by
Rusty » Thu May 29, 2008 4:51 pm
stevea wrote: Hi Reka,
...CC's employees (once again, my store only) were uniformly dull-witted and non-interested.
Gee, I wonder if that may possibly have anything to do with last week's announcements by Circuit City - $$ losses, financial belt tightening, closing hundreds of stores nationwide, back to basics?
I have always found CC employees to be reasonably helpful if asking a PC-related or music-related question; totally out of their element on photography. I like having Bust Buy and Circuit City around because I don't have to waste time shopping. My local, full-service camera store knows what's going on.
When I buy something at the camera store that is carried by CC or BB, the price tends to be slightly more -- but not enough to bother me. If I'm buying "real camera stuff", the price will be more than B&H or Calumet of Adorama but, guess what, it's more by about exactly the S&H added on by the mail-order houses. The smart local guys know their competition isn't just across town; they either offer price and service to compete, or they don't survive.
I wanted a SB-600 flash to give my son for Christmas. This local store was out of stock and had no idea when he would have more. He picked up the phone and called his biggest competitor across town to ask if they had any -- no luck. He then called Chicago and determined that Calumet, a big mail-order competitor still had eighteen in stock (exact same price as he sold them for + s&h), he handed me the phone, I placed an order on the spot and had my flash 3 days later.
Now, that's customer service. And why I will always try to do business at that store first.Rusty