The two products may be identical, but they are not the same
One of the sneaky tricks pulled by salespeople is the “We match any competitor’s price on the same item” offer. The trick is to make sure the products in your store are not available at any competitor by simply changing the model number.
I read that this trick is particularly popular for some reason with furniture stores (in cahoots with furniture manufacturers). They will sell you a Fabrikam model 1310-XD-2 sofa. You spot the same sofa at a competitor and they say, “No, it is not the same sofa. That sofa is a Fabrikam model 1310-XC-2. The one you bought is a model 1310-XD-2. Sorry.”
The two sofas are completely identical in every respect of any consequence. The only difference is that the furniture manufacturer prints 1310-XC-2 on the tag of the sofa it sells to store A and 1310-XD-2 on the tag of the sofa it sells to store B.
Since the model numbers don’t match, the price match guarantee does not apply.
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Yup. See also mattress manufacturers and stores for another example of this slimy trick.
I have also seen a variation of this at Costco, wherein a manufacturer will provide a special Costco-only SKU for products sold there. In some cases, like with the Roland digital “mini grand” that Costco sells, the Costco item is made slightly differently (e.g. fewer instrument sounds). In other cases, like with certain TVs, the product is essentially identical to the mainstream retail offering.
There is of course also the completely different slimy trick of enforcing minimum advertised retail prices, something which used to be illegal but which the shift to laissez faire handling of anti-trust in the US made commonplace, for consumer electronics, cameras, computers, and a variety of other products. It’s almost like capitalism in the US was designed to favor the big corporations who bought all those politicians, instead of the consumer who proponents always say reap the benefits of capitalism.
This is also the same with laptop notebooks. Some large stores here in the Netherlands have their own SKU, which makes it very hard to compare models.
Similar behavior:
For a very same product, manufacturer labels a “online store models” which legally makes it different from models sold in physical stores.
There will even be different models for different online resellers.