Retail

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Scott Toilet Paper: Here We Shrink Again

In the continuing retail race to shrink the size of a sheet of toilet paper to that of a postage stamp, Scott 1000 sheet rolls have been downsized again.

Exactly four years ago, we reported on Scott shortening each sheet on the roll from 4 inches to 3.7 inches.

Now, they are making each sheet narrower too.

*MOUSE PRINT:

It went from a full 4.5 inches wide to just 4.1 inches wide. A four pack now has almost 42 square feet less paper — a reduction of nine percent.

When the company was asked why they narrowed each sheet, a customer service representative replied:

This makes Scott “comparable with other brands on the market shelf” … and that there was “a slight improvement to make it thicker.”

How much thicker are the sheets now? Probably not too much as the new package weighs a full five ounces less than the old one.

Scott has a long history of downsizing its 1000 sheet rolls: 

Original: 4.5 inches by 4.5 inches

Pre-2006: 4.5 inches by 4.0 inches

9/2006: 4.5 inches by 3.7 inches

9/2010: 4.1 inches by 3.7 inches

The cumulative effect on consumers of all this downsizing is significant. Today’s roll is a full 25% smaller than the original.  Maybe they need to rename the product Scott 750.

As with all products that are downsized inconspicuously, it is a sneaky way to pass on a price increase because the customer is paying the same price, but getting less.

Thanks to eagle-eyed Mouse Print* reader Karen S. for this submission.

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CVS: From Ad to Checkout, Promised Discounts Disappear

Last Friday, CVS sent out an email to customers offering “20% off your entire purchase in store or online*”.

*MOUSE PRINT:

“The 20% sale cannot be combined with another product sale running at the same time. You will receive the larger discount.” — disclaimer for online coupon use.

“*Excludes sale items.” — disclaimer for in-store coupon use.

Those exclusions are pretty limiting considering your “entire purchase” really is not covered.  What makes them worse was the fact that those disclosures were not made anywhere in the email itself. You had to visit CVS.com to find them out.

Still worse were the seeming 40% off discounts promised off the regular price of “Red Hot Deals” featured on the landing page of CVS.com:

cvs

MrConsumer placed those three 40% items in his cart, but when checking the cart, the 40% discounts had completely disappeared. Well, maybe the right sale prices only show up when you are about to checkout?

*MOUSE PRINT:

Nope. Even on the very last page of the ordering process after providing a credit card number, all the 40% off items remained at full price. Had MrConsumer clicked the “submit order” button there, he would have been charged $42.47 for items that had been advertised for $25.47. That’s an overcharge of $17.  This is the online equivalent of a scanner error where the store sign promised 40% off, but the items scanned regular price at the cash register.

CVS subsequently corrected their error, but who knows how many people might have been overcharged in the interim.

The lesson here is that just because an item is advertised on a website for a particular price, you must double-check to see whether that is the price that is actually charged once the item is in your cart and you are at the checkout.

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CVS: Sign Up for Offers, Get a $4 Coupon?

In the CVS drugstore circular on August 1, the company promised to give customers who signed up for their email list a $4 coupon:

The unreadable fine print in the reduced size picture above only refers to the company’s privacy policy, and that people already on their list are not eligible.

Seemed like an easy way to save $4 to Linda D., a regular Mouse Print* reader. So she signed up at their website. She  filled out her name and email address on the page that contained this description (actual size):

So far, so good. Then she got an email from CVS with her coupon:

Excuse me, $4 off a $20 purchase? Where did that come from? There was no mention whatsoever about this coupon requiring a minimum purchase in the circular. Even visiting the CVS website on the page where you fill in your name and email address, there was no disclosure right on that page either [since changed as noted below].  If you were to click to see the sample coupon, you would have seen the $20 minimum purchase requirement, but few would probably have a reason to view the sample coupon.

Most people would only find out they’ve been hoodwinked after they had given CVS their personal information.

Mouse Print* contacted the PR folks at CVS to ask if they didn’t think this promotion was deceptive, and whether they would now provide people who signed up with a no-strings-attached $4 off coupon. They responded, in part:

“On the sign-up page, a sample coupon was displayed setting forth the details of the offer.

While we feel the information was available, CVS/pharmacy appreciates customer feedback and moving forward, we have enhanced the language for this ad to indicate more clearly that this is an offer for a $4 off $20 coupon. This change has already been made online at www.cvs.com/email. We have also made this change to our circular and it will be reflected on the online circular beginning on 8/22 and due to printing lead times, the new ad will begin running in the printed circular the week of 9/5.”

So, basically CVS decided against doing the honorable thing right away — offering those who signed up based on the misleading ad a no-strings-attached $4 coupon. And notice that they made no mention of running a retraction in newspapers across the country, as might be required by various state advertising laws.