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Price-fixing or MSRP, what's the difference?

Posted by Jay (A) on March 25, 2007 at 12:41:25

I understand that high-end audio MSRP is commonly enforced by terms of the franchise agreement between manufacturer and retailer. Is the price-fixing case cited below in any way relevant to high-end audio's MSRP?

Newswire excerpts:

High Court Takes Up Price-Fixing Case
Sunday March 25, 10:58 AM EDT
WASHINGTON (AP) — When a family-owned retailer in Texas lowered prices on women's fashion accessories, the manufacturer cut off the store's supply. Phil and Kay Smith sued and won in a case now before the Supreme Court that asks whether price-fixing always is illegal. Arguments before the justices were scheduled for Monday.
The manufacturer, Leegin Creative Leather Products Inc. in City of Industry, Calif., is challenging a 1911 Supreme Court ruling that automatically classifies agreements to set minimum prices as anticompetitive.
Leegin says that by maintaining price consistency among niche retailers it sells to, stores can offer improved customer service. That, says the manufacturer, enables smaller stores to compete against rival brands sold by bigger cut-rate competitors.
At issue is whether price floors such as Leegin's always should be treated as illegal or evaluated case by case to see if they are pro-competitive.

. . . . .
"In the Internet age, this is a dagger at the heart of the most consumer-friendly environment we've seen in generations," said Mark Cooper, a spokesman for the Consumer Federation of America.
"Would there ever have been a Sears & Roebuck, an A&P, a Walgreens, a Kmart or a Wal-Mart" absent a ban on minimum pricing agreements? the federation asked in court papers filed in support of Kay's Kloset.
In Leegin v. Kay's Kloset, the Bush administration says it is inappropriate to automatically prohibit price floor agreements when they are not necessarily anticompetitive.
Thirty-seven state attorneys general oppose the administration.
. . . . .

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