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Pagans, Pricing and Profit:
How Much is Too Much?
Anyone who has ever worked in purchasing for a retail or wholesale business knows the drill. The same applies to those who are in charge of estimating for contracted jobs, dealing with supplies from subcontractors and vendors.
It's called mark-ups. And it's the way most businesses makes money.
The standard calculation for most businesses is to mark up a product they receive from a vendor by anywhere from 50-100%. This means a box of incense sticks, for instance, could be purchased for $3, but is placed on the shelf at a pop-culture retail shop in a mall for $6.
Indeed, that mark up goes toward covering the business' overhead - rent on the space, salaries for the employees, utilities and other expenses. The profits come from that mark up, too.
For corporate owned businesses, the higher the profit, the happier the bosses.
It can get a bit ridiculous, though.
An example: a new building is being constructed, which requires ample amounts of concrete. The general contractor contacts the concrete supplier, who in turn contacts the vendor who provides the sand, gravel and other ingredients to make the required mixture. Those ingredients are marked up 100%, with an extra 20%, say, thrown in to cover the cost of running the giant mixing machinery. That price is given to the general contractor, who again marks it up 100%, also adding in the labor for the trained personnel required to finish the job. The company having the structure built ends up paying a lot more than the supplier of the sand and gravel will ever see.
And somebody's making a nice fat profit.
According to many, it's the way the world goes round.
It doesn't have to be that way with Pagan businesses, though. Sure, if a person looks at some catalogs - and knows where to look - it is possible to find the pricing for the wholesalers and retailers, along with the "suggested price" paid by the public. Those prices are usually 100% higher than the retailer pays.
What a Pagan business owner really needs to consider, perhaps, is whether it is necessary to mark the stock up that full amount. By figuring the monthly expenses for the business, and dividing it by the amount of sales in the same time period, the profits can be calculated... and if those profits are exorbitantly high, it may be a viable option to drop some of the prices.
Advocating such tactics may seem to go against the capitalistic rationale of business in general. The reasons are clear, though. By marking up stock too much, it actually decreases sales. More than once, it has been declared by Pagan shoppers and festival goers that they save up their money all year just to spend it at weekend events or on trips to large shops. Knowing that Pagans, as a rule, tend to work jobs which are more suited to their lifestyle and, perhaps, don't pay the highest salaries, Pagan business owners can serve their customers and still turn a reasonable profit by dropping prices a bit. It also helps deflect the rigors of inflation by helping the customer save and by generating additional sales for the business owner.
This is not to say the Pagan business owner should end each month in the red, for that serves no purpose other than to put the business on the rocks. Yet most Pagans go into business to serve a group of people who hold beliefs similar to their own, and who have very special, unique needs. Is there a better reason to keep prices reasonable? Is there a better way to be regarded in the Pagan community than as a business person who sells quality goods for reasonable prices, and offers a bit of competition to the large chain stores? Pagans, after all, would much rather do business with and for other Pagans, and offering the right prices is an added incentive and courtesy.
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