History Series / ThePriceIsRight

** Early in the Carey era, some pricing games had vintage cars as a prize, once including a 1964 Bentley.

* HotterAndSexier: The show played heavily into the "sex appeal" of Bob Barker and Barker's Beauties starting in the late 1970s until about 1992. Examples of this include Dian Parkinson's skimpy swimsuits, the models' Bump windups, and Bob's "hundred dollar pocket" routine. The fallout of Bob and Dian's affair, plus a request from CBS to [[TamerAndChaster make the show more "family friendly"]], curtailed this focus significantly.

* DamnYouMuscleMemory: During Drew's first two seasons a good number of contestants still referred to him as "Bob".

** The BigWinSirens were slightly different in the early years. The klaxon itself was originally a separate sound effect that played on top of the regular dings.

* {{Expy}}:
** Goodson-Todman's ''Series/SayWhen'' (1961-64) had two contestants selecting prizes from a pool and trying to not go over a target value. 1975's ''Series/GiveNTake'' had a similar format.
** The most recent Expy was NBC's primetime game ''Series/ItsWorthWhat'', where contestants determine which in a group of antique items (in a series of seven separate games) is most expensive.
** The primary contest on the 1960s ''Series/SupermarketSweep'' had the three housewives (whose husbands did the "Sweep") guessing the prices of grocery items, with the closest guess scoring the added sweep time. (No "without going over" rule patch.)
** The original format of Gas Money was oddly similar to ''Series/DealOrNoDeal'' -- the contestant picked the price they thought was the value of the car, and then revealed the ones thay thought were wrong. After it ended up being quite confusing (mainly due to Drew not exactly explaining the rules too well), the rules were simplified so that the player had to pick the four wrong prices for the car while avoiding the correct one.

** During Barker's run, ''Price'' maintained an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude in regards to its production: the only significant change to the set was a change to its more familiar color scheme (with the green door frames, reddish turntable walls, [[ColorCodedMultiplayer multi-colored]] Contestants' Row, etc.), and all other changes were just progressive tweaks and refurbishments to said set, such as the updated doors of the 90's, and the infamous Hollywood Mural turntable walls. The music remained the same as it ever was, including the Moog theme song and various '70s music cues still being played. Even into the 1990's, pricing games still used manual props or legacy electronics (such as eggcrate, sportstype, and vane displays; some European versions used CRT monitors instead), and they never used computerized graphics until 1996 (when the credits finally switched to Chyron).

** Big Money Week, and ''how''. One game each day is played with its prize cranked UpToEleven, such as Punch-A-Bunch for $250,000, 3 Strikes (for a [[CoolCar Ferrari]] with [[NintendoHard six digits in its price]]), Grand Game for $100,000, Cliff Hangers for $250,000 ($10,000 is deducted for every step the mountain climber travels), and Plinko (with a $100,000 center slot, and later with a '''$200,000''' center slot).

** The announcer role is a bit of an ascended extra. Johnny merely read the copy during the early days, but starting in mid-1974, he began participating in Showcase skits and appearing on-camera regularly, and this continued for many years when Rod took over. The on-camera appearances stopped at the beginning of Season 31, but restarted with Rich not long after Drew took over as host. When George took over, the AscendedExtra nature was turned UpToEleven; he functions more like a co-host than any of the previous announcers, with a lot more off-copy banter with Drew and the contestants. Drew has taken to introducing him on-camera in every episode, and George sometimes participates in the pricing games, modeling the items and holding a price tag, usually during "Most Expensive".

* LaughTrack: Although the show has been "sweetening" the audience reactions from the beginning, it was turned UpToEleven when the show began taping with no audience, then later a small, limited audience, during COVID-19. Canned loops of an audience shouting suggestions, cheering, or groaning are constantly played at a low volume.

** On ''Series/GameshowMarathon'', ''The Price Is Right'' was the opening round of a primetime celebrity tournament spanning across seven game shows. In this case, a variation of the half-hour format (but with the Showcase Showdown still intact) was played, and the winner in the Showcase moved to Finalist's Row. a general rule set much closer to several foreign versions.

