• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Did I handle this the wrong way? LONG RANT

#41
As a salesman at a Mom and Pop music store. You were not handled properly by the floor associate and did not deserve to be yelled at but that being said you didn't handle the price negotiations well.

I'm only speaking for myself now but If you are fresh off the street and I've never seen you before, I won't give you a discount. Discounts are given as a loyalty incentive. If you come in the store and buy things, or even just chat me up and are of friendly sort I'll usually give you 10% off the top. That being said some items we just don't have room to move on. Margins are slim for us. The days of full-pop for us are over. We have to compete with online retailers which in many cases leaves us with margins as small as 5%. Always keep that in mind.

Sometimes if your a good customer you can actually get gear at below or at cost. But in my opinion we have the online retailers beat on service. If you buy a product from us not only will we handle the warranty claims for you and in some cases (live-sound usually) even arrange a loaner for you. We'll give free setups and always be available 24/7 to bounce ideas and questions off of. I always give out my personal cell-phone on my business card. Sure, it can be annoying but it builds a relationship with the community that MF and the like can't replicate.
 
#42
It should be a straightforward negotiation. Either the store haggles or they don't. You either pay their price or walk. No emotion required. I always ask for a better price. Sometimes you get one. I just bought an amp from the local music store today (a monopoly on GK - its Canada ay) and paid the inflated price because I could try it in the store and take it home today and MF won't ship it into Canada per the agreement.
 
#43
OP, it sounds like you know the cost of everything and the value of nothing. Going into a music store and saying (in effect) "where's my automatic discount?" and then telling the guy that you can get the bass cheaper online makes you sound like an ass and I don't blame the guy at all for throwing you out. Keep treating your local stores like garbage and pretty soon you will be ordering everything off of MF when your local stores give up because every twerp in town uses them to test drive instruments. Most of them probably don't try to goad the owner into an argument, though.
 
#44
Atoz said:
The OP established that the bass in question was being offered at the MF price, so any haggling would over the amount of sales tax. Let's say that's $100. For me, that $100 buys the following:

(snip)

To me, it's TOTALLY worth the price of the sales tax, for the added peace of mind.
Click to expand...

To me, it's TOTALLY worth the price of sales tax to have repaired roads, fire service, hospitals and schools. I don't spend my life worrying about $10 here or $30 there. If that makes me a chump, so be it. None of the people I know whom act like that, rich or poor, ever seem like basically happy people. If I feel like I don't have enough money (to buy what I want) it's my job to figure out how to make more and not my job to figure out how to get other people to accept less. I buy what I can afford at the places I want to have my money. I don't pay full pop if I don't have to and most places I go seem happy to see me and sell me stuff. It's the happy way, the middle way.

My friend the Piano Dealer once quipped, "No piano sale is ever concluded it seems, until one side is left unhappy. If I make enough to buy new stock, send my kid to college and have enough to retire, someone on the internet will tell him he 'paid too much'. If he gets the price that he believes is 'fair', then I get to go home and wonder how I'll make it another year."

Mugre
 
#45
bolophonic said:
OP, it sounds like you know the cost of everything and the value of nothing. Going into a music store and saying (in effect) "where's my automatic discount?" and then telling the guy that you can get the bass cheaper online makes you sound like an ass and I don't blame the guy at all for throwing you out. Keep treating your local stores like garbage and pretty soon you will be ordering everything off of MF when your local stores give up because every twerp in town uses them to test drive instruments. Most of them probably don't try to goad the owner into an argument, though.
Click to expand...

This.
 
#46
Mugre said:
To me, it's TOTALLY worth the price of sales tax to have repaired roads, fire service, hospitals and schools. I don't spend my life worrying about $10 here or $30 there. If that makes me a chump, so be it. None of the people I know whom act like that, rich or poor, ever seem like basically happy people. If I feel like I don't have enough money (to buy what I want) it's my job to figure out how to make more and not my job to figure out how to get other people to accept less. I buy what I can afford at the places I want to have my money. I don't pay full pop if I don't have to and most places I go seem happy to see me and sell me stuff. It's the happy way, the middle way.

