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Marcus wrote:

I like Best Buy better. I find things to be cheaper. The circuit city is really low lit and dark. The set up of the store is weird, like a circle.
Best Buy is brighter and better.

I've noticed the same about the brightness levels of the two stores.  But since BB is 30-40 minutes away, I usually end up at CC.

I haven't had too many problems with the staff at either store, but I don't rely on them for product advice.  I usually do my comparison shopping and research online, so by the time I get to the store I usually know exactly what I'm looking for.

Tweeter is good for the high end stuff that won't explode in a year.
The guys at my local Tweeter store are way more knowledgeable than the pimpled geeks at the other two chains. Also, Tweeter sells Monster cable for high end equipment, not 5' 1/8" cables. I do think it's lame that the guy said it didn't exist though. What a bonehead.

What was that cable for anyhow? Never needed one of those before.

Last edited by Grumpy (2005-09-13 2:25 pm)

There are no BBs or CCs around where I live, so I'll just say what I think about futureshop, which is owned by BB.
They are a bunch of warranty pushing, difficult, crooks. They make it impossible to return things, they give you a horrible look if you don't buy the warranty. And, in one case, they were selling RAM for 100$ more than another store which was selling it for 70 CAD. (it was a Kingston PC3200 512MB chip). Anyways now I do all my shopping at a small chain called Microbytes. They have amazing prices, they're knowledgable and helpful. By amazing prices I mean that I would be hard pressed to find things on ebay for less.

Grumpy wrote:

Tweeter is good for the high end stuff that won't explode in a year.
The guys at my local Tweeter store are way more knowledgeable than the pimpled geeks at the other two chains. Also, Tweeter sells Monster cable for high end equipment, not 5' 1/8" cables. I do think it's lame that that guy said it didn't exist though. What a bonehead.

What was that cable for anyhow? Never needed one of those before.

Express only gets a signal on the side of the room opposite my speakers.

Best Buy. They do have a better look and cleaner feel. And you're right about the randomly placed registers at CC. Though it seems that every department has one. Which I don't think is bad. If I only want a game, why should I have to wait in the normal line when I can just check out in the game section then head out the door.

Anyways, I bought my TiVo at CC though.

I don't care really. I shop wherever has the deal I want at the time. And I agree about rebates. God I hate them. Maybe I don't know enough about how a rebate works, but I really wish they could just give you the money off the price then and there instead of making you send for money that'll take months to arrive.

I've hated Best Buy since a clown there refused to sell me some RAM after finding out I was going to put it in a Mac. "We don't sell Mac RAM," he said. I told him I knew what I needed, and it would work fine, but he wouldn't budge. He just insisted that they don't sell Mac RAM. Idiot.

I worked at Best Buy for a few months last year... a bit of advice for you:
Don't take the "free" magazines. They aren't free... they fired me for not selling them because I insisted that they were cheating the customer.
If the plan is cheap enough, take it. It will pay off, especially if you buy a hunk of junk, or if you're accident prone... if you're scared something might happen, even if there is a small chance, take the plan. They'll replace it.
Most people I've known to work at Best Buys have been jerks, with a few nice people in between. I really hated working there, and yeah, it was mostly college students trying to get discounts. The discount is good... you get wholesale pricing for working there.
Either way, both aren't very good stores.. Circuit City has always had bad customer service, while Best Buy tries to help you out and just end up pissing you off in the process. Choose the lesser of two evils.

I've only bought two things from CC and I've returned both of them. A MP3 player that I couldn't get to work in MacOS9, and Star Wars Wireless Xbox controller that really sucked (no matter how much I wanted to love it).

Neither are hardly their fault, and they refunded me for both without a problem.
I don't know if BB has that good of a return policy.

Last edited by B.S. (2005-09-13 11:23 am)

fingerjello wrote:

I don't shop at either because I'm sick of every damn thing with a price tag that says "after rebate"

you don't have to worry about seeing that at an apple store, that's for sure 

General_K wrote:

In the course of about twenty minutes one time, I must have been approached by no less than six employees, asking if I needed help finding anything. I dunno, maybe I just look a bit shifty, and they're watching me.

That's not it at all. They are all just told to do that. Like you said, it's better if you have too much help available, than none at all.

Most of the regular employees aren't really looking out too much for shifty people, unless someone specifically tell them too.

B.S. wrote:

Sucks for those employees, though.
What if some dude's girl just died a week ago and he has to get back to work at BestBuy to pay the rent but doesn't really feel chipper or want to deal with every other idiot's problems every two minutes and just wants to stock the DVD's and go home.

Yes, it is terrible when employers expect their employees to adhere to their job description and not to some other job description.

nannyandnutro wrote:

Jasoco wrote:

I don't care really. I shop wherever has the deal I want at the time. And I agree about rebates. God I hate them. Maybe I don't know enough about how a rebate works, but I really wish they could just give you the money off the price then and there instead of making you send for money that'll take months to arrive.

Because as many as 2/3 of people never send them in.

...and they get to collect marketing information

I usually consider my personal information worth more than what they're willing to "pay" me, but I know not everyone feels that way.

B.S. wrote:

Sucks for those employees, though.
What if some dude's girl just died a week ago and he has to get back to work at BestBuy to pay the rent but doesn't really feel chipper or want to deal with every other idiot's problems every two minutes and just wants to stock the DVD's and go home.

Err... 'k.

Then he wouldn't get a job where he's expected to work with the public.

Sales is like acting. Even if you don't care about the customer's problems, you never let them know it. NEVER. You at least let on that you do, and hopefully solving that problem results in a sale. A happy customer. A nice commission.