** The only "true" celebrity edition (with celebrities actually playing instead of civilians) was the ''Price'' episode of ''Series/GameshowMarathon'', as the opening round of a primetime celebrity tournament spanning across seven game shows. In this case, a variation of the half-hour format (but with the Showcase Showdown still intact) was played, and the winner in the Showcase moved to Finalist's Row. a general rule set much closer to several foreign versions.

** Kind of hard to switch the prices in Switch without saying "Switch"

** The show played heavily into the "sex appeal" of Bob Barker and Barker's Beauties starting in the late 1970s until about 1992, when the fallout of Bob and Dian's affair, plus a request from CBS to make the show more "family friendly", curtailed this focus significantly.

** College students rarely were chosen as contestants. After Bob appeared in the film "Happy Gilmore" and Jonathan Goodson wanted the show to improve their aging demographics, they were picked as contestants much more frequently.

** In recent years, Drew has taken to signing off with "Thank you for spending the hour with us, it has been a blessing", and following the "spay or neuter" tagline with "I love you, bye."

** During Barker's run, ''Price'' maintained an "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" attitude in regards to its production: the only significant change to the set was a change to its more familiar color scheme (with the green door frames, reddish turntable walls, [[ColorCodedMultiplayer multi-colored]] Contestants' Row, etc.), and all other changes were just progressive tweaks and refurbishments to said set, such as the updated doors of the 90's, and the infamous Hollywood Mural turntable walls (which were probably just as tacky as the aforementioned Purple Wheel. Unsurprisingly, both changes were forced on the show by Syd Vinnedge). Even into the 1990's, pricing games still used manual props or legacy electronics (such as eggcrate, sportstype, and vane displays; some European versions used CRT monitors instead), and they never used computerized graphics until 1996 (when the credits finally switched to Chyron).

** In Cover Up, rather than trying to get the price right on the first try, it might be beneficial to leave the first number (or one of the first two numbers) incorrect in hopes of guaranteeing yourself another try and eliminating some of the wrong choices if you get any of the other digits, although you also run the risk of [[EpicFail getting no numbers right on your first guess if you try this trick,]] as happened to at least one contestant over the years.

