The Young Adult: A Pragmatic Look at Price in Advertising.

The U.S. Surpreme Court in 1996 ruled to strike down a Rhode Island statute that prohibited liquor retailers from including liquor prices in their advertisements. The rationale behind the decision was because the state law infringed upon free speech rights to advertise low prices. Based upon the ruling, this article explores the effects that different ways of presenting advertised price offers may have on young consumers. The experiment consisted of a convenience sample of 225 college students. Three nearly identical advertisements were used (comparable to the ad in the court's ruling): one with the price listed, one with "WOW" replacing price, and one depicting products only with no price stated. First, data were collected to gather information about the normal shopping habits of the consumer. Second, questions were devised to seek details pertaining to these specific advertisements. Thirdly age particulars were gathered. The findings reveal that price specific ads reinforce the retailer's product offerings. The young adult's attention does widen when price is low and direct-price ads do attract more attention. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]