Bargain hunting

I am not a big fan of clothes shopping. Yet, from time to time, I am required to pick up some new clothes as the old ones wear out. As a shopper, I enjoy a bargain as much as the next guy. But when I was out last week, I found what was probably my best shopping bargain ever.

How much is too much?

As you can read in the tag, the jacket that I bought was marked down from $220.00 to $22.00. That’s quite a savings!

My limited knowledge of the retail sector leads me to believe that department stores mark up the items that they sell by 100% or more. But if a store is reducing a product by 90%, surely the initial product must have been previously WAY overpriced. Can the store’s mark-up be so high that it could sell the jacket for $22.00 and still make a profit (or at least cover its costs)?