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Primark  Reopening All Of It's 153 Stores On In England 15th June.

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"During lockdown the clothing chain has built up almost £2bn-worth of stock to sell, double its normal stockholding.

However, bargain-hunters will be left disappointed after the firm said there would be no special discounting"

It seems quite a bold statement about no discounting.  An uncertain economy and double it's normal stock levels. I think there will be some discounts later on at some point.
https://www.bbc.com/news/business-52874532

 

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Might be to keep footfall more regular.

 

Most other clothing retailers can sell their built-up stock online at discounted prices.  Primark can’t.

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Discount on what exactly? Primark has tiny margins, it's how they operate; buy it cheap and stack it high. They probably can't afford a fire sale considering they are the only major retailer I can think of that doesn't sell anything online so have made no money whatsoever during lockdown.

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I called in the one at Parkgate last week.

 

While I was waiting to pay for some slippers, I looked at the men's socks on a rack at the side of me. 5 pairs of 70% cotton rich socks for £2! I got some to try, and they were some of the most  snug and comfortable socks I have worn.

 

I think they must be a loss leader or something similar. If not, how much do the women get paid in the factory, how much do Primart pay, and how much profit do Primart make on an item like that? Hard to imagine how they do it.

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36 minutes ago, Janus said:

I called in the one at Parkgate last week.

 

While I was waiting to pay for some slippers, I looked at the men's socks on a rack at the side of me. 5 pairs of 70% cotton rich socks for £2! I got some to try, and they were some of the most  snug and comfortable socks I have worn.

 

I think they must be a loss leader or something similar. If not, how much do the women get paid in the factory, how much do Primart pay, and how much profit do Primart make on an item like that? Hard to imagine how they do it.

A good answer to your questions can be summed up by the  word pennies.   

 

The factory worker in some sweatshop on the other side of the world will be getting pennies for their shift.  The wholesale price of those products will be pennies per item with huge buying discounts available to Primark (and many other similar operations) who will be purchasing such stock by the container load.  The profit margin on that item will be pennies but once again when you look at the overall volumes of sales that is where they make their money.

 

It is an extremely successful formula but not a new story in the world of business.

 

The question of ethics is a very different matter.  Something which has created a lot of hypocrisy between ravenous bargain hunters who at the same time raise objection about businesses taking advantage of people and even countries. 

 

The harsh fact is people can't have their cake and eat it.

 

If we want pile it high sell it cheap somebody has to be exploited in the chain.  Of course the more palatable alternative is ethically sourced, locally made, high quality, low quantity but in turn such comes with higher price tags.  It doesn't take much comparison of retailers to see which side is winning the battle.  

Edited by ECCOnoob

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10 hours ago, Janus said:

I called in the one at Parkgate last week.

 

While I was waiting to pay for some slippers, I looked at the men's socks on a rack at the side of me. 5 pairs of 70% cotton rich socks for £2! I got some to try, and they were some of the most  snug and comfortable socks I have worn.

 

I think they must be a loss leader or something similar. If not, how much do the women get paid in the factory, how much do Primart pay, and how much profit do Primart make on an item like that? Hard to imagine how they do it.

By using the brutal working conditions, and pitifully low paid workers of Bangladesh. Dunno if you've been to Bangladesh or the poor Eastern states of India, but there are some heartbreaking sights.

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59 minutes ago, Bargepole23 said:

By using the brutal working conditions, and pitifully low paid workers of Bangladesh. Dunno if you've been to Bangladesh or the poor Eastern states of India, but there are some heartbreaking sights.

Indeed. But in defense of Primark (not something I thought I'd write when I got up this morning) I'm not sure the factories they use are worse than some of the more expensive brands suppliers.

 

And they don't do online selling which keeps their returns much much lower.

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The enquires into the Leicester ‘sweat shops’ is beginning to reveal  clothing retailers lack of knowledge re the multiple sub contracts used by their manufacturers 

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All very true but unfortunately the solution is not simple.

 

We all love a bargain and without that sort of 'exploitation' and mass multi-layered supply chain we wouldn't get it.    

 

We could stop using these sweatshops in developing countries but that would then lead to huge numbers of the local population with no employment.  Take a look at some parts of China and India where there would be entire cities completely destroyed because their existence and livelihood has evolved soley from supplying these companies.  I have read a book about one place in some backwater Chinese province which supplies all of the Christmas tat to the pound shops.  It was one of the largest wholesale markets in the country and the reporter advised that just straight walking around the building grid INSIDE took 8 hours. That is a sort of size that these places are manufacturing on.

 

It could be suggested that we pay these workers more, but that in turn will lead to dramatic inflation of their local living costs and other prices which could lead to even worse situations for the population living there.

 

It really is catch-22 and the solution goes far beyond merely considering the ethical parts and a bit of westernised slacktivism.

Edited by ECCOnoob

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15 hours ago, Janus said:

I think they must be a loss leader or something similar. If not, how much do the women get paid in the factory, how much do Primart pay, and how much profit do Primart make on an item like that? Hard to imagine how they do it.

They don't waste £millions on advertising like other stores do which also helps keep prices low. And yes, I agree about the socks.... :hihi:

 

4 minutes ago, ECCOnoob said:

We could stop using these sweatshops in developing countries but that would then lead to huge numbers of the local population with no employment. 

A very important and sometimes neglected point.

Edited by apelike

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26 minutes ago, ECCOnoob said:

 

 

It could be suggested that we pay these workers more, but that in turn will lead to dramatic inflation of their local living costs and other prices which could lead to even worse situations for the population living there.

 

 

You're going to have to dumb this down for me.  If you are giving an entire country a big pay rise I can see how hyper-inflation can take place. But given large chunks of the Chinese population are earning better wages, surely those at the bottom of the heap can get a pay rise without messing up an entire economy.

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I felt post No5 by ECCOnoob  was an interesting one. I too am not quite grasping how paying those at the bottom will cause dramatic inflation, but I don’t know much about how things work in China.


By the way, the socks  that I mentioned were labelled made in China. Pretty much on a par with India of course in some parts.

 

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