The Illusory Discount

Vicki and I have been slowly (over several years) covering most of the wood surfaces on the outside of our house with vinyl siding. It's simply become too much work to keep them painted, and so we've systematically been dealing with all of our soffits and fascia in this way.

The company that we've used for this in the past has done a very good job of it, at a so-so price. In other words, we've been happy with the quality but always feel like it's a little bit more expensive than it should be. Sometimes we've talked about getting other quotes on it, but usually it's enough of a hassle just getting one (especially back when both of us were working) that we've stuck with the one company up to now.

Late last month, I got a phone call from the siding company, telling me that they were doing a special 30% off sale through the end of July, and asking if there was any work we'd like to get a quote on. Seeing an opportunity to get more wood covered up at a better rate, I set up an appointment. Which brings us to today.

The guy came out as scheduled, this evening, did some measurements and then provided an estimate. We went into this exercise with a notion of what this amount of work would normally cost us (based on previous invoices, going back 3 years), and the figure that he quoted us was right around that, or maybe a little less. So I asked about the 30% off discount, and was told that the 30% had already been taken off. Vicki asked some further questions and was told that the material had gone up in price, and the guys were very busy these days, and blah blah blah. But basically we were left with the impression that they baited the hook with the promise of a 30% sale, and then basically raised their prices enough so that they still made just as much profit on the operation as they always do. Which naturally left a sour taste in our mouths.

Given that there's a Home Renovation Tax Credit available this year, we'd like to get some work done in 2009 rather than putting it all off to next year. But experiences like this aren't really helping the cause... you know what I mean?