A badass marketing strategy that 2 wristwatch stores used on me

Last year, I came across a badass marketing strategy implemented by 2 Indian Brothers I’d like to share. It was the middle of the year and I needed a nice wristwatch to match my outfit, so I did what any human would do, which is to head to a wristwatch store.

There were two stores side-by-side in the shopping mall, so I naturally walked into the first shop. After looking around for about 2 minutes, I saw a wristwatch I liked somewhere in one of the shelves.

When I priced it, the middle-aged looking Indian man brought it out, ‘cleaned’ it with a piece of white clothing, then told me (I have translated the currency)

“Only 350,000 naira my friend, but we are on a promo”

He brought out his calculator and did some calculations, then concluded: “if you buy it between now and tomorrow, only 310,000 naira you will have to pay my friend.”

I smiled and replied, “That’s much cheaper than I expected, I’ll come back next time to buy it”.

That was my escape strategy. I don’t know any version of me that will spend 300k on a wristwatch. Will that watch tell me the time of death? Is it the pray and watch that the disciples were supposed to keep while Jesus prayed at the mountain?

As I walked out of the watch store, I didn’t know when I walked into the next one. There it was, the same watch, on the front display.

Reluctantly, I asked, “how much is that?”. The slightly younger Indian man replied “This one? Only 28,000 naira my friend”.

My mind was blown away! How does the same wristwatch that costs 300k in the other shop now cost 28k here?

That other man must think I am a fool but I got things under control. As per naija guy.

I quickly paid with my ATM, got the watch adjusted to my wrist size and boom, I am off to parte.

But something kept bothering me, “why the huge difference in price even though they are just one wall apart?”

Son of man could not understand until one night I was about to sleep a week later. It suddenly occurred to me that they weren’t just Indians, they actually looked alike, they must be brothers!

Damn!

I quickly jumped into the elevator, rushed downstairs and got into an Uber, and headed straight for that store.

I went into the second shop again telling him that I couldn’t set the watch to work correctly. (I had purposefully set it to a wrong time)

“no problem my friend, this I will fix right now” he smiled.

He took the watch from my hand and started fixing the time. That was the moment I asked

“You look so much like the other man in the other shop, how come?”

He replied with a wide smile while shaking his head in the traditional Indian way “we are brothers”.

Ladies and gentlemen, on my way out, I brought out my phone immediately and checked on Jumia, to my biggest surprise that phone sells for 5k on Jumia!

These two guys were able to sell me a wristwatch almost 6 times the price by first strategically scaring me with a much larger price. If I had walked into the second shop first, my guess is that they would have played that same trick on me in reverse.