Buying Cotton Swabs with GIDCompare

A couple of days ago, I was at the local pharmacy and decided I also needed to get myself some cotton buds. Cotton buds are so cheap that I am sure many of us don't even know the price we usually pay for one. I know I didn't. Like regular people, I'd usually just walk into a store, grab the first one that catches my eye or whatever is available on the shelf, pay, leave and not think about it until I run out again.

Since I have GIDCompare installed on my Android™ phone now though, nothing, not even cheap cotton swabs, is going to escape my scrutiny. :)

I must reveal right away that the results below are somewhat shocking and that I am quite disturbed by the price variances I found.

As you will see, if you buy a certain brand of cotton buds at a certain store in Malaysia and if you just happen to choose the wrong packaging, you can pay up to 196% more for the same product!

This particular brand of cotton swab comes in 3 different sizes/packaging. Let us compare the first 2 first:

i. 5x20 sticks @ RM2.90

ii. 2x120 sticks @ RM5.88

GIDCompare i vs. ii

GIDCompare Report i vs. ii

Using the 'move' button in GIDCompare, we'll move Package ii up into Item A and fill in the details of our 3rd package in as Item B.  Here is the third product packaged and priced in yet another way:

iii. 5x100 sticks @ RM4.90

GIDCompare ii vs. iii

GIDCompare Report ii vs. iii

All 3 packaging compared above contain the exact same product, but can costs a whopping 196% more if you pick/buy the wrong one!

From now on, I am going to use GIDCompare to compare unit cost prices for everything, and I mean EVERYTHING! :)