MAP monitoring
Where an Advertised Price Starts and Where It Stops
A MAP policy needs to name the prices and advertising surfaces it covers. Shelf tags, store signs and cart prices need explicit treatment. A local item-pricing definition cannot settle those choices for every brand.
For a MAP programme, start with the policy’s definition of advertising and the law that applies to the reseller. Name the surfaces your monitoring covers. A price on a shelf, in a campaign or behind a cart gate needs explicit treatment.
New York City’s item-pricing law defines an advertised price for that local law. It refers to promotional methods and includes in-store signs among its examples. That definition does not establish a universal MAP exemption for shelf tags or cart prices. Your counsel needs to review the policy and jurisdiction together.
Surfaces to name in the policy
Flyers and circulars. Record the advertised figure and the issue or distribution date. Check which products and promotions your policy covers.
Public address announcements. Decide how the policy treats prices announced in a store and what evidence your team can retain.
Online ads and email. Include campaign pages and coupons in the review. Record the offer terms as well as the headline price.
Storewide markdowns with signage. Capture the sign and the products it covers. Check whether an approved promotion applies.
Shelf labels and local markdowns
Shelf labels and hang tags. Do not assume these are exempt from your policy. Ask counsel to make the intended treatment clear.
Markdowns shown only on the tag. Record where the price appears and whether another sign promotes it. Preserve that context for review.
A markdown on one rack. Capture the rack sign and any wider promotion. The policy review needs the actual display, not a label such as “local markdown”.
Prices revealed in the cart
Some listings reveal a price only after the shopper adds the product to a cart. Record both views and the steps between them. Check how your policy treats gated prices before calling the offer a violation.
Have counsel review that treatment before enforcement begins. A definition written for your programme does not override the law that applies to a reseller.
Before you write any of this down
We are not lawyers and none of this is legal advice. The answer turns on how your policy is drafted and where your resellers operate. In the US, a manufacturer’s unilateral decision about whom it keeps supplying has been treated differently from an agreement on price. That treatment dates from United States v. Colgate and Co., 250 U.S. 300 (1919). Resale price maintenance has been judged under the rule of reason since Leegin Creative Leather Products v. PSKS, 551 U.S. 877 (2007). Several states are stricter than federal law. Your counsel draws the boundary. We enforce the policy as written, and this is what that involves.
Correction, 23 September 2026: the earlier version treated a local item-pricing definition as a general MAP test. Shelf and cart treatment needs separate review.