4 ms·

Jumping to the conclusion that everything a company does is calculated and delibarate is a mistake I see a lot of people make, but in this case it’s accurate.

by gxs 8y ago

Jumping to the conclusion that everything a company does is calculated and delibarate is a mistake I see a lot of people make, but in this case it’s accurate. In a business that operates at a scale of 100s of thousands if not millions of bottles sold annually, cents matter and can make up a significant portion of revenue. With this in mind, there is a huge incentive to get people to buy sooner rather than later and more often. Forcing a small amount to remain in a used up bottle is definitely a benefit to the company even if the product is going to waste. This doesn’t include the cost of implementing something new. I’d imagine a company would do extensive survey based research to understand if the additional customer satisfaction would outweigh the costs/downsides. If it’s not a conscious decision, it’s a nice coincidental benefit to them.

markkanof 8y ago
Maybe, but it seems more likely this isn't due to malice but just stupidity/apathy. Maybe most companies just aren't aware of this technology, or they don't want to implement something new because of uncertainty about the potential problems with the new technology. For example, maybe 1 out of a 100 of these bottles gets completely clogged and won't dispense anything at all. That looks bad for the company and maybe even requires a recall. It's easier to just stick with what they are doing and no-one is complaining loudly about the small bit of wasted product.
- manigandham 8y ago
  Large companies are constantly doing research and development which handles all of this. They definitely aren't stupid and aren't waiting around for youtube videos to learn about things. They have teams that actively engage with new suppliers and inventors and are also getting pitched constantly with new ideas. It's most likely that extensive testing and consideration showed that this wasn't worth the costs. You even described such a scenario so I'm not sure why you think that's stupid or apathetic, when it's actually quite calculated.
richie5um 8y ago
Yup. Business benefit supersedes customer benefit. Always.
akg_67 8y ago
I am not sure why you were downvoted. There are several examples of the behavior you described. Potato chip companies reducing the quantity of chips in a bag but keeping the size and price same. Because they were unable to raise prices with older packaging. Typically customers didn’t look at weight, just size of package. It was in the news for quite a while and IIRC there is a business case study. It has been happening in beverages and other items too. Why do you see now package weights of odd numbers like 11.5 or 14.5 oz instead of standard number like 12 oz or 16 oz with typically no price reduction. Recently I encountered same behavior with toothpaste tube in Japan. To keep the form/shape of the toothpaste tube with usage the nozzle was designed to suck in air to fill new space in the tube. My wife claimed we are out of toothpaste and wanted to throw away the tube. The toothpaste tube was perfectly formed but I noticed tube was still little heavier than I would expect for a empty plastic tube. But when you squeeze the tube mostly Air was coming out with little bit of spray of paste. Reducing the air space with paper clip, we were able to use paste from same tube for another 2 weeks. Typical behavior would be most probably what my wife was going to do to throwaway old one and open a new one.

by gxs 8y ago

markkanof 8y ago

Maybe, but it seems more likely this isn't due to malice but just stupidity/apathy. Maybe most companies just aren't aware of this technology, or they don't want to implement something new because of uncertainty about the potential problems with the new technology. For example, maybe 1 out of a 100 of these bottles gets completely clogged and won't dispense anything at all. That looks bad for the company and maybe even requires a recall. It's easier to just stick with what they are doing and no-one is complaining loudly about the small bit of wasted product.

manigandham 8y ago
Large companies are constantly doing research and development which handles all of this. They definitely aren't stupid and aren't waiting around for youtube videos to learn about things. They have teams that actively engage with new suppliers and inventors and are also getting pitched constantly with new ideas. It's most likely that extensive testing and consideration showed that this wasn't worth the costs. You even described such a scenario so I'm not sure why you think that's stupid or apathetic, when it's actually quite calculated.

richie5um 8y ago

Yup. Business benefit supersedes customer benefit. Always.

akg_67 8y ago

I am not sure why you were downvoted. There are several examples of the behavior you described. Potato chip companies reducing the quantity of chips in a bag but keeping the size and price same. Because they were unable to raise prices with older packaging. Typically customers didn’t look at weight, just size of package. It was in the news for quite a while and IIRC there is a business case study. It has been happening in beverages and other items too. Why do you see now package weights of odd numbers like 11.5 or 14.5 oz instead of standard number like 12 oz or 16 oz with typically no price reduction. Recently I encountered same behavior with toothpaste tube in Japan. To keep the form/shape of the toothpaste tube with usage the nozzle was designed to suck in air to fill new space in the tube. My wife claimed we are out of toothpaste and wanted to throw away the tube. The toothpaste tube was perfectly formed but I noticed tube was still little heavier than I would expect for a empty plastic tube. But when you squeeze the tube mostly Air was coming out with little bit of spray of paste. Reducing the air space with paper clip, we were able to use paste from same tube for another 2 weeks. Typical behavior would be most probably what my wife was going to do to throwaway old one and open a new one.