Thursday, May 5, 2011

Bear market... Well Bare This!!!

I have to hand it to “SOME” retail and restaurant businesses, they're starting to get the idea...

This “idea” I'm about to blather about revolves around the concept of “stack it high & watch it fly” kind of mentality to sales in the US.

Some will want to credit Sam Walton of Walmart fame with this particular quote and business practice, but I can't exactly confirm that, but the old bird did have a point. Like any other genius, its simplicity was its brilliance which is why Wall Street and all the other Greed fucks will never reach the god-like status they always seem to coincide with what that think they deserve.

Somewhat simple example; Wall Street wants to sell cigarette lighters that cost .10 cents to make at $1.50. They call this selling the lighters “what the market will bear”. They have been doing this shit since the 80's when the whole “fuck you, you bought it, you deal with it” and the “this is cheap shit” era came into existence.

Now bitch about Walmart all you want, but what Sam tried to do back when he still had control was buy all the damn lighters he could, as cheaply as fucking possible so that folks who couldn't even afford the damn things at $1.50 could buy them at .85 cents. Not only did this get folks to at least buy one, it got folks that could only afford one to actually pony up and buy 2, so when the Wall Street fucks tried another stupid stunt, Joe America might be able to weather out the storm with their surplus lighter. Or, Sam would have enough of the cheap lighters sitting in a warehouse that he could continue selling to folks so that they wouldn't be taken to the cleaners.

I really don't think “Sam” was never an evil guy, it's what they have done in his name after his death that has tarnished his good name.

Back to the sodomizing of America...

So here we are 35+ years later, Wall Street has fleeced your ass over that same $1.50 cheap assed lighter, but now they (Wall-nuts, capitalism Greed mud-fuckers) have learned that it is going to cost $1.45 to MAKE the damn thing. But now they have fucked themselves!!! The market will no longer bear much over $1.50 for a disposable lighter, i.e., people aren't going to pay that much any more. Speaking for myself, I don't smoke, so I'm not in the market every other month for a lighter to determine a competitive price, but I can definitely tell you that when I feel the old pyromania creeping up my asshole I certainly don't race down to the minute mart with the intentions of spending more than a few coins from the floor boards for a damned lighter. I'm sure there will be more than a few affirmations with me on this one.

With this in mind let me throw a new sales pitch from a local car lot on you from my area on you.

Now I grew up with advertising being the 'bread and butter' in the house hold. If I were a younger lad I would most certainly have my feet held to the flames and scolded for spilling bile in public against the very thing that has fed, clothed and sheltered my ungrateful ass. Truth be known, had it not been for my attention to the art of bullshit, sorry, advertising, I wouldn't have made through a few rough years myself.

Look, everyone has had to “advertise” themselves. Putting it in perspective, that's what your resume is for. But I'm talking about current affairs and equivalent of snake oil in today's society.  

I was supposed to be commenting about this car dealer in my immediate local...

Now the sales slogan this shit head is using has been tried (or originated) in the past by the now defunct Saturn division. It is basically a technique by which they price their cars just low enough where they “look” cheaper than those advertised by everyone else; “just walking onto the lot”. I.e., you walk up to the new car on the lot, look at the sticker thinking your going to explosively shit yourself, but come to find out it is 'relatively' cheaper than what you have been seeing at other dealers.

What they then do is 'tell' you is that this price is as cheap as they can go because 'they' (the dealer themselves) had done all the shopping and under cut the whole mess and gave you the customer the best deal. And because they went and did all this work, you don't get to haggle over the price, you get to pay that price there on the window. Thank you for shopping. Now either pay up or go away.

This “PRICING” is conveniently called “market based pricing”. I believe the proper, although probably socially unacceptable, slogan should be “market based fucking”...

Putting things into further perspective...  Different situation; I was working with this asshole fixing computers. I wasn't doing it for my betterment. I did it for, stuff. It sure as hell wasn't for money because this asshole literally fucked me out of what could have been a descent cash flow. And no, not from a source of personal greed either. It was HIS fucking greed that killed it, as I will now explain. Pack your ass with steel wool you new capitalist loving fucks...

So ass love owns this pawn shop in a college town. The recession hits and like everyone, shit is getting tough. Without getting into another history lesson, pawn shops get a bad rap for several reasons, when they really shouldn't. It's the owners or individuals within that give the establishment their reputation. Nuff said.

Anyway, in order for a shop to be successful, electronics that come in and set, obviously produce a problem that the seller 'didn't' tell us about. Customers that come in can't get it through their thick fucking skulls, “you're buying a USED item!!!” Fucking Moron!!! It's not factory fresh. Asshole hired me to get it completely operational, or simply as close as I can get the thing & then it gets priced accordingly so that he can recoup his investment. Thus, business.

