I should have posted this long ago. As a former employee, here is an insider's look at the top 5 things from the HT department of Best Buy (where I worked) that I guarantee they do not want their customers to know.
5. Barely legal bait and switch schemes. They push the limits of the laws with many of their flyer ads with some cheap product, like a 40 dollar DVD player to get you in the store, in hopes of encouraging you to buy something better, ie more expensive. That's the salesmen's job under any circumstance, so it doesn't change with these cheapo sales events either.
4. Open box items are usually returned items, not something that just happened to get opened in store, which rarely happens. I've seen many store employees try to avoid saying it was returned, in fear of losing the sale. Also most employees don't take the time to properly label the open box tags so you may think you are getting all accessories when you are not.
3. I've discussed this before, but here is more on this subject. As part of employee training, monster cables are drilled into employee's heads as a part of all applicable sales add ons from day one. In fact it is part of the "Total Solution" mechanism in place that all employess are to follow during their sales routine. Employees are told straight up that monster's products are superior, but never given any detailed reason why this is supposedly so. The employees I witnessed would typically memorize much of the fluff that was written on the package, on their own behalf, as a way to more quickly answer customer questions, preserve "expert" status, and eliminate possible reservations that the customer might have about spending more on something that was already provided in the box. In fact, this was often lied about. Employees don't like telling customers that zipcords come with their dvd player when asked. If they employees are forced into telling a customer, they will be quick to point how poor in quality they are in comparison to monster's products. One manager would actually say "The only thing (the customer) better be using zipcords cords for is to hold their trunk shut after they've just bought something". AR cables and recoton cables are seen as a failure of doing a proper sale at Best Buy and used only as a last ditch effort to get the customer to buy a little something extra. If an employee doesn't ask you "do you want cables, an antenna, blank discs, tapes, etc. with that?" when you are buying an applicable product, then they are simply not doing their job as instructed.
2. Employee know how. There was a recent Home Theater magazine article on the knowledge of Circuit City, Ultimate Electronics, and Best Buy employees. The rag was trying to determine how well each store knew their stuff. I knew what the results of this absolutely retarded article were going to be before I even began reading it, but as a former employee I read it anyway for curiousity's sake. The results, of course, depended on the individual knowledge of the employee that the writers happened to speak to.
Best Buys's policy is for each employee to know as much as they can about the products they sell in their primary area of responsibility. Yet, in order to do so they have to research the product almost entirely on their own time. During slow times throughout the day when you would think an employee could do a little studying, typically this is when the merchandising manager obegins running around being his/her most concerned about the store's cleanliness and the straighntess of the product on the shelves etc., so employees rarely get to know their products that well and also because of the constant product turnover. Also keep in mind when selling something such as a DVD player you can only know so much by looking at the box, the little tag, and the exterior of a product, never once getting a chance to operate its menus or analyse its performance on screen. For these reasons, the most knowledgable of employees are those who are interested in HT, music, etc. for their own personal hobbies and interests and know about these things from the time they spend reading learning, and using them outside of work. Best Buy would rather you think their "friendly experts" are well seasoned and well informed NOT some pimple faced kid, but usually that's exactly what they are. The technical training employees do get is nearly non-existant, and the little that is given is usually in the form of hurried-up computer modules so they can get you back to the sales floor. Also good training starts at the top, and when most employee's superiors know less about the produts than the salespeople do, it's a lost cause from the beginning.
1. PSP. This little acronym stands for Perfomance Service Plan, or better known to most as an extended warranty. It is the single biggest thing harped on by managers to their sales staff to be absolutely certain to sell. coincidentally, it is also one of the most lucrative things that Best Buy sales in terms of pure profit, (cables are up there also). The reason for this is because very rarely do customers take adavantage of the plan., and believe me they know this. If everything is done correctly an employees should try to sell you a PSP on any device which has one, and then the person at the register should also ask you,, though it is the sales persons job to sell it to you. The person at the register merely acts as a vocal reminder. Managers prefer employees to sell their products with PSPs at the register in the department so you can't walk and think alone, since this allows an opportunity for this pressure approach to fail.
The explanations of coverage by the PSP it is often errored, because the specific coverage varies from product to product. This causes a tremendous amount of confusion and often salespeople tell you that something is covered under the plan when in fact it is not. The employee probably doesn't do this consciously, but because the managaers are as confused about the specific coverage as anyone else their is no source for accurate information when making the sale, so employees might embellish when they aren't sure.
The status of a salesmen lives and dies by the ability to sale the PSP along with as many other related products as is possible.The more expensive the product, the more expensive the PSP, and consequently the more important it is for a salesmen to attach one to the sale. If a salesmen sales a big screen television without a PSP you can bet money that the manager is going to be wondering why, and you can bet the employee is going to be trying to avoid the manager for the next few hours. An employee would also be expected to sale cables, a dvd player, a surge supressor, and whatever else seemed logical as a result of answers to strategically asked questions during a big screen sale. This is the idea of the "Total Solution" I spoke of earlier. You didn't think they asked all these questions to be nice did you?, but that's how they try to play it off. Friendly experts with all the answers.
Most employees will probably tell you in private thet they hate selling PSPs because it is a contradiction to th view that the corporate office holds dear. The corporate ideolgy is that of a proper, friendly, non pressured sales approach. Unfortuately this happens only in theory compared with that which actually takes place. In practice, managers ride the asses of employees to sell the PSP. So much so that salespeople are basically forced into being very bullish in their approach to selling them, and that's when an employee is forced to be very "creative" in how they handle the situation, sort of be friendly, but persistant as hell approach.
Well I hope this post was informative, I wish all former employees would call out on their experiences. I think this only helps consumers understand the mendling that goes on behind the scenes.
