Watch Out For The Customer Appreciation Price Penalty At FTD
Longtime readers know that we recommend going directly to your favorite independent local florist, but we won’t fault Rebecca for placing an order through the national FTD site. We’re cool like that, and the flowers her friend got were probably great. We do want to share her experience, though, to point out something interesting about FTD and many other retailers. Sometimes it pays to clear your Web browser’s cookies while browsing. It “pays” in a very literal sense.
Rebecca wrote to us:
After I bought an FTD bouquet for a friend, FTD began sending me “customer appreciation” emails promoting their special deals. Thinking I might receive a discount on their arrangements, I began searching their site for Mother’s Day bouquets.
My husband also started looking for FTD arrangements on his computer, and found that the prices listed for him were $3 to $5 cheaper than those listed for me.
Clearing all the FTD cookies from my browser made my prices drop precipitously. Clicking on the “customer appreciation” email link to FTD brought the prices back up.
Want to see illustrations? Of course you do!
Here’s what Mr. Rebecca saw.
Here’s what Rebecca saw, with previous-customer cookies.
The front page that Mr. Rebecca saw.
The front page Rebecca saw…where the prices are all a little bit higher.
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