6 years, 8 months ago Mike Moyers
When did you stop shopping there?
Guilty as charged. I’m guilty and you probably are too. Best Buy’s announced store closing on Monday is a direct reflection on the Amazonation of the United States. Or, in this case, is it?
Doing business with local business has always been a “must do” for me. But in the case of Best Buy you have to ask the question; was the business arrangement a two-way street? Was your buying experience worth the trip out there?
I can tell you there were a number of times when I wasn’t sure if the person waiting on me was talking to me--- or the person at the other end of head set he or she was wearing. I sometimes felt like an inconvenient interruption to the person’s day.
More often than not I walked out of Best Buy empty handed and vowing not to go back.
There was a time when the customer actually knew the store owner and members of the staff but those times are long gone. Today, in the wonderful world of franchises, the store manager is most likely someone who’s moved up the corporate ladder and then been coerced to move to a small community like Quincy to manage a store—“until something bigger opens up.” And that’s usually in 24 months or less.
For the record, the 10 years the Quincy Best Buy was here my company, STARadio, made every attempt to do business with Best Buy. They were our primary source for most things electronic until they couldn’t provide the merchandise we needed. We spent more than our fair share at the Best Buy in Quincy.
However, I quit going to Best Buy for a couple of reasons: service and selection. On the business side I once made the 15 minute trip to Best Buy to replace an item I had purchased there about 10 months before, only to learn that they either didn’t stock the item……or didn’t know where it was in the store. The product appeared in their inventory printout, but nobody could find it. I was there for over 45 minutes helping them look before we finally gave up. I ordered the same thing on Amazon, got it in two days and paid less. I was embarrassed for them.
On the personal side I attempted to buy a camera from the local Best Buy only to learn that the only model they had in stock that I wanted was the display model. I offered to purchase that camera, but Best Buy was unwilling to let it go because, “it was the only display model they had.” What?
I drove back to my office and ordered the same camera from Amazon, paid ten dollars less, and had it 2 days later.
And that did it for me. I haven’t been back.
I’ve spoken to a number of people who have shared similar stories. Some even told me that Best Buy employees had recommended they shop with Amazon due to the savings and availability of the product they were looking for rather than purchase it at Best Buy. This while they were standing INSIDE Best Buy. No kidding.
Unless franchises like Best Buy, TGI Fridays, Ruby Tuesdays and others REALLY attempt to make the buying experience a POSITIVE thing we’ll see more store closings here in Quincy.
It’s local first, local second and local third as far as I'm concerned. We’ve got to get back to that philosophy before our society Amazons itself out of existence.
At the same time the corporate world has to realize that communities support businesses that support them. They have to realize that business is a two-way street. Especially here in Quincy.
