When are special offers not so special?

I am really intrigued by the notion of retailers advertising Special Offers. Perhaps, on closer examination, these offers are not so special after all. A couple of years ago, an Asian friend of mine admired a dress I was wearing which I had bought from a high street store. She asked how much it had cost and when I told her that it was about seventy pounds, she told me that she could have bought the same dress in India for five pounds!

Now I really am all for those who can make a decent profit, BUT, there is profit, and then there is profit with a bit of integrity. So when the same retailer can advertise a seventy pound dress in a sale for half price they are still making a handsome profit.

Of course it is not just the cost of the item that has to be taken into consideration, wages, shipping packaging wholesaling and possibly other costs have to be accounted for.

Sadly those who make the clothes appear to be the people who get the least, and while they are beavering away making clothes for us all in the West, to me the “special offers” suddenly do not appear to be so special after all.

Talking of special offers, perhaps some terribly clever marketing person, can explain to me the difference between premium butter and everyday butter?

Why should an everyday commodity be of an inferior quality to that used for special occasions, and if we only use everyday quality how are we ever going to know what “premium” quality tastes like?

I really do not understand all of this.

Supermarkets sell everyday products at a lower price, but what ingredients are used in ‘everyday’ butter and ‘premium’ butter? I thought all butter was made from the same ingredients.

I obviously needs educating.

I cannot quite make my mind up as to whether we are all incredibly stupid, or all very trusting.