Here’s one for you that is just kind of funny. I went out the other night to my local 99¢ Only Store looking for a real plunger to help fix a clog in our kitchen sink (the plunger we had is one of those fancy plastic ones with a small mouth that wouldn’t fit over the drain opening in the kitchen). For those of you unfamiliar with the store, it is a chain of discount stores based out of California that advertise that they sell nothing over 99¢. They are pretty nice and large for dollar stores.
Anyway, as I was searching for the plunger (which they ultimately didn’t have), I noticed several signs that said “99.99 cents Only”, with the second 99 in small font. I initially thought I must be misunderstanding the sign, thinking surely they weren’t advertising prices including fractional cents. To my surprise when I got to the checkout, everything rang up $0.9999, which of course rounds to $1.00 per item. I guess things are bad when even the 99¢ Only Store raises prices! The other odd thing I noticed was that they were now selling full gallons of milk for $2.8999. I don’t see how that fits with the whole “nothing over 99(.99)¢” mantra, but I guess no one would realistically think they could get a gallon of milk for 99.99¢.
On a side note, I noticed in researching this story (which I could find no mention of on their website) that they announced in September that they are exiting the Texas market entirely. Too bad because they really are cool stores, even if things aren’t really 99¢ anymore.