I’m a fairly frequent visitor to the Mos Eisley of deal sites, HotUKDeals, a user driven deal aggregator site that sometimes has the odd bargain on that I’m interested in. For the most part it’s full of scallies that spot a deal for something then buy ten of it so they can eBay 9 of them for a minuscule profit or individuals with a shaky grasp of the law who scream blue murder when a major online retailer refuses to honour a misprice that will see a £400 TV marked up at £35 and not the £350 that the retailer intended.
Still, one thing it has highlighted to me is the innovative ways that businesses now describe 2nd hand goods:
- open box;
- refurbished;
- factory sealed;
- reconditioned; and
- ex-display.
Open box to my mind is a particularly devious euphemism, since it covers a multitude of sins from opened for an at the counter customer to look at, to used quite a bit and returned but the whole lot are more than a little bit disingenuous.
