The 4K Puppy Named Tank

The challenges of the modern consumer and Buy Now, Pay Later

This is a true story. To protect the identities of the people involved, names and minor details have been changed. I have been given permission to share this story so others can learn from what happened.

A student stopped by my office to wish me a happy holiday season. Before leaving, she shared what she called “the story of the $4,000 puppy.”

Let’s call her Ariel.

The other day, Ariel and a friend were leaving TJ Maxx when someone said, “Do you want to go pet puppies?” That sentence should probably come with a warning label.

They ended up at Petland. Bright lights. Excited dogs. Staff trained to keep things moving.

Ariel fell in love with a brown lab named Tank.

She called her father.
“He’s so cute. I think I’m going to get him.”

Her father, assuming this was a normal adoption situation, said what most people would say:
“That’s adorable. Get him.”

Tank went home with Ariel.

Then came the question that matters.

“How much was he?”

If you’re guessing a few hundred dollars, you’re using the same reference price most people have in their heads.

Tank cost $4,000.

It gets worse.

Petland didn’t just charge $4,000. To “make it more affordable, they help Ariel finance the purchase”.

When her father asked about the interest rate, Ariel didn’t know. The paperwork didn’t list one. They had to call Petland to get the details.

The interest rate was 27%.

Somewhere during the checkout process, Ariel’s credit was pulled and a payment plan was offered instead of a lump-sum price. Faced with that choice, Ariel selected the installment option.

This isn’t a story about puppies.

If you’re reading this and judging Ariel’s decision-making, you’re missing a much bigger problem developing in our economy.

This is a story about how modern payment systems turn bad decisions into reasonable ones.

Let us dig deeper into the economics of buying a $4,000 brown lab named Tank.

Why This Decision Made Sense in the Moment

Ariel didn’t act irrationally. She acted predictably.

1. Impulse Purchases Are Emotional by Design

No one plans to buy a dog while running errands.

Impulse purchases are most likely when emotion is high and time feels compressed. The longer you pause, the harder it becomes to say no. They are also more likely when you are tired, stressed, or looking for relief. A study found that decision fatigue and cognitive depletion were more likely to cause “choice impulsivity” in participants when they are tired.

Ariel and her friend didn’t go to Petland intending to make a purchase. They went to “pet puppies” to de-stress, which put her in a vulnerable state, making an impulse decision far more likely.

2. Lock-In Makes Walking Away Feel Impossible

Pet stores are designed to trigger emotional attachment first and address price second. Once emotion enters the picture, careful comparison shopping disappears.

Once Ariel said “yes,” the decision no longer felt reversible. Marketers and salespeople intentionally rely on emotions—fear, pride, trust, belonging, curiosity, and hope—to raise the psychological cost of backing out.

In Ariel’s case, she had already bonded with Tank. Walking away wouldn’t have felt like changing her mind; it would have felt like abandoning a dog that now depended on her. Paperwork was underway. Staff were involved. At that point, the decision stopped feeling financial and started feeling moral.

That’s lock-in. And it works.

We see the same dynamic in car and housing markets, where once someone imagines themselves in a vehicle or a home, emotion replaces price as the primary driver of decision-making.

3. No Reference Price Means No Guardrails

Ariel didn’t know what a dog should cost.

Without a reference price, a mental benchmark based on past experience or market information, $500, $2,000, and $4,000 all sound abstract. Economists and marketing researchers have shown that consumers rely on reference prices to judge whether an offer is “normal,” “cheap,” or “expensive.” When people lack reliable reference points, sellers gain pricing power because buyers have no clear standard for comparison.

In everyday markets where prices are transparent (like groceries or flights), shoppers quickly form internal reference prices based on what they’ve seen before. That reference price anchors expectations and moderates willingness to pay.

But in opaque markets, where prices vary widely and sellers don’t disclose clear benchmarks, consumers have nothing to anchor to. That makes it easier for extreme prices to stand unchallenged. Unless buyers have a reference price in mind, they are more likely to accept whatever price is presented. This is why markets with low transparency tend to produce wide price dispersion and outsized markups.

4. Buy Now, Pay Later: Reframed the Decision

Ariel didn’t experience this as spending $4,000.

She experienced it as “manageable payments.” Buy now, pay later doesn’t lower the price; it changes how the brain processes it. Installments shift attention away from the total cost and toward short-term affordability.

Research from the Federal Reserve shows that consumers who use buy now, pay later are more likely to be financially fragile, not because they are careless, but because this payment structure encourages people to evaluate purchases based on payments rather than price.

That framing can turn a bad idea into a responsible-seeming one.

5. Installments Hid the True Cost of Interest

The most important number, the interest rate, was invisible until after the fact.

At 27%, this wasn’t regular financing. It was a high-interest consumer loan attached to an emotional purchase.

If you don’t know the interest rate, you don’t know the price.

The Bottom Line

Ariel didn’t make a careless decision. She made a decision in an environment designed to override good judgment.

Impulse, emotional attachment, missing reference prices, and buy now, pay later financing all worked together to change how the choice felt in the moment. The purchase stopped being about price and became about payments, feelings, and momentum.

This is why financial literacy education matters, and why it has to go beyond budgeting and interest rates. We need to learn how to shop, what questions to ask before we commit, and which psychological pressures are influencing our decisions.

Thanks to Ariel, Tank now has a loving home for this holiday season.

Reader Question: What are your thoughts on Ariel’s experience?