Image is everything when it comes to price

The book battle that erupted last week among Target, Amazon and Walmart likely isn’t the last, especially as Walmart pursues a pricing strategy in which it focuses on using key items and product categories to establish low price perception. That means Target will find itself in the position of reacting quickly to Walmart’s action, as it did with books or several years ago with $4 generics. Target has implemented some bold pricing moves on its own through the pages of its circular, but the company is generally finds itself in a defensive position, following Walmart’s high-profile pricing initiatives, which tend to attract considerable media attention in an economy that still feels recessionary.