Well, we also did computer repairs and other electronic repairs as well on the side that required no out of pocket expense from him.  That put money in his shop to continue the cash flow. But there was a HUGE problem with his pricing options. I had a conscious and he didn't.

There were times I couldn't/wouldn't want to warranty a repair and he would undermine me & then hold my feet to the repair which cost $$$ each time I opened the device & executed the repair, but he didn't pay for the parts or labor. Not to mention, I can't afford “out of pocket” for some of these repair items. Quick example: $300 for a projector lamp for a DLP television. Even though it's customary for the client to cough up half first, I have to get the other half. Not the pawn shop, but he'll definitely sell the TV to recoup the repair parts and my time, but I didn't get shit until after that time. WTF!!!

This didn't happen all the time mind you, but often enough. But the biggest complaint was pricing of services that killed the whole deal; both his cash flow & mine, i.e. his Greed...  To put it into a better frame of reference:  Best Buy will charge you $320 to reload your operating system onto your computer due to a complete system failure or viral pollution or Geek Squad bullshit-a-thon. Similar costs are charged from other chain stores I'm sure. Other area computer shops and re-sale shops want to charge in the neighborhood of $200+ for a similar process and will probably have older operating systems and be more receptive to folks that don't want the “latest and greatest” yet, as the chain stores will brow beat the shit out of you to upgrade or simply turn you away period.

Seeing as we were a pawn shop and not known for doing/associated with electronic anything, commanding a higher price would be a damned foolish idea. Not in Asshole's mind. He constantly reminded me that he was going to price things under the hospices of “What the Market Would Bear”. And yet that's exactly what killed my little gig with the pawn shop.

My grandfather, god love him, said it best. “If a rich man is the only one that can afford a hamburger, then no one is going to buy one. Cause the rich man won't find an idiot to buy one for him. Make the hamburger affordable so even the poorest man can at least buy one, then even the richest asshole will buy one.”

What Asshole couldn't/wouldn't get through his thick skull was, sure, 1 person would come to “ME” to get his computer worked on for $100 and get it up and working 'like' new, but the poor bastard was only going to pay that much on an old computer one (1, uno, hana, mahz) time! There is NEVER going to be repeat business.

People get pissed, especially if the repair took, but not REALLY good. Say it was a descent repair, but what is the customer is an idiot. Say I removed a virus and got rid of Limewire (the avenue that put the virus on there in the first place) with instructions to not do it again, otherwise I can't warranty the work. At $100, I may be scoffed as half an idiot and the client may do whatever the fuck they want again with the exact same results and then never return for another repair. I lose business, Asshole loses the business.

When at the beginning, I told Asshole to charge $50, we split the money (seeing as he isn't doing a damn thing to earn his keep anyway) thus procuring a better than 75% chance of return business even if the repair goes bad in a short time. Hell, I would bring a repair back for a second try for a total of $100 as apposed to $100 each time, that's simple fucking math in anybody's book. Well, except for Asshole's.

My whole point to this particular blog being that debt doesn't “MAKE” anything. Whoever thought that one up needs to run through a gauntlet of eighth graders with his nuts bared and the kids armed with ping pong paddles. The offender then pulled slowly through the ranks as the kids swing like wild horizontal wind mills at his testicles. Fucking moron, debt is less than nothing. You fucking football bat, there is NOTHING to be had and yet act like you're an innocent victim in the demise of our economy that YOU helped cause?

Ideologicals will scream socialist, but I bellow ethics and common sense in saying that only one of two things will cure the fucked up mess that the good ol US of A is in and neither are going to be popular. So here goes...

My particular favorite that covers all social, political, economical and religious fanatics is the crowd pleasing zombie apocalypse. You can't exactly run from it or hide from it. At one point or another you will have to confront it with all your baggage. I mean ALL your baggage!

The other solution is to take America’s wealthy and force them to pony up and pay into the slush fund that forces the corrupt system back into a 'flush' state. Obviously this opens Pandora’s box into a worm fervor and a mess that not only causes the Catholic's to explode, but organized crime, the wealthy, the corrupt wealthy, the borderline wealthy, the idiots who think they are wealthy, business owners who think they are wealthy, anybody active with the tea-bag party, right-wing activist assholes, Greed capitalists, upper corporate echelon, pig fucking assholes from the oil producing companies that have butt fucking the world public in general for the last 40 years, everyone involved in the tobacco industry, drug czars, politicians and probably a shit load of other individuals I haven't the slightest clue about to shit a woolly worm & start their own hate letter campaign.