* EpicFail: Oh, so much.
** Most often, the term is applied by fans during a particularly bad show – usually, one with a mix of poor gameplay by the contestants and poor interaction between the host and contestants. The term is most aptly applied when all six pricing games are lost (not just a smaller prize won, but all six lost outright), followed by a double overbid in the Showcase round; this scenario is referred to as an "El Skunko" by fans.
*** October 28, 2010: Maybe the closest known example of this. Rat Race had a really close 3rd place finish; otherwise the show would have been a ''complete'' washout.
*** November 10, 2010: Besides the [=IUFBs=], not even a triple-digit prize was won. Only two double-digit prizes were won in Bonus Game. A total of only $7,314 was won in the entire hour.
** Any time a contestant loses Cliff Hangers on the first prize.
*** Shouting out “There Goes Fritz” is much worse (if the game was lost and it did) when it turned out to be tragically mistimed for nighttime host Dennis James and model Janice Pennington. In one nighttime syndicated episode in 1976, Dennis called the mountain climber Fritz, unaware that Janice’s husband whose name was Fritz Stammberger had gone missing while mountain climbing during that time. The contestant playing Cliff Hangers had lost the game and Dennis James shouted out “There Goes Fritz”, causing Janice to run off stage, crying for the rest of the episode.
** When a production mistake is discovered to have affected the outcome of a pricing game, the staff awards the contestant the prize(s) by default. March 3, 1989 was a particularly bad day because this happened on ''two'' games. First, a contestant punched a hole in Punch-a-Bunch that didn't have a slip inside and was given the then $10,000 top prize[[note]]The slips for Punch-a-Bunch are kept in place with plywood backing. According to Roger Dobkowitz, the backing was not properly secured that day. The contestant punched with so much force that the slip fell to the floor behind the board[[/note]]. Second, a wrong number was loaded into One Away, and they gave the contestant the car thanks to its impossible setup.
** It is common for a "first four" contestant to not even make it out of Contestant's Row. However, there was one known instance on March 26, 1992, in which ''three'' contestants were stuck for ''the entire show''- every winner came from the first (red) player slot.
** In the Showcase Showdown, any time that a contestant hits five cents on their first spin and one dollar on their ''second''.
** Any time in "3 Strikes" that a contestant strikes out without getting a single number right. Even worse if the contestant draws all three strikes without even drawing a single number (the earliest instances happening on March 18, 1980 and November 14, 1983).
** Any time in "Hole in One (or Two)" that a contestant gets the $500 bonus in the grocery portion, only to whiff on the putt for the car.
** The month of February 2006 had an instance of three consecutive double overbids.
** Plinko is the show's most popular game. Its draw is that the pricing strategy (the small prizes) is secondary to luck (the board itself), and that the pricing portion was usually a mere formality. But...
*** March 26, 1996: A contestant wins all five chips [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dorsMWKuYXc&t=2m23s and promptly drops all five in the $0 slots.]]
*** February 15, 2010: But even that is nothing compared to [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HA_eJUlOKo this playing.]] [[spoiler:(One chip, $0, and the audience '''booed Plinko'''. The subsequent applause and cheering was added in post-production. Luckily for him, he made it to the Showcase and won.)]]
--->[[spoiler:'''Contestant:''' ''[royally pissed]'' Oh, come on!]]
*** June 10, 2011: HistoryRepeats, with Drew [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0YoabsrDvQ commenting]] on how the same exact thing happened to another contestant a year ago. (Drew also correctly predicted that the two contestants would later be following each other on social media).
** March 6, 2007: A contestant playing Grocery Game picked four of Capzasin HP. Well over $21, his total for the first pick added up to '''$56.36'''.
** September 21, 2009 (Season 38 Premiere): On one hand, it introduced [[SceneryPorn a new set]]. On the other hand:
*** The prize copy for Push Over was incorrect, resulting in the prize being given to the contestant on a technicality. The show was otherwise "skunked".
*** A contestant bid $10,000 on a Showcase including two trips and a Toyota Prius, and is off by just over $28,000.
*** The gameplay and copy error would be considered part of a bad show any day, but again, this was a '''season premiere''' episode.
** January 5, 2010: [[http://www.golden-road.net/index.php/topic,13625.0.html This playing of Pick-A-Number]] had the prize package include ten massages "at a spa of [the contestant's] choice" — something that can't reasonably be priced, in a game where the price matters. Making this an even bigger fail was that the three number choices were for the last digit. A contestant was forced to price ''to the exact dollar'' a prize package which included an element whose inherent nature means it doesn't have a set value. [[note]](And yes, this was the same day Amber screwed up Switch? and Drew smashed the yogurt in Hi-Lo.)[[/note]]
** January 11-15, 2010: Of the 30 games played that week, a staggering 27 were lost due to a combination of dumb contestants ($41 on a $15 tote bag in Cliff Hangers?!) and way too many games set up to be lost (Lucky $even's price ending with 9, where most contestants would go with 5). Additionally, no cars were won, not even in the Showcase.
** May 21 and 24-26, 2010 (excludes the weekend): A streak of 16 consecutive game losses, which includes two consecutive "skunked" shows, with one "El Skunko" on May 24.
** October 15, 2012: A contestant plays Any Number and his first three guesses... fill in the piggy bank.
** Among retired games, one oft-cited example of epic failure happened in a game called The Phone Home Game, where the object was for a studio contestant to work with a pre-selected home viewer to match three prices with their respective grocery items to win up to $15,000, which was split between the two players. The home viewer was advised not to give the name of a grocery item or else a turn would be lost. Several times, the home contestant did this once but then, after having the rules clarified, would play the game correctly. However, one particular home viewer – likely very confused over the rules, despite Bob Barker's clarifying it the best he could – gave the names of grocery items '''all three times''' ... and the poor in-studio contestant left with nothing.
** December 20, 2012: Hatea plays Cover Up and his first guess... has no numbers right.
** In general, Season 41 and Pass The Buck. Until June 14, only '''two''' grocery products had been correctly priced, on February 4 and May 30. The playing on February 25 also resulted in a wipeout.
** January 15, 2015: During Most Expensive, George Gray tried to read the prize copy for a treadmill whilst running backwards on it. It didn't work, but he still kept going.
** February 27, 2018: The poor contestant plays Hot Seat and guesses wrong on ''every item'', winning no money. [[ThrowTheDogABone Luckily]], she makes up for it afterwards by spinning a dollar on the Showcase Showdown, the only contestant to do so that episode.
** September 14, 1992: During the 21st season premiere; Clint plays Cliff Hangers (playing for a dinette set) and the watch was the first item he had to guess the price of. He guesses the price of a watch as $350. Actual retail price: $25. The poor mountain climber [[https://youtu.be/8lr1PkqlU7Y?t=1867 never stood a chance]].

