dollar amount. After walking the aisles and looking, I finally found one deal on an end cap. It’s an air filter that ends in .03.
We then jumped back in the car and headed for another popular favorite, Target at Stonecrest in south Charlotte. In here, according to Kyle’s sheet, prices ending in .99 mean full price and that’s what we mostly found. If it ends in .98, .88, .04, or .24 that’s a marked-down item. But here’s the real clue: on clearance items, look in the upper right corner of the tag, that little number means the percentage you are saving. It’s very small.
NBC Charlotte emailed some of the stores listed and the ones that got back to me said they either don’t discuss pricing strategies or Kyle’s information is incorrect and out of date.
All we can add is that everything we found was spot on correct.