Tuesday, July 29, 2014

Price discrimination - theatre edition

I'm in Minnesota for the AAEA annual meetings - I have only missed one of these meetings since 2001, and it's been great as usual.

I'm also visiting family, and tonight my family is going to The Little Mermaid at the Chanhassen dinner theatre.

Here's the pricing



As you can see, the theatre charges different prices based on what they assess the demand will be both for different days of the week and for different groups of people, a classic case of price discrimination.

One condition that has to be met to price discriminate is that the seller must be able to prevent resale of the tickets.  For most theatres, a chart like this wouldn't work, as those students and those who are 55 and older could buy the cheaper tickets and profit by selling them to others.  But since this is a dinner theatre, they can prevent the resale of tickets.

A final note - they also have an educator's discount, that's actually more generous than any of the other prices listed.  Whereas students cost $54/ticket tonight, educators can purchase a ticket for just $45.  I'm happy about this, naturally, as I benefit, but I am surprised.  Why would educators be charged a lower price than students?


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