Class Ring pricing (rip off!)

[dfrecore]

Popcorn is a bit different. Popcorn profit helps keep the theater open, which ticket sales may not do. Ring sales aren't keeping schools open.

So true on the popcorn.  I worked in movie theaters when I was in college.  I recall that the manager told me that the theater did not make money on ticket sales.  That goes to the production studios, actors, etc. The movie theatre makes their money on concesssions.

---

I stumbled upon this pricing scam….

I was ordering my son’s high school yearbook (on Jostens) and out of curiosity, I clicked on the class jewelry link.  I saw the pricing of some of the rings and decided to look up what they offered for my college.   I never did get a class ring back then.  The exact same ring is DOUBLE the cost.  All the same options.  So I googled a few other class ring manufacturers and found the same thing.  Same metal, same jewel, same options…. And the college rings are significantly more than the high school rings.  

That’s just dirty.  

I am not at all shocked.  If anything, I'm shocked that you're shocked.  My sense of it is that historically, parents have bought these rings as a gift for their graduating child.  I think they've always been overpriced.  It's opportunistic profit, not much different than the price of popcorn at the movie theatre.

But the huge increase between high school and college is just wrong.  Especially considering I was comparing the EXACT SAME rings.  Not a single difference.  Same color, stone, etc.

If this was something the ring company was doing, then really, they would be charging MORE for the high school ring; the fact that they charge less for the high school and more for college says that they are paying a license fee to the college and therefore have to charge more for the ring itself.

[freeloader]

Do a quick Google search for “class rings antitrust lawsuit”. There have been a number of FTC complaints and lawsuits about class rings. Basically, there are 2 or 3 companies that sell the vast majority of class rings. The companies tend to get exclusive licensing agreements with the various college and universities. These very few companies are able to keep prices artificially high because there is no competition. There also have been repeated allegations of actual collusion and price-fixing in this market.

Part of the higher cost for a college ring is also because the college gets a cut under its marketing deal, the marketing company that handles the marketing deal for the college gets a cut, and, in all likelihood, the NCAA gets a cut (if you attended an NCAA school). The rest of the difference is the “excess profits”, if you will, that result from the anti-competitive nature of college branding.

How far does this stuff go? The Commonwealth of Kentucky wanted to “brand” its Covid-19 response messaging as “Team Kentucky” and sought to trademark that. This is the state government we are taking about. The University of Kentucky formally opposed the trademark request because they claimed the state was infringing on the university’s marketing and that the university’s brand would be diminished by the state (which, of course, owns the university). Ohio State tried to trademark the word “the”, the result of would have meant, practically speaking, that any university or college who wanted to put THE in front of the name (THE University of X as opposed to University of X) on its merchandise would have had to pay OSU a royalty.


https://amp.usatoday.com/amp/8161774002
https://www.thelantern.com/2020/03/ohio-...rk-battle/