This Week in Your Wallet: August 14, 2012
The grocery games just got a little more complicated — and unfortunately, I’m not talking about “Supermarket Sweep.” (Though, anyone else miss that show? I love it when I catch a rerun on the Game Show Network!)
According to an article in the New York Times, grocery stores are adding another layer to the process that is finding sales: they’re personalizing the shopping experience, and they’re going beyond the typical loyalty programs to do so. Grocers like Safeway and Kroger are actually tracking shoppers’ habits in order to offer individualized prices.
The personalization process works like this: Let’s say you buy a family-size box of Kellogg’s Cornflakes every week to feed your family of five. Meanwhile, your friend shops at the same grocery store but buys a different box of cereal each week — Special K, Coco Puffs, Kashi Go Lean, etc. After tracking these buying habits, your grocery store sends you an email with a deal offering you one box of family-sized Cornflakes for $2.99. Your friend, meanwhile, tells you she paid $3.75 for the same product. Because you have the history of brand (and product) consistency, you get the deal.
The Times article notes that this personalization can also work in favor of shoppers who switch off equally between two products. One woman interviewed found that she was given cheaper prices on ground coffee when she strategically alternated between Starbucks grounds and Dunkin Donuts grounds versus only buying Starbucks.
How can you work this new trend to your advantage? That’s not completely clear (we’ll keep an eye out and get back to you with more specifics), though signing up for a loyalty card is a must.
And finally, while we’re on the subject of personalization, I want to give one last word regarding the focus groups and workshops I’ve been looking into. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, I am developing a series of workshops based on my books. Many of you have emailed me about your interest in this, and I very much appreciate your responses. But for those of you who might be hearing about this for the first time or might be interested but haven’t had a chance to reach out to me yet, I wanted to let you know that it’s not too late. I’m still seeking your feedback on this, and I’ll be taking emails until the end of thisweek. If you’d be interested in attending a Jean Chatzky workshop (or being involved in focus groups during development), just shoot an email over to jean@jeanchatzky.com with your name and where you live.
And now, here are the other headlines for the week:
Saying Goodbye to SmartMoney Magazine…
… Or the print version, at least. As I may have mentioned a few months ago, SmartMoney magazine has decided to stop its print edition and continue on as a website. While I’m happy that it will still exist insome capacity, I was sad to see the very last print edition of the magazine hit stands this weekend. I was one of SmartMoney’s earliest employees, and it’s where I learned many of the ropes of financial reporting.
In honor of its last edition, the staff compiled a list of the eight money lessons they’ve learned over the years of reporting on personal finance. Among the tidbits: “you’re responsible for your own retirement,” “be contrarian — and win,” and “the world is your oyster.” The whole article contains some good advice, so I highly recommend reading the whole thing.
College Choices Affected By Cost
The above headline should sound like a no-brainer, as the cost of something should always factor intoyour purchasing decision. However, until now, college has been the exception to that rule, and to the tune of $100 trillion in student debt. Yet parents and students are catching on. According to the latest “How America Pays for College” report by student loan lender Sallie Mae, 69 percent of families have eliminated college choices because of cost. In the five years Sallie Mae has done this study, this is the highest percentage they’ve seen in that category.
Testing Retirement Calculators
As I’m sure you know, there’s no shortage of online calculators out there when it comes to calculatingyour retirement needs. And if you’ve ever used more than one of these calculators, I’m sure you also know that they can often provide very different results. Over at CBS MoneyWatch, writer Steve Vernon is frustrated by these varying results, so he’s setting out to test these calculators over a multi-part series of articles. In part one of the series, he confirmed just how different the results can be: some calculators told him he needed to save 10 to 20 percent of his salary, while others told him 30, 40, even 70 percent. Yikes! As a general rule, I like to tell people that they should aim to save 10 percent of their income each month. In the meantime, I’ll be on the lookout for Vernon’s follow-up articles — I’m curious to see what else he finds. Stay tuned to my Twitter and Facebook, where I’ll be sure to post relevant articles as they pop up.
Have a great week!
Jean