My friend the Piano Dealer once quipped, "No piano sale is ever concluded it seems, until one side is left unhappy. If I make enough to buy new stock, send my kid to college and have enough to retire, someone on the internet will tell him he 'paid too much'. If he gets the price that he believes is 'fair', then I get to go home and wonder how I'll make it another year."

Mugre
Click to expand...

Good post.
 
#47
RotoRick said:
First of all no one cares about his cost. Second this is the future not only with music stores but even big box stores as well, you want to make a sale, match the online price period. Him trying to sell anything at list price is a good indication of someone trying to gouge your eyes out.

Do what I do, I hate brick music stores, they never have what you want, carry mostly bottom shelf stuff and always try to convince you to buy something you don't want.

So in the chance they do have what you want, try it out then order it online and laugh all the way to the bank.
i can't count the number of times a saleman who thinks I don't know anything has told me that his price is the sale price, when infact its list price. The music stores where I live actually match the bigger stores prices and I appreciate that and will do business with them.

But it doesn't cost me 300.00 dollars to drive 100 miles to another store if I have to. I would also guess that if you had bought it there and something was wrong with it the after the sale customer service would have sucked too. He won't be in business long, and that is a good thing.
Click to expand...

Spoken like a true non-gigging, bedroom noodler. Ordering online is great until you have a need for something the day of a show. Then what? Also: I care about businesses in my community staying afloat. Otherwise, you have a town full of empty stores and unemployed neighbors.

Mugre said:
To me, it's TOTALLY worth the price of sales tax to have repaired roads, fire service, hospitals and schools. I don't spend my life worrying about $10 here or $30 there. If that makes me a chump, so be it. None of the people I know whom act like that, rich or poor, ever seem like basically happy people. If I feel like I don't have enough money (to buy what I want) it's my job to figure out how to make more and not my job to figure out how to get other people to accept less. I buy what I can afford at the places I want to have my money. I don't pay full pop if I don't have to and most places I go seem happy to see me and sell me stuff. It's the happy way, the middle way.

My friend the Piano Dealer once quipped, "No piano sale is ever concluded it seems, until one side is left unhappy. If I make enough to buy new stock, send my kid to college and have enough to retire, someone on the internet will tell him he 'paid too much'. If he gets the price that he believes is 'fair', then I get to go home and wonder how I'll make it another year."

Mugre
Click to expand...

Sums it up perfectly.
 
#48
RotoRick said:
First of all no one cares about his cost. Second this is the future not only with music stores but even big box stores as well, you want to make a sale, match the online price period. Him trying to sell anything at list price is a good indication of someone trying to gouge your eyes out.

Do what I do, I hate brick music stores, they never have what you want, carry mostly bottom shelf stuff and always try to convince you to buy something you don't want.

So in the chance they do have what you want, try it out then order it online and laugh all the way to the bank.
i can't count the number of times a saleman who thinks I don't know anything has told me that his price is the sale price, when infact its list price. The music stores where I live actually match the bigger stores prices and I appreciate that and will do business with them.

But it doesn't cost me 300.00 dollars to drive 100 miles to another store if I have to. I would also guess that if you had bought it there and something was wrong with it the after the sale customer service would have sucked too. He won't be in business long, and that is a good thing.
Click to expand...

Well I would think that his cost is a pretty big factor in this whole decision, also he already matched the online price... what more was he supposed to do to provide "incentive" to this guy?

You need to go pretty far off the beaten path to even see something priced at list price in my neck of the woods, I imagine it is like that everywhere in this day and age.

As I said, this guy has to deal with a bunch of lookey-loos who come in, grease up his inventory, waste his employees time, and his money. He spends money just to let people like you wander in, try stuff out, and then support someplace else because you're too attached to your $100 to support a neighbour.

When your local music stores shut down, remember to "laugh all the way to the bank"...
 
#50
I'm very wary of buying anything online. If it's new, sure, it probably has a warranty but then you have to pay for shipping to get it serviced and wait longer for the shipping to happen. I want to physically see and get my hands around an instrument before I decide to part with my hard earned cash. I have bought stuff online when the price was right, but I feel much more comfortable buying from a brick and mortar, to be sure.
 