You all get to take them bazillions in cash you've been corn holing the public out of and put back into the system that you have fucked and get it back to flush. Or at least something that looks flush anyway; then you can get a real job and earn a “REALISTIC” paycheck like the rest of the world.

You know, I've made some decisions that million dollar plus projects were hinged on and never got paid bullshit bonus checks for my involvement .[and don't give me any bullshit about how I should have 'held out for my take' , fuck you very much...] I have a VERY educated and technical background. I'm also quite rehearsed in history and theoretical studies, so I dismiss your diatribe on any other insight to actions unseen by the general public as otherwise pretentious bullshit.

For those continuing to bitch that this is still Nazi propaganda and incites radical anti American actions I conclude with this... Hey FUCKHEADS!!! The poor bastards paying taxes like they should!!! The ones still paying bloated prices for shit they still need to get by in this fucked up society YOUR capitalism is creating!!! YEAH!!! Those people are the ones that payed $150 billion to YOUR fucking capitalist fuck ups and with NO fucking information as to where the money went to. Not one fucking word.

So Capitalist, right-wing tit mouse, why don't you write a check for grand and over night to me. It's none of your fucking business what it's for & don't bother asking when I'll get it back to you either. 

This is EXACTLY how your corporations of today do business. Now, capitalist love-plug, you want to tell me which of the fucking ivy league schools has Ass Rape of the American Tax Payer 656 on the graduate itinerary? 

I didn't fucking think so...

4 comments:

  1. Problem 1- The wealthiest 10% pay 80% of the tax dole now as it is- not my figures; these are the IRS's own numbers [I'll get you a link to .gov]- Many of these places are like Chik- Filet that treat their customers and employees well- others are the Steve Jobs & Bill Gates Mighty Bastards... Many others are the Tim Guietners, Van Jones's and Michael [never saw a donut I didn't love] Moores of the Communist/Socialist party.

    Problem 2- "What the Market Will Bear" IS an "asshole term". But it is nevertheless true in many [certainly not all] instances. Case in point is the "not" which ivolves asshole-dumb-fuck from your previous repairman gigs. Throw an G4 iPod up there at Best Buy and watch the "uber elite" flaunt their cash faster than you or I ever could at this time.

    Get this- some entrepreneurial prick out there got an idea and bought up everybody's "old piece of junk iPod G3s" refurbished/refreshed them for next to nothing and sells/sold them for $50 apiece to cheap/poor assholes like us on ebay- MoFo made a killing in his own little world. Should the /gov take 60% of his revenue as "punishment for success"?

    Problem 3- The .gov taxes the bejesus out of us anyway.

    Gas is $4.00 a gallon!!!! Kill the rich oil bastards you say!

    Almost $2 of that $4 goes to .gov... FEDERAL- NOT State or municipality!

    Add to that that EVERYTHING to get that gas to the pump is taxed- from the shirt on the trucker's back to the spare lug nuts in his tool box [the fuckin' toolbox too!] and I have little empathy for .gov...

    Laziness has brought the Capitalist Greed Machine down on us. "Cheap- But what the market will bear" is still cheap plastic shit. We all get that- but when you get punished for buying the necessities through rampant taxation- that's even bigger shit.

    Greed is a form of corruption.
    Taxation without representation ["income taxes" for example- they take it out before you ever get it!] is corruption.
    Trend setting [Wall Street form] Speculation on commodities is corruption.

    There's lots of corruption long before we buy the splastic shit on the shelf- all of it individual and accountable- if only we weren't taxed to hell and back.

    ffeJ

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  2. Rich paying the taxes, you might want to check your figures on that one bubba... The stats your quoting on are actually slanted due to the bloating from the 50% fucking from the "exit" taxation of gambling taxes from all casinos and lotteries.

    I'm not trying to be combative here, our government just LOVES to hide half truths and numbers, statistics is a beautiful way to do it & Michael (I'll blow shit out of proportion & half truth bullshit artist extraordinaire) Moore shouldn't even be aloud air time.

    As for the comment about "should a person not be aloud to make his/her fortune", I should smack the piss out of you... That is a typical capitalist, whiners, piss cake, gimme gimme, I deserve, equally as shitty "I'M ENTITLED" statement as any other greedy asshole that probably didn't earn what they want.

    By absolutely no means whatsoever did I imply, say or outright quote that anyone couldn't earn a crazy bullshit-o-rama paycheck for themselves. I am still in the market and will gladly do what it takes to earn it as well, but I'm not going to have it taken away on a slanted bullshit slide scale either. I'll pay my fair share. And I did say "EARN"... Meaning fucking "WORK" for the gyotdamn thing. Not sit on my fat ass and wait for the fucking thing to walk up on my front porch and knock on the door.

