The attached poster is taken from a photocopy cum flexiload shop at Motijheel. As of today, most of the people in the city know about this trend. Now, lets have a simple math with an assumption that total 40% of the 2.4 million GP subscribers will charge Taka 40 at a time. That means 2.4 x 0.40 = 9.6 lac subscriber will pay additional 9.6 lac taka at a time to charge their account. I do not want to further proceed with the question, what will be the extra money paid in a month or in a year.... I just stop at this point and let the reader ponder on it.Lately, smokers of B&H and B&H Light already know that, if you buy a single stick of any of the two brands, you do not get back Tk 0.50. On a single transaction, it may seem pretty low. However, when you estimate the figure on whole market and monthly or yearly basis, then the figure matters!!
Whose benefit is this, when the trade is getting more profit than fixed by the company? First of all the retail traders are making the profit. However, if the scenario is explained in a different angle? Suppose, the companies take such strategy wittingly (like B&H) so that, it favors retailers not to give back fifty paisa and allows the retailer to pile up this. Thus the company strategy favors the ratailers without even increasing the retail price!! Therefore, brand image does not get upset but the retailers remain happy even at a lower profit rate offered.
In both of the above cases, two multinational companies are quoting one retail price but the product is selling at another price. My humble question to you all is: whose responsibility is this to affirm the Retail Selling Price at par with the company's quoted retail price? and how?
