In today’s economic climate, consumer spending can be a tricky trend to forecast. Recently I learned that there are psychologists who specifically study consumer mind sight and are paid boocko bucks to tell retailers things like ending prices in 9, 99 or 95 sets off some sort of “good deal” alert in our head. Evidently we’ve been primed subconsciously and its believed specific formatting in prices sways our willingness to buy.

Since we all process numbers differently, its tough to nail down exactly what goes into consumer reasoning when making a purchase.  Rather than focusing on specifics, researchers say its all about perception.  How we PRECEIVE a price can set off a few “triggers” that have been studied and proven to produce sales.

Some of the perceptions believed to trigger our need to shop till we drop include:
1. Savings perception: Ending prices in 9’s and 5’s are looked at more favorably by consumers
2. Value perception: If a consumer thinks they are getting something free or some sort of bonus with a purchase, they are more likely to buy. The BOGO’s or X% more free deals fall into this category.
3. Discount perception: Considered to be one of the more alluring triggers because of perception of a good value for the money, % discounts fall into this trigger.
4. Unbundling perception: Probably the most deceptive trigger, the perception here is that we are more likely to buy if a price is “unbundled” or spread out into routine payments. Studies suggest that when faced with the exact same price for the exact same product, we are more likely to buy if the price is divided up. The typical insurance policy billing is an example here. Rather than charging $1,200 every year for insurance, there is a $100 a month charge, which seems more reasonable to a buyer.

Pricing can be a complex subject. Retailers need to sell to make a profit while pricing merchandise attractively. I knew price tag numbers weren’t random, but who would have thought that psychologists are involved?

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The investment of a Cricut™ Personal Electronic Cutter is essential to paper crafting. I love mine and I am looking forward to upgrading to the latest model. There are currently 3 versions of the machine and each cuts a variety of materials without a computer. Oodles of cartridges offer an endless assortment of shapes, letters, and phrases; there’s something for every occasion. The ever advancing accessories alone could sell this thing but in today’s unpredictable economic climate, dropping a couple of hundred dollars on a hobby machine may seem completely out of the question. This blog post will help you see that this is one investment that will actually have you seeing green in no time; both in your wallet and on all of your Cricut merchandise.

 LEFT: The Cricut™ Create is the new kid on the block. This compact
cutter combines the best features of the first 2 generations of the Cricut™ machine: portability and the ability to cut size .25″ up to 11.5″ on a 6″ x 12″ cutting mat. New functionality is also introduced. Read about it in #10.

1. Never buy cut chip board again, make your own – These cutting machines are beasts! They cut through many types of material, including chip board so you can create your own chip board in the size you want.

2. Create your own personalized stamps cheaper than you can buy them – Personalized stamps are costly and can take weeks to receive. If you already have acylic blocks, you can purchase the stamp creating refill sheets for approximately $8. Other wise a starter kit is available for $20. Either avenue is cheaper than ordering personalized stamps.

3. Favors made easy – Showers, weddings, parties, class room treats, whatever you need a favor for, you’ll be thanking the Provo Craft gods for how easy the Cricut cutters make creating favors. The Bags Tags and more cartridge offers endless favor possibilities and options available in many other cartridges, like box available in this one, allow you to create boxes and bags in any color or size to suite your theme or purpose.

4. Beautiful scrap book layouts for pennies! - I don’t care what anybody says, Scrapbooking is pricey! The cost of Stickers and embellishments adds up fast and you get little product for your hard earned dollars. Why purchase embellishments and sticker sets when you can make your own? With oodles of cartridges on the market and an easy to use software suite, you can create one of a kind scrapbooking layouts with ease. With your Cricut machine at your finger tips you will always have access to embellishments and the ability to to create lettering an phrases.

5. Look out Hallmark – The last time I purchased a card from Hallmark, it cost $5! I love to give cards but with a special occasion nearly every week, $5 quickly turns into hundreds of dollars. Yea “budget” cards are available but why waste the money when you can create your very own beautiful, sentimental, hand made, personalized card for a fraction of what it costs to buy one? Today I bought 50 sheets of card stock for $3.99. After a couple of passes through my Cricut machine, I will have dozens of beautiful looking cards that I made my self. There are cartridges with the ability to create the card form and envelopes. The savings here alone are endless.

6. Trendy Home decor made easy, cheaply and personalized! – Vinyl wall decals are all the rage right now. Favorite phases, cute graphics and holiday images are just a few of the decals being used in home decorating right now. Provo Craft offers vinyl and transfer tape so that you can create your own decals right from your personal cutter.  Store bought decals range from $10 to $50 and aren’t personalized.

7. Expensive punches aren’t necessary - Why are paper punches so darn expensive? It seems like the more useful the punch the more expensive it is. Since purchasing my cutter, I haven’t had to drop cash for any paper punches. The ability to cut in many sizes a shapes helps eliminate the need for those pricey punches.

8.  Custom make stencils - The Cricut Stencil Material allows you to create your own custom stencils to use ion home decorating or crafting projects.

Bottom line: you can purchase a Cricut cutter for $199 to $399 depending on sales and the model but if you are a frequent crafter, this is one investment you cant afford to not make.

I am part of a team that is participating in a March for Dimes for Babies walk on April 26th 2009.  Check out my sponsor homepage here: MLLauffer March of Dimes Homepage You can donate directly from my personal webpage with a credit card or PayPal. If you prefer, I can also accept cash or check. Just click the appropriate box on my webpage

So today the hubby and I got all of the Christmas back into the attic. I hate January because of the weather and the un-decking of the halls. In Western PA January typically means very cold and the biggest snow fall. We were threatened with a terrible storm this weekend but seem to have just missed it. A little north of us got 8.5 inches. We got Slush all day Saturday. The dogs loved it. Me not so much. So anyway I always do my "Spring" Cleaning when we put that stuff away because we are in the groove. We throw out stuff reorganize … you get the picture. The garage is the only beast to tame. We’re saving for another January weekend. January is always our least busy month so we get a lot of house stuff done. Now for the fun stuff ……

It’s that time of the week! Lauren’s Saturday Sketch Challenge. I can ALWAYS use thank you cards so I decided to make a thank you card for the challenge.

  To the left you can see the sketch. For my take, I started with a piece of paper from a scrapbooking calendar that I got for Christmas last year. It has a lot of nice stuff for paper crafting. So I dug through my papers and found a brown and orangish shade to match and threw together this card. It felt a little naked on the bottom so I added my favorite embellishment – a butterfly punched from my Martha Stewart punch decorated with a few rhinestones. It turned out cute. Cant complain.

Speaking of not complaining I found out this week that I get to go to an international conference for work March 25th thru 27th. How exciting. Its at the Buena Vista Palace in Orlando Florida – its in the middle of the Disney parks  The end of March is usually another crappy time here weather wise. The big Blizzard of ’93 struck during that week and having a March 23rd birthday I remember many snowy birthdays.  So I will be ready for some sunny Florida weather right about then.