** For the 1972 version, the daytime series originally used a "D" designation corresponding to the week number and day of that week — for example, #6543D was the Wednesday show of the 654th week (aired June 10, 1987). Once the show reached week #1000 in May 1996, they switched the "D" to a "K" and went from #9995D to #0011K, skipping a week. Some fans may refer to "K" episodes with their "D" variation in parentheses — e.g., Barker's last show was #4035K (or #14025D). The system after #9995K (projected to air in December 2022) is currently not known.

** Booing contestants who didn't get the wheel all the way around. Bob actively encouraged this during his tenure, but Drew didn't. This tradition ended when the show began taping without an audience during COVID-19.

''The Price is Right'' is a [[Creator/MarkGoodson Goodson-Todman]] GameShow originating in 1956 with Creator/BillCullen as host and directed by Creator/PaulAlter, asking four contestants to look at a prize and guess its actual retail price; whichever contestant got the closest without overbidding won the prize. This format ran in daytime and nighttime on Creator/{{NBC}}, later Creator/{{ABC}}, from 1956-65 (moving to the latter in September 1963). The show was pastiched in a famous episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheFlintstones''.

The more familiar format, with the CatchPhrase "Come on down!", debuted in 1972...but the story of how it got on the air is a bit odd: Goodson planned for a weekly primetime syndicated series and wanted Cullen as host, but those talks fell through at about the end of January. Mark's next choice was Dennis James, who caught his eye upon seeing him fill in on ''Series/LetsMakeADeal''; Goodson and James recorded a pitchfilm on February 16 for the ''New'' show, distributed by Viacom, sharing ideas and concepts that had elements of what was to come.

** For Ten Chances, if the contestant didn't know the zero rule, Bob would chide the audience to help he/she out.
** The discarded blocks in Push Over falling to China and saying hi to the Chinese people eating Chow Mein.
** Booing contestants who didn't get the wheel all the way around.

* AbsenteeActor:
** Original host Bill Cullen took an annual vacation and hosts such as Merv Griffin or Johnny Gilbert would substitute for Bill.
** Bob Barker missed only one taping in December 1974 with back spasms. Then-nighttime host Dennis James filled in for Bob on four daytime episodes that aired during Christmas week. One of these episodes exists on Website/YouTube.

*** One Showcase FramingDevice during Barker's era was notably heavy on the fanservice. "The Reading of the Will" featured one model as a HollywoodNerd, one model as a Creator/DollyParton lookalike, complete with [[GagBoobs a fake chest]] sewed into her dress, and one model as a HospitalHottie in a somewhat NaughtyNurseOutfit.

** Barker's Beauties (Carey doesn't have a nickname for them, although the occasional reference to "Carey's Cuties" will show up). Special mention must be made of the "Classic" Barker's Beauties trio of Janice Pennington, Dian Parkinson, and Holly Hallstrom (which became a quartet when Kathleen Bradley joined in 1990), as well as the "new" classic group of Lanisha Cole, Amber Lancaster, Gwendolyn Osbourne, Manuela Árbelaez, and Rachel Reynolds. Since Carey took over, a few male models have shown up too.

* EarlyBirdCameo: The catch phrase. When ''Price'' moved to ABC, a celebrity was employed to play for people in the audience. When the celebrity called an audience member's name (as per drawn cards), they were told to "come on down" to a waiting area adjacent to the stage.

** On the Cullen show, the models wore nautical outfits with ''extremely'' short skirts whenever a boat was wheeled out as an IUFB. With some of the moving around they did in them, it's a wonder there was no PantyShot.

* PantyShot: The models during some 1980s Showcases, which had them in cheerleader outfits.

** From 1972 to 1987, Bob Barker would sign off with "Bob Barker saying goodbye, everybody!" Starting in 1987, Bob would remind viewers to "Help control the animal population. Have your pets spayed or neutered." On the November 11, 1994, episode, he accidentally began signing off with his ''Series/TruthOrConsequences'' catchphrase, ending up with "Bob Barker saying goodbye, and hoping all your... prices are right!"
** Drew Carey still uses Barker's "spay or neuter" sign off as an homage to him.

