Research on odd prices: Dead end or field of potential innovation?

Abstract

Half a century ago, the literature on pricing topics included several terms used as synonyms, respectively “odd prices,” “just-below prices,” “magic prices,” “charm prices,” “irrational prices,” “intuitive prices,” “rule-of-thumb prices” and “psychological prices.” There was no formally accepted definition of these terms and of the content of such strategies. In essence, “odd pricing” consisted in setting prices just-below an even denomination. The usual examples were the prices ending in 9, 0.99 or 0.95.