#52
Just a FYI all states that I know of require you to pay sales tax on internet purchases - you are supposed to pay it yourself if the "store" didn't collect it. So telling the shop owner that you were planning on commiting a tax crime by not doing so and that because of that he should pay the sales tax for you if he wanted the sale seems a bit low, no? I'd tell you to GTFO too...
 
#53
RotoRick said:
First of all no one cares about his cost. Second this is the future not only with music stores but even big box stores as well, you want to make a sale, match the online price period. Him trying to sell anything at list price is a good indication of someone trying to gouge your eyes out.

Do what I do, I hate brick music stores, they never have what you want, carry mostly bottom shelf stuff and always try to convince you to buy something you don't want.

So in the chance they do have what you want, try it out then order it online and laugh all the way to the bank.
Click to expand...

Spoken like a true d-bag.

And when you've run all the brick and mortar stores out of business, don't complain that you can't try anything out before you buy.
 
#55
Okay, so OP is a tough customer. People who work in retail are supposed to be good at working with tough customers. Customers can't all be creampuffs who will stand there all day waiting for a clerk to pull a guitar off the rack, and they can't all be people who will pay any price for an item without question.

What's interesting about this story is, whenever there is a MF/GC thread, there are always the voices becrying how the big box store is ruining brick and mortar, the cries of "shop local, think of poor mom and pop, save the local economy." Well, too bad "local economy," if I have to deal with jackass music store clerks, I'm sitting at home in my underwear with a beer and clicking the send button for my internet order.

And say what you want about Guitar Centers, but I can at least pull a guitar down (unless it's a multi-thousand dollar specimen) and try it without a permit. Help is usually a lot easier to find as well.

I do find that the attitudes are far worse in the small brick and mortar local shops.
 
#56
We had a really nice brick and mortar boutique guitar store very close to my house, but they went out of business. It is now an Internet Sweepstakes joint. The guy would have been way more successful in a better location. It was so inconvenient somehow to get there, even though he was closer than Guitar Center.
 
#57
bolophonic said:
Spoken like a true non-gigging, bedroom noodler. Ordering online is great until you have a need for something the day of a show. Then what? Also: I care about businesses in my community staying afloat. Otherwise, you have a town full of empty stores and unemployed neighbors.



Sums it up perfectly.
Click to expand...

And what makes you think when you need something the day of the show you'll find it at your local store, they never have anything you want, always have to order everything. Case in point, went to my local store to buy some new rotosounds, sorry have to order them, ok how long ? Two weeks they should be here, nevermind I can have them at my house in 2 days.

The only thing I would buy at the brick store would be the bass for obvious reasons, but for amps or anything else, nope I can have it in 2 days or less. Hard to find a good bass in a brick store unless you love 200.00 Ibanez.

Like I said in my earlier post some local stores are cool to deal with, but the ones who tag everything at list price and won't deal, who needs them.

Trust me on this, buy something from the hard a$$ and see how good his customer service is when you have to bring it back, remember his profit margin is real low, can't have you bringing something in for repairs or especially warranty work.
 
#58
okay okay,

I see where this is has gone. I, for one, was not looking to beat up on the OP. While only having his side, I'm certain there was a bit of that "old time guitar store" chicanery going on...classic "be with you in a minute" etc.

And obviously, someone fellas, like RotoRick have had a bad experience, or live in an area with poor selection.

Yet, time and again...every freakin' musician I know...who knows how I roll with gear, are in absolute awe over how I can get classic gear at the prices...
I've built relationships with stores in my area...and I mean, statewide-area.
When I was younger, sure I got brushed off. And I definitely boycotted bad stores.
But I'd poke my head into other shops, say hello...ask about items, maybe leave a request list.

After awhile [geez, do I sound like uncle vic? badabing badaboom] these guys are calling me up everytime something cool comes in. Something vintage. Something odd.

I tried this with the new GC that opened over the summer...worked for about a month. The manager pulled me aside, and said..."I don't feel comfortable...I asked my district head". That's corporate stores for ya. I'm buying gear. I'm a customer. With a list by your register, and in back at receiving. Besides, GC only has whatever they're supposed to be pushing this season, and random used pieces in pawn shop conditions.
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back