The Decision

Here you are, faced with a piece of plastic shrouded in a glorified cardboard envelope. You will never buy the cardboard without the plastic, and you will not buy the plastic without the cardboard. Strangely, you will never use the cardboard for anything, but we are not talking about use. This is a record. It is not its cardboard cover, and not the circle of vinyl inside. There is a price on the cardboard. It will typically range from $0.50 to $50.00. You have no idea where it comes from. No idea. At Joe’s Moldy Oldies in Woonsocket he writes a ‘list price’ on the back of the record. This is often $150-$300. Then, you bring him the record and he shows you the price he has written on the back and asks for $15, which is probably $10 too high. You decline. At the Time Capsule in Cranston all LPs without a price are $3, and some are marked at higher prices. You will never buy the very rare Stevie Wonder album at $8 because you have never seen anything else priced so high there. At another store you would buy it in a second. However, you are more likely to buy a $5 record because (you believe that) the price will ensure the record’s quality. At Luke’s Records in Pawtucket there was a sale every month and everything was half off, and you would pay $7.50 for a $15 record which you could have found at the Time Capsule for $3. It is a complicated game. You pay attention to the ‘price context’ and if you see something that is at a fair price relative to the rest of the prices in the store, and it is something that you want, then you feel good about buying it.