Garage Sale Phenomenon: Part 3

It’s the big day and the garage sale is underway. The ladies are salivating at the sheer magnitude of dollars they expect to rack up. The first customers are pawing through the junk, ‘er’ merchandise and, at last, a purchase is attempted. It is at this time where we examine the foundation, the very focal point of the garage sale: the art of the negotiation. You see, all the pricing that was done last night simply provided the beginning bargaining point. Consider this: the customer finds an item they can’t live without, priced last night by the ladies at $4.50. She picks the item up and approaches the check out table at the end of the driveway with great fear and trepidation for there, eyeing her every move, is perhaps the most rigorous, yea even the fiercest bargainer of all time: a lady we shall call K.

The negotiation begins. The lady offers $3.75, K counters with $4.50, the lady counters with $4.25 and K firmly avows that she cannot accept less than $4.50 as this is a very nice item. Now the two have come to the crossroads and each finds herself in a quandary: if K cedes to the $4.25 offer, she has been defeated and her aura is shattered; if the lady renders $4.50, she has been laid bare as a weak and defenseless negotiator, a reputation she will not soon leave behind. Alas, she puts the item back and walks away. Now, they both can claim victory, each believing they have dealt a mortal blow to the other.

Sadly, who has really won? Exxon, Shell, Diamond Shamrock, etc. Because, that difference of a quarter that could not be agreed upon, now will cost me $3.00 per gallon in gas for my vehicle. For, following the garage sale, I will cart that item and the many other’s whose quarter difference could not be agreed upon, to the Salvation Army drop-off. If you are keeping count, there still has been no money made at what was supposed to be a VERY profitable Saturday morning.