    I DO want to know how a Fortune 500 corporation (GE) gets away without paying "ANY" federal taxes this year! Explain that to me Mr. tea-bagger... That is damn sure not fair, that's called fucking the system.

    Gov taxes us to death... YUP! and I'm plain flat fucking tired that we get taxed multiple fucking times too. Taxed, on our pay, then each time we purchase, then at the end of the year... but the stores & banks don't get taxed due to business exemptions, but then charge us for the taxes up front and then make interest over the year, then play financial fuck-fuck come April...

    Nah, Greed I am afraid is a tool into and promotes corruption. I can be greedy because I want more than one cookie, but taking two cookies rather than taking the whole platter doesn't make me corrupt. Power could be another door into corruption as well, but no one seems to want power much anymore. Well, Sony and Steve Jobs, but that's the subject of my newest blog...

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  3. Nah- no insult taken- talk is all good so long as ideas are shared... Hiding in the Communist Dark, making plans and sticking shills into public office is downright criminal.

    As for smacking the piss out of me- any time you and your cane can get off the ass-molded couch and cripple your way next to me in the Lay Z Boy, bring it on, Pussy Cakes!

    [LOL!]

    Piss boys like Steve and [conveniently left out of almost every diatribe of yours] Billy started in their garages just like you and me- some of their work was genius some of it toil and a whole butt-load of luck, to be certain.

    But the one thing they both had in common was their exceedingly arrogant willingness and ability to slit each other's throats to get ahead.

    Steve got the Mighty Meat Butt Plug from Bill when Billy Boo-Boo stole the idea for Steve's "mouse" [1st implemented on the Lucie II] that Steve invited Billy over to rub his nose in.

    Billy-Boo-Boo made "intellectual property" a household term by linking his software as a proprietary commodity like action figures and Pop-Tarts; everyone in the field of computers hailed him as THE AntiChrist for making software a "purchased" thing because the Utopian belief at the time was that computerization of the world wasn't to be bought and sold but shared equally amongst all of mankind.

    As I've said before- "There's danger, even in an Utopia."

    "Greed as a tool" is one thing- if we truly had no intent greed within our very core being, we'd have died back when Ook, The Mastodon Man took food out of our mouths, ripping our tongue and brains out at the same time. Inherent greed as both a survival instinct and as a business model to BETTER ourselves is an inherent "bad" trait made good.

    Greed as "power"- that's another matter.

    "Greed" isn't the corruption- it's an ailment- a symptom manifested by said corruption. And we're talking the "crush the little man" type of greed like Tucker, Tesla and Melliesse' could tell us all about.

    Progressive Leftists [a dual oxymoron- like saying "Twice the Communist with Half the Man"] will have you believe that this is a bad country- that all our existence is based on bad ideals, bad motivations, corrupt ideology and evil, empirical intent on "crushing the little yellow/black/brown man".

    They're so full of thunder-shit the sound of each new bolus baby is a thunderclap of wafting offal to humanity.

    The USA is inherently GOOD.
    The people righteous and inspirational [no, not all- don't get obtuse].
    Those at the pinnacle of business, government and policy are no longer the struggling men and women that started from humbling beginnings- even though Sevie and Billy did- there's no possible way you or I could make computers like they did from the ground up without being regulated and taxed to death... That's all by design I might add.

    Look up Cass Sunstien and his book "Nudge"- this cocksucker is the one motivating the current Fed .gov into bullshit like "apples instead of fries" in our kids Happy Meals...

    Powerlust- corruption- radical ideology- crib-to-grave entitlement, white guilt and black separation theology- all of this is agenda driven to smack down independent, individual thought and entrepreneurial spirit.

    Sony learned from the best. Google "Woodrow Wilson & The 4 Minute Men"... In a time when radio was still infant there were ways to get your messages across and still fuck over society...

    Peace, Love and Greed!

    ffeJ

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  4. PS-

    "Ass Rape of the American Tax Payer 656" is considered a mandatory 8 hour graduate level course at Princeton, Harvard, Oxford an UCLA School of Business and High-Asses...

    Don't forget that they also throw into their syllabus the extraneous norms surrounding "the indigent, the illegal alien, the good-for-nothing baby factory, the welfare tul and the human drug addicted thunder snot" in their greed formulae as they too are greed riddled mendicants to society.

    Oh, graduates of the fine Ivy Leagues are all che'-che' with their quaff and Bernelli- but THEY can't possibly be greedy because they are ACADEMIC ELITES!

    Corrupted souls are corrupted souls- regardless of the shell that vessels them.

    "Give Torture a Chance"- it worked for OBL!

    ffeJ

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