Thursday 11 August 2011

Another letter from America

Well Day 2 presented an interesting dilemma. It seems that this weekend (Friday, Saturday and Sunday - today is Thursday) the State of Florida waives it's sales tax on items needed by those returning to school. Subject to some maximums items such as stationery, clothes, shoes, briefcases, etc. qualify. This helps anyone buying those items not just students or their parents and does include tourists - hence the dilemma faced by my squad of consumer commandos (wife, daughter and niece) - to shop or to wait? In the end they performed a recce of one of the big outlet centres, but have held their money until tomorrow.

What was interesting about this, and you can figure this out, us that according to the local TV station hunting vests, both male and female, qualify for the saving. So how many schools run classes in hunting?

The other thing that caught my attention was when a good looking, young lady (yes, it is pertinent) came in off the street and asked to talk to the manager of a golf shop we were visiting. I didn't catch the whole conversation, but subsequent comments between staff members suggest I have the gist. It seems like she was promoting a website for golfers where one could arrange for a golfing partner. It seems all staff were young and female, this could be checked online, but there was no comment on handicapping!

This seems to be something that Tiger Woods could sponsor, but I seem to think the "business model" (sic) has been used before. I have to say "only in America", but then again maybe not.

I don't think this shop took this service up, referring the young lady to some department called "Corporate Affairs" (sic). That somehow seems so appropriate.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Orlando, Florida

1 comment:

  1. Ian, as a non-US national you can actually purchase exempt of sales tax *all the time* in most of the large department stores. You just have to ask them to give you a certificate which you then show at the airport before leaving the country, and all sales tax will be refunded to whatever credit card you used...

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