Retailers routinely present a posted price together with a higher advertised reference price, in an effort to evoke a perception of the discount the consumer is receiving. If prices can be negotiated though, what impact does this initial perceived discount (IPD) have on the ultimate discount, demand, and revenue? With data from consumers of a large durable goods retailer, in a natural decision-making environment, this study provides evidence that a greater IPD is associated with smaller negotiated discounts. Then, a lab experiment involving negotiation and purchase decisions for multiple products, with randomly assigned values of the IPD, establishes that a $1 increase in IPD lowers the negotiated discount by 4.7 cents. Furthermore, 75% of this decrease can be attributed to reduction in the participants' likelihood to initiate a negotiation. Under bargaining, almost half of the increase in revenue from a higher IPD stems from an increase in the negotiated price, which is unlike fixed pricing, in which setting an increase in IPD affects revenue only through changes in demand. Sellers also have a greater incentive to set exaggerated advertised reference prices in bargaining contexts, compared with fixed pricing. These findings in turn have implications for researchers, retailers, and consumers.

零售商通常会同时展示公布的价格和更高的广告参考价格，以努力唤起消费者对折扣的看法。如果可以协商价格，那么初始感知折扣 (IPD) 对最终折扣、需求和收入有什么影响？根据来自大型耐用品零售商消费者的数据，在自然决策环境中，本研究提供了证据，证明更大的 IPD 与更小的协商折扣相关。然后，一项涉及多种产品的谈判和购买决策的实验室实验，随机分配 IPD 值，确定 IPD 增加 1 美元会使协商折扣降低 4.7 美分。此外，这种减少的 75% 可归因于参与者发起谈判的可能性降低。在讨价还价的情况下，更高 IPD 带来的收入增长几乎有一半来自于协商价格的提高，这与固定定价不同，后者设置 IPD 的增加仅通过需求变化来影响收入。与固定定价相比，卖家在讨价还价的情况下更愿意设定夸大的广告参考价格。这些发现反过来又会对研究人员、零售商和消费者产生影响。