gibbergibber - 6:30 pm on Aug 10, 2007 (gmt 0)

This is very odd indeed. America is supposed to be the world's champion of the free market, but this ruling goes against that.

A retailer should be allowed to use whatever strategy they think is appropriate to sell goods, including pricing appropriate to their customers. Manufacturers shouldn't have the power to interfere in that.

--A gut reaction might be to think this is not in the consumers interest, however experience has shown that large corporations use loss-leaders (selling at bwlow cost price) as a technique for closing down the competition, and then can charge what they like.--

But if they close down the competition, that will drive prices up in the long term, not down.

The more competition you have, the lower the prices and the higher the quality. Competition has to be protected above all else if you want the consumer to benefit.