** When a production mistake is discovered to have affected the outcome of a pricing game, the staff awards the contestant the prize(s) by default. March 3, 1989 was a particularly bad day because this happened on ''two'' games. First, a contestant punched a hole in Punch-a-Bunch that didn't have a slip inside and was given the then $10,000 top prize[[note]]The slips for Punch-a-Bunch are kept in place with plywood backing. According to Roger Dobkowitz, the backing was not propertly secured that day. The contestant punched with so much force that the slip fell to the floor behind the board[[/note]]. Second, a wrong number was loaded into One Away, and they gave the contestant the car thanks to its impossible setup.

** When a production mistake is discovered to have affected the outcome of a pricing game, the staff awards the contestant the prize(s) by default. March 3, 1989 was a particularly bad day because this happened on ''two'' games. First, a contestant punched a hole in Punch-a-Bunch that didn't have a slip inside and was given the then $10,000 top prize. Second, a wrong number was loaded into One Away, and they gave the contestant the car thanks to its impossible setup.

* SomethingCompletelyDifferent: In 1957, the NBC daytime show tried out a new format. After an IUFB was shown, Bill read the price tag, but it was not the item's correct price. The contestants had to determine whether the correct price was higher or lower than the price Bill read and make their bids accordingly.

* HalloweenEpisode: Beginning with Drew Carey's first season, the show has also done Halloween-themed episodes, including one where Drew, Rich, and the models dressed as props and games (Drew was the Yodely Guy, Rich was the wheel), one where [[SendInTheClones everyone was dressed as and referred to as Drew Carey]] (complete with a CreditsGag of everyone having "Drew" as their first name), one was ''[[Literature/TheWonderfulWizardOfOz The Wizard of Oz]]''-themed (complete with Golden ''Brick'' Road), one was a carnival, and the 2017 edition featured the crew forming a SuperTeam to combat the evil LosingHorns Trombone.

** 2022 had a series of bizarre occurrences throughout the show (many of which catching Drew off-guard): the first item up for bids--a refrigerator--had its shelves and contents fall out as soon as it was opened, a video package for a trip to South Africa had Drew and George's faces edited into its photos, a '''car''' was an item up for bids (conversely, Cliff Hangers was played for a $500 dashcam, with [[UnwinnableJokeGame cheap fuzzy dice, license plate frames, and floor mats as the small prizes]]), martini glasses were destroyed when clinked together, the Push Over blocks were stuck to each other, a ping-pong table prize included 1,008 balls (promptly dumped on the models), the Balance Game prize sack was stuck to the table, someone in a gorilla suit surprised George Gray while demonstrating a tilting platform and VR headset, Drew threw to a break by saying that the show was "only on Creator/{{ABC}}", and It's in the Bag was renamed to just "Bag"--with [[Series/LetsMakeADeal Jonathan Mangum]] revealed to be snacking on the can of beans behind one of the bags (causing Drew to literally drop and break his microphone in shock). The Showcases were relatively normal, besides Mangum and the gorilla making appearances as the "models" for cars in both of them.

** 2022 had a series of bizarre occurrences throughout the show (many of which catching Drew off-guard): the first item up for bids--a refrigerator--had its shelves and contents fall out as soon as it was opened, a video package for a trip to South Africa had Drew and George's faces edited into its photos, a '''car''' was an item up for bids (conversely, Cliff Hangers was played for a $500 dashcam, with [[UnwinnableJokeGame cheap fuzzy dice, license plate frames, and floor mats as the small prizes]]), martini glasses were destroyed when clinked together, the Push Over blocks were stuck to each other, a ping-pong table prize included 1,008 balls (promptly dumped on the models), the Balance Game prize sack was stuck to the table, someone in a gorilla suit surprised George Gray while demonstrating a tilting platform and VR headset, Drew threw to a break by saying that the show as being "only on Creator/{{ABC}}", and It's in the Bag was renamed to just "Bag"--with [[Series/LetsMakeADeal Jonathan Mangum]] revealed to be snacking on one of the grocery items behind one of the bags (causing Drew to literally drop and break his microphone in shock). The Showcases were relatively normal, besides Mangum and the gorilla making appearances as the "models" for cars in both of them.