It’s amazing how wildly prices fluctuate on Amazon

Since I do a significant portion of my shopping online and especially since it’s the holiday season, I’ve noticed the prices on Amazon seem to have a wide swing. I was paying attention to a gaming headset and quite literally saw the price jump from $72 to $42 to $50 to $70 then back to $72 all within the same day. The same thing happened with a DVD box set I wanted. There are three pieces to the collection and the price went up by $10, then down by the same amount. I clicked Refresh a couple of times and got a lower price. And it happened again last night. I checked the price early in the morning and it was $20. I check again several hours later and it’s $15. This morning, it’s back to $20. The prices fluctuate like mad!

That makes computer headphones, DVD and software. I’m not sure if it happens as frequently in other departments, but this is my area of shopping interest.

I guess with so many vendors this sort of thing is to be expected. But it’s actually quite funny. Just because you see a price, is it the right time to buy? It’s like playing with stocks. Will the price go up or down in 30 minutes?

If you haven’t already installed one, I highly suggest one of the Amazon Price Tracker plugins for Firefox. I have the one from Keepa.com and it works very well for me. It gives a nice history of the price fluctuations. You can see if there’s a chance of a price drop coming. Maybe $20 is a good price, but since it was selling for $7 last week, maybe not.

If you’re doing you’re holiday shopping on Amazon, count to 10 before making a purchase, the price might change.