Rationing...

Much is being made of a recent decision by Wal-Mart to start rationing ammo sales. The general consensus is that this is a bad idea, in that we should be able to buy however much ammo we want at a given time. Others disagree, with the idea that rationing allows more people to buy ammo. Many wonder why, exactly, Wal-Mart (and Dick's Sporting Goods as well, apparently) have chosen to limit ammo sales, under the premise that they're going to sell it all anyways; what difference does it make whether they sell all 50 boxes to one person or 25 people?

It's very simple: repeat business is good, and impulse shopping is better.

One thing you can say for the folks that run Wally World, they're sharp business people. It's a near-certainty that, with ammo as scarce as it is and folks checking in daily, sales have gone up across the board in the entire store. This is because people walk in with the intention of seeing if there's any ammo for sales, and remembering that they need to pick up a pound of coffee, a car battery, or a new pair of hiking boots while they're in the store.

Getting people in the store is the holy grail of retail. And with the ammo shortage, Wal-Mart's just about parked the bus outside the Ark of the Covenant here... Tortured metaphor aside, basically Wal-Mart is extending the in-store time folks spend by making them make multiple trips to the store (or store locations) as they're only able to buy two boxes of ammo at a time. Rather than driving to three different stores hoping one has ammo in stock, now we'll drive to three different stores to buy two boxes at each location...

It's genius, plain and simple.

I applaud the thought that went into this decision - while the gunnie in me is pissed that I'm *still* going to have to drive all over hell and creation to find ammo, the sales & marketing guy in me has to nod approvingly at the concept.

That is all.