Summer discounts at Amazon, Walmart and other retailers aren't always as deep as they look

NBC News

a day ago

Summer discounts at Amazon, Walmart and other major retailers aren't always as deep as they seem. A smattering of markdowns during the latest round of sales events was preceded by price hikes, an NBC News analysis of e-commerce pricing shows.
The NBC News Price Tracker has been following a selection of household items sold online by major retailers. The basket of goods includes everything from dishwashers to running shoes and headphones — items that aren't bought as frequently as groceries but are common enough to attract shoppers during heavily advertised seasonal promotions.
Of 178 tracked items at Amazon, Walmart and Best Buy, at least two dozen saw price increases in the weeks before each of the three retailers' sales events kicked off. The price fluctuations come as consumers remain sharply more pessimistic than they were this time last year, with many hunting for bargains after months of executives' and economists' warnings about tariff-fueled price increases.
Several items rose in price the week leading up to Amazon Prime Day (July 8-11), then fell once the sale started.
The Keurig K-Duo coffee maker was priced at $199.99 until late June, then rose about 9% to $219.99 in the weeks before Prime Day. Its price was slashed to $139.99 during the Prime Day sale — a more than 36% discount but only 30% lower than the earlier level.
The Cannon EOS R50 camera, which started at $799 in the weeks leading up to Prime Day, went up to $879 the week before Friday, July 4, and is now down to $749. The change turned what would have been a roughly 6% discount into a nearly 15% markdown.
'Amazon consistently offers the lowest prices across the widest selection of products, and we continue to meet or beat prices versus other retailers across the vast selection of products in our store,' a spokesperson for the company said.
Best Buy increased some prices in the run-up to its Black Friday in July Sale (July 7-13), too.
A Yamaha outdoor speaker that started at $104.99 jumped nearly 43% to $149.95 the week before the promotional event kicked off, only to return to $104.99 during the sale.
An Anker charging dock spiked to $79.99 a little more than a week before the retailer's sale, when its price was cut by 20% to $63.99 — the same level as in May. In fact, the device went as low as $52.99 at certain points in both late May and late June.
A Best Buy spokesperson said the speaker was priced at $104.99 for the last several months, aside from a two-day period when it was unintentionally reset to its regular price before being lowered again on July 3. The charging dock has been on clearance at $63.99 for at least a month, the spokesperson said, adding that neither item — nor three others that NBC News identified with similar price moves over roughly the same period — were part of Best Buy's July sale.
Walmart made its own price increases for some items ahead of the Walmart Deals event (July 8-13), though the handful of hikes NBC News identified among the 74 Walmart-sold items in the Price Tracker occurred in May or June, rather than immediately before the summer sale.
This Barbie Dream Camper set started at $65, increased to $99.99 weeks before Walmart Deals week, and fell back to $65 during the sale.
A Pelonis oscillating fan, which started at $26.42, jumped to $34.99 in early June. During Deals week, it dropped to $28.38.
Even an inexpensive Bic multipurpose lighter selling for $3.52 in May jumped to $4.99 in June. During the week of Walmart Deals, it returned to $3.52.
A Walmart spokesperson said the company's July promotions offered 'incredible value on thousands of items' and that its 'commitment to everyday low prices extends beyond our deals events.' Walmart doesn't control the prices of the many products listed by third-party sellers on its site, the spokesperson said.
Several Amazon products monitored by the Price Tracker also saw spikes beginning in May and June to levels that fell only just before Prime Day.
These pricing shifts are nothing new. Retailers have been criticized for such practices for many years and typically say they constantly tweak prices to stay competitive with one another and respond to shifting consumer demand.
'Many, but not all, merchants increase prices right before the sale begins just to drop them back down to the same discounts they'd been at just a few days prior,' said Samantha Gordon, deals editor at Consumer Reports, where she said these moves are also turning up in the outlet's own price tracker.
'This can make it look like you're getting a better-than-normal deal when it's really just the everyday sale price,' she said. 'The best way to know how much you're really saving is to check prices at least two weeks before the sale starts.'
The price spikes NBC News identified weren't across the board.
Most of the tracked items' prices stayed flat ahead of the summer sales events, rather than climbing beforehand. It's also true that the Price Tracker zeroes in on a minuscule sample of e-commerce purchases at just five large retailers, each of which sells a vast range of products both in stores and online. But it isn't hard to find evidence of price jumps in the run-up to summer discounting periods on other retail price-tracking platforms, too.
Keepa, which tracks Amazon's prices, found a pair of JBL noise-canceling headphones listed for $129.95 in the last couple of weeks of June. They jumped to $149.95 on July 3 before dropping to $99.95 for Prime Day. CamelCamelCamel, which also tracks Amazon, shows a Ninja air fryer that jumped up to $129.99 from $100 just before Prime Day, before falling to $89.99 during the sales event.
The appearance of deep price cuts fueled a surge in consumer spending. U.S. retail e-commerce sales exceeded $24 billion from July 8-11, Adobe analysts said Saturday, a more than 30% jump from the same period last year that 'sets a new benchmark for the summer shopping season.'
Purchases surged across key product categories reflected in NBC News' Price Tracker, with online sales of apparel rising 250%, appliances up 112%, electronics up 95% and home improvement items up 76%, Adobe found.
Retailers successfully 'leaned into discounts to drive growth' among price-sensitive shoppers, the analysts said — so much so that many consumers 'traded up' to higher-ticket items that they'd forgo on an ordinary day. The share of purchases made up by the priciest items rose 20% during the summer sales period from typical levels this year, according to Adobe, with even steeper gains among top-shelf products in categories such as appliances (up 36% over average levels), sporting goods (up 30%) and furniture (up 28%).
But as NBC News reported during the last fall's holiday shopping season, consumers who miss out on major retail promotions can still find plenty of discounts year-round.
'Prices rise and fall due to changing conditions,' noted shopping expert Trae Bodge, not just due to planned sales events. 'Because dynamic pricing exists, I suggest that shoppers research price histories so they time their purchases accordingly.'