Macy’s Catalog Typo: Reduced Necklace Price From $1500 to $47, Customers Bought En Masse

The Macy’s catalog typo was glaring and big enough to attract attention and well, gasp, at the unbelievably huge discount. The retail giant mailed an advertisement across the country this month with a gigantic pricing mistake. It listed a $1,500 necklace on sale for only $47. The price is less than 10% of its original price.

What’s the other problem with the catalog error? Customers took it seriously and to heart. Numerous Macy’s buyers purchased the item for the erroneous price and bought the entire inventory at the Macy’s in Collin Creek Mall in Dallas, TX according to Robert Bernard.

Bernard actually tried to purchase two of them.

The catalog screams “Super Buy!” according to Bernard who held up the 44-page advertisement Macy’s mailed to him and showed it to WFAA-TV. He said he thought it was quite a deal, perfect as an anniversary gift for his wife, which he was shopping for when he saw the catalog.

The necklace listed is sterling silver with 14-karat-gold. Macy’s said it is regularly priced at $1,500, however the mailer mistakenly listed it at $47.

Bernard did suspect that the mailer might have made a mistake and the pricing untrue. But when he got to the Macy’s at Collin Creek Mall, customers were actually paying the $47 price for the expensive necklace.

The customer in front of him brought every inventory the store had in stock, said Bernard.

The clerk offered to sell Bernard two of the necklaces for $47 and have it shipped to his home. His total savings for the purchase was $1,400, the receipt indicates.

A couple of days later, however, Macy’s left him a voicemail saying:

"This item has the wrong price for $47. The correct price is $479 dollars and because of that pricing error, your order has been canceled and I apologize."

The upsetting thing for Bernard is that Macy’s did not even offer him anything else for the money he spent, but the company said that it would process a refund for him.

“I’m very, very bothered by it because I don’t want anybody else to feel the way I feel,” he shared.

Macy’s apologized for the error Friday afternoon, but didn’t explain how it happened.

"When the mistake was caught, signage did go up in the fine jewelry department and on store doors alerting customers that a mistake had been made," according to Beth Charlton, spokeswoman for Macy's in an e-mail message to News 8. "For those customers who bought the necklace at the $47 price, they were fortunate. For the gentleman you spoke with, he was not so fortunate. We are sincerely sorry he was disappointed and unable to buy the necklace at the $47 price for his wife."

Macy’s could not immediately identify how many of the $1500 necklaces have been sold for the wrong $47 price.