The man walks over, a little confused by the sign. "Did you make a mistake with the sign? It should be the other way around, or it's not a very good sale."

The merchant smiles in response and says "Nope, you saw correct. £1 each, or 3 for £5. It's been getting me a lot of customers, so it must be doing something right."

"But it's completely backwards! ...Let me try to explain another way. I'd like to buy one melon."

"That'll be one pound."

The man hands over a pound and receives his melon. "I'd like to buy a melon."

"That'll be one pound."

The man hands over a pound and receives a second melon. "I'd like to buy a melon."

"That'll be one pound."

The man hands over a pound and receives a third melon, then begins to gesture towards his purchases. "Look, do you see what I just did?"

"Yes, you purchased three melons. No refunds, by the way."

wheres the joke though

He got conned into buying three melons when he didn't need them

The joke is that he sold three melons, so the promotion works.

Probably written by AI.

How fucking dare you. I wrote this myself, thank you very much.

Humor is subjective and even if reading this post doesn't make you laugh, there's probably a way to deliver it that might be more successful. Some of my favorites are more likely to get an eye-roll or a groan but I think they still meet the definition.

This actually works and it's explored by supermarkets all the time, just maybe to so egregiously.

"3 for £5" is a suggestion to the customer to buy three: which actually works on enough people. It's similar to "limit X per person" which implies scarcity and suggests a quantity.

Don't worry, OP. The joke was funny and creative.

Not just 3 either, but multiples of 3. It even misleads some people into thinking they have to buy 3 for the "deal", since some other stores really do the "$x when you buy y" thing.

Over the last decade or so, I've seen stores really pushing buy one get one half-off, BOGOHO, which is of course just "25% off when you buy 2". It's riding the coattails of BOGO and overall is usually a pretty mediocre sale.

Edit: I've also seen BTGO cropping up, which is of course "33% off when you buy 3".

I wouldn't go that far, but it's an unfunny, derivative joke written by a human.

My uncle did this as a kid in alaska in the 60s, sell cups of lemonade 1 for a dime 2 for a quarter.

I specifically look for the "x for y" deals because in my experience, most of the times the fine print specifies that the individual price is also discounted, so no need to buy more just to "save."

Now hold on, it's definitely not written by AI but I've seen this joke (or something very close to it) years and years ago. Retelling jokes is an art in itself that I certainly appreciate, but it doesn't constitute writing them!

I will grant you that this is a good retelling of this one :)

I didn't invent the joke, but I did write my retelling. If you're going to be a pedant, you need to be correct, or you'll end up with three melons you don't need.