The long-standing retail tradition of offering uniform prices to all shoppers is facing new scrutiny as companies experiment with artificial intelligence tools capable of tailoring costs to individual consumers, according to researchers and consumer advocates.
For more than a century, posted price tags have provided predictable expenses for household budgets, a standard traced back to the 1860s when merchant John Wanamaker established fixed pricing in Philadelphia. However, modern dynamic pricing systems powered by AI could replace those uniform tags with individualized costs determined by personal data, location and shopping habits, CBS News reported.
Concerns over individualized costs
Rather than simply adjusting rates based on broad market demand or weather patterns, AI systems can process massive streams of customer data to estimate the highest price an individual shopper might pay. Lindsay Owens, chief executive of the economic think tank Groundwork Collaborative and author of a book on consumer pricing, told CBS News that retail technology is shifting away from pricing products toward pricing individual people.
A 2025 report from Cornerstone Research noted that advanced machine learning models enable corporations to assemble and examine consumer behavior to establish far more granular and individualized rates than previously possible, according to CBS News.
Advocacy groups have already documented early experiments with variable retail pricing. In December, Groundwork and Consumer Reports highlighted an Instacart trial powered by Eversight software, which the grocery delivery company acquired in 2022. The investigation discovered that identical grocery baskets could cost up to 23 percent more depending on the customer, which could create an annual gap of about $1,200 for a four-person household, CBS News reported.
Instacart disputed those findings, telling CBS News that the figure reflected an atypical basket designed with maximum possible differences. The company maintained that it does not rely on protected consumer demographics to set prices, though it announced in December that it would end the practice of allowing merchants to charge varying prices for the same products on its app.
Retailers deny using personal data
Other retail giants face similar questions from consumer groups. In research published this month, Groundwork reported that Walmart filed patent applications for tools such as digital shelf tags that could theoretically adjust prices based on comprehensive customer profiles or the contents of a shopping cart, CBS News reported.
Walmart strongly denied deploying or planning any such technology. Dan Bartlett, the retailer’s executive vice president of corporate affairs, wrote in a response letter this month that the company does not and will not use personal information, income, shopping history or willingness to pay to calculate individual prices. Bartlett also said the company does not implement dynamic pricing based on sudden weather changes or other short-term factors.
Still, academic observers note that retailers have strong incentives to keep algorithmic pricing quiet. Jay Zagorsky, a senior lecturer at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business, told CBS News that merchants gain nothing positive from publicly announcing variable pricing strategies, even as standard fixed price tags become less common across commerce.
Debate over consumer protections
Consumer advocates are now urging government officials to intervene before algorithmic pricing expands further. Owens has called on federal and state lawmakers to pass a set of protections barring surveillance pricing, eliminating unexpected junk fees and ensuring transparent billing up front, according to CNBC. Similar pricing discrepancies have appeared in live entertainment; an experiment conducted with NBC’s “TODAY” program revealed fluctuating fees on StubHub, though the ticketing platform said its tests were randomized and anonymous rather than tied to personal data.
Whether regulators will adopt new restrictions on AI-driven pricing remains uncertain, leaving shoppers to navigate an evolving marketplace where identical items may no longer carry a single price tag.
