The Royal Mile

[bricelythgoe]

Never mind.

[bricelythgoe]

Never mind

[OC Richard]

We DO sell cheap imported kilts for tourists and we do not feel it's wrong in any sense. We also do NOT label these items as "Made in Scotland".

Ah, but the rub is, are these clearly labelled MADE IN INDIA and MADE IN PAKISTAN? I can't recall seeing any such labels, and at the very least Scotland should require such.

Ignorant tourists don't notice the absence of a MADE IN SCOTLAND label and assume that they're buying Scottish-made goods.

I know, because as a piper I get phone calls on a regular basis from people who bought sets of bagpipes on their travels to Scotland or Ireland who want to come over and begin lessons. In 9 cases out of 10 their pipes turn out to be Pakistani rubbish. They are quite amazed when I tell them that their Scottish pipes are not Scottish in the least, and are quite useless for musical purposes.

[CDNSushi]

Ignorant tourists don't notice the absence of a MADE IN SCOTLAND label and assume that they're buying Scottish-made goods.

I'm not trying to be confrontational here (just in case my post is seen that way) but why are you so concerned about tourists' ignorance? Stop trying to save the ignorant from their own ignorance (because not only do they not realize that they need saving, but you'll give yourself a headache in trying to do so).

As long as YOU know the difference, that's all that counts. As long as your friends, relatives and the people who venture to XMTS to educate themselves about kilts know the difference, then that's what's important. There will always be a market for tat so I'm not going to condemn the Gold Bros. for being good capitalists. If you don't want to buy from them -- fine. Don't. But don't assume that Scotland needs to be saved from them either, necessarily.

As far as the Morrison kilt shop goes, I haven't ordered from them so I can't attest to their quality, but something tells me that it might be the same case as certain craft beers. I have a friend who's a bit of a beer snob. He refuses to drink Budweiser, Miller, Coors, or anything produced for the mass market, because he hates the idea that these beers are made by global mega-corporations. Thing is, as part of my business courses, I did an in-depth analysis of the operations of AB-InBev, and found that MANY of the "craft" beers that my friend enjoys are actually wholly-owned subsidiaries of the company he refuses to support and give his business to.

Now, I COULD tell my friend what I found, but why pi$$ him off? It would serve nothing except to sour his taste for something he currently enjoys. Fact remains, AB-InBev is perfectly capable of producing some mighty fine beers, in spite of it being owned by a global mega-corp. The same way, I'm confident that it IS (at least theoretically) possible for the Gold Bros. to own and operate a kilt shop that does not sell tourist tat.

[BEEDEE]

Several of the recent posts are close to violation rules 4 & 5:

Rule #4
- Intolerance for our fellow human beings, of any kind, is inexcusable behavior in today’s world.

Rule #5
- Discussions espousing one particular religious belief or political system over another or comparison of one belief or system to another will not be allowed.

Please confine your comments to the topic to avoid closure of the thread.

Brian

[bricelythgoe]

Never mind.

[auld argonian]

As far as the practice of "tiering" by a merchant, consider that The Gap, Banana Republic and Old Navy are owned by the same corporate entity. Thus they provide the high end, mid-level and low end of very similar product lines all at the same time...oh, Lord, how the money rolls in!

But the concerns, as I have seen it, are an almost predatory saturation of the marketplace and possible misrepresentation of the "genuine-ness" of articles. Like buying Kentucky Bourbon made in Bolivia or the classic "Schmolex" watch from the episode of Seinfeld.

If your competitor has the capital to buy out all of the retail space that opens up around you, what can you do? If his signs are bigger and yours recedes in the background what options do you have? Try to get some kind of zoning ordinances limiting such things...not easy.

I do think that everything should be very prominently labeled as to place of origin and materials.

Best

AA

[ForresterModern]

"Tiering", "niching" and "market saturation" are common corporate tools in businesses and locations where there is high potential for high profit and high volume sales.

Tiering examples----well look at the US car market up until the last year or so. GM corporate put out Hummer and Cadillac at the top end, Buick and Oldsmobile in the upper bracket, Pontiac as the "niche" performance market, and Chevy and Saturn as the everyday working man's cars. Ford: Lincoln high, Mercury still upscale but not Lincoln, and Ford as the everyday man's cars. Even the Japanese 20 years ago got into tiering by introducing their upscale brands---Lexus= upscale Toyota, Infiniti = upscale Nissan, Acura = upscale Honda----all to compete with the high price portion of the market.

Market saturation can be seen everyday at professional sports events or in places like tourist traps and ski resorts where one company will park t-shirt and other tat vendors only a few feet away from each other on the same sidewalk corner to increase exposure to the fast moving crowd going by, or one resortwear company will place outlets(possibly with the same or different names) every couple hundred feet along the business district of a ski resort to maximize thier products' exposure so it is seen as being the standard of products available by drowning out its competition who may have different and possibly even better quality goods for sale, but likely at a higher price so they cannot afford to stock as much or offer as many outlets. There was one corner in Madison Wisconsin where two identical gas station/minimarts were diagonally directly across from one another at a very prominent and busy intersection, owned by the same owner, selling the same products for the same price, for the simple logic that they saturated that particular physical location while maximizing convenience for the customer, because nobody had to ever make a cross traffic(left in the US) turn to get into one of their two stores---it was always an easy right turn in as well as out, so not cross traffic to fight.

These are simple business principles and unfortunately are commonly seen in tourist areas becasue of the high traffic of relatively ignorant transient consumers with money to spend and wanting some keepsake of their trip, but not necessarily wanting to drop 300gbp on a custom fitted kilt that they have to wait 4-8 weeks for. So tat is what they buy, and because of that tat is what gets put out there, unless the local business and political groups band together to make an area a historic or restricted business zone, something not easy to do considering the tax income these shops bring into the locale and the other money brought into the local economy.

[OC Richard]

Stop trying to save the ignorant from their own ignorance...

As long as YOU know the difference, that's all that counts.

Part of me agrees, but enough people think otherwise for laws to be passed requiring food ingredients to be listed on packaging, autos to declare their estimated gas mileage, public schools to declare parental rights in writing, etc. There's an established tradition of saving the ignorant, at least in the USA.

[Kilted Rogue]

Oh... another thing about the Holyrood end: the unspeakably hideous Parliament building:

I loved the Parliament Building. We rented a flat just off the Mile and around from the Parliament Building.. Yeah is a little out of place, but what do you want another Castle!!