Peace,
hopjohn
Last edited by hopjohn : 05-14-2004 at 11:19 PM.
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I think it is funny that you mention this. I have not had the misfortune of working at one of these retail stores. However, I was at Circuit City this evening looking for a movie and killing time while the wife was shopping next door at a dept store. I happen to over hear a vunerable customer fall into the hands of some over zealous salesmen. I am not going to ramble out the whole story.. I will say that the customer didn't know much going into the store. So after being convinced on which equipment to buy the salesman lead him to the Monster accessories rack. They went right to the $200 a roll speaker cable and told him this was what he needed to get it all hooked up. (All this for a HTIB)
I desperatly wanted to say something, but after much deliberation I resisted the temptation and went on looking for movies. It makes you wonder how many people get duped on a daily basis..
Another quick story.. I work at a locally owned electronics store. We recently sold a $500 TV and a $110 DVD player to a customer. A week or so later he came back in asking questions on how to connect his stuff with his new Monster Cables. Yep, you guessed it.. He went to Best Buy and the salesman there sold him close to $600 in cables. (I kid you not!) So after his $610 purchase at our store, he spent the same amount he spent on the equipment on the cables. (Power conditioner, high dollar comp video, Svideo, and A/V kits) A Best Buy salesman of the day I bet!
Just as a side comment: I've never worked at a Best Buy but in patronizing them, the management seems as inept as the employees. Once, I returned a DVD player that I had opened, the woman at the register told me I'd have to wait until the manager checked it. The manager was standing there shrink-wrapping some documents and continued to do it for 10-15 minutes while I stood there. Finally he finished, walked over to the box, looked in, and said ok. 15 minutes of waiting for a job that took 2 seconds. That was the height of ignorance.
Just one of many horror stories.
Anyway-
I have worked at Circuit City and they drill the ideal of spending 10% of your total budget on cables (they ONLY carry Monster). Each employee is supposed to have a certain total of his sales in extended warranties (City Advantage) and accessories-usually about 5% or so. That makes it a bit easier working...managers aren't riding your *** about it unless you are just making or lower than your requirements.
Also, Circuit City actually puts their staff through online training about the specific products and technologies they sell. I only worked in the portables, video games, media, and phone sections and I still had a good 5 or 6 hours of training. I think some Circuit City stores are far superior to Best Buy. Unfortunately, they are inconsistent; some are awful.
I would second that about Circuit City. It usually boils down to the luck of the draw in terms of who you end up dealing with in any consumer electronics place. Even boutiques aren't immune to this. Some employees are quite knowledgable, and some are on the verge of falling into a coma for lack of brain activity.
Another quick story.. I work at a locally owned electronics store. We recently sold a $500 TV and a $110 DVD player to a customer. A week or so later he came back in asking questions on how to connect his stuff with his new Monster Cables. Yep, you guessed it.. He went to Best Buy and the salesman there sold him close to $600 in cables. (I kid you not!) So after his $610 purchase at our store, he spent the same amount he spent on the equipment on the cables. (Power conditioner, high dollar comp video, Svideo, and A/V kits) A Best Buy salesman of the day I bet!
I am not trying to be mean here, but him purchasing that dollar amount in cables from someone else is the salesperson's fault. If the customer would have been qualified more extensively, the salesperson may have been able to sell him a $900 TV and a $220 dvd player and an additional $90 in cables and peripherals (which would have made a much bigger difference than the cables he was sold, which were sold to do that purpose). The customer would have been more satisfied with your store and received better equipment in the end. Customers, and people in general, will spend more money than what they tell you they are willing to spend. IF they can be shown the benefits of the superior product and why they may be necessary.
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Annunaki
I agree to some extent. I didn't actually help this customer. So you may be correct in assuming that he would have spent more money. That was not the point of my story. Which was that some customers believe anything they are told. (these people are targeted by dishonest salesmen)
Maybe if the guy at best buy actually cared he would have done a better job helping this guy instead of sticking it to him.
My complaint about both Beast Bum and Circuit $H!!tty are that you cannot get what you want when you are more knowledgable than the sales twerps. If you want to waste money on Monster's top of the line stuff, you cannot get it. If you want plain 12 awg zip wire, you cannot get it. If you want AR's top of the line you cannot get it. But if you want KLH crap they can get it.
I bought both a Sony RDR-GX7 DVD player/recorder and a Sony RCD-W500C CD player/recorder at big blue. I had done my research and knew what I wanted and what my budget was (I'm not comparing these units to other brands, just my research and budget). I walked in and put the boxes in my cart and walked up to the cashier. I tried, with all my military special ops training to avoid the sales people, but dam they're good. I did not make it through the CD racks to the cashier before being accosted about service plans, extended warrenties, cable upgrades, HD TVs (to better view the DVDs on my upcoming purchase). I almost had to get physical to get out of there.
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Hard work has a future payoff. Laziness pays off NOW.
I agree griff. Sorry to go off topic. I do agree that the best buy "experts" set people up with things that they really do not need. I will say however, that if that customer was willing to spend $600 with best buy, he may have been willing to spend it at your store.
__________________
Do you Believe the Truth or Seek it.
Annunaki
Although Best Buy is not the perfect store, they do come in handy for me. I ussually buy things that I really can't afford at the time by using their no interest financing plans. Though I don't buy the psp plan for everything, I actually use it when I do. I faithfully use it with cell phones and Pocket PCs. Because of the fact that something always goes wrong with these types of products I ussually upgrade about once a year and only pay the difference.
This is why web sites such as this are so valuable. You can do all your own research, talk with experts on these forums, and if Best Buy or Circuit City has something you want at a decent price, you can grab it and ignore the sales people. Believe me, one "I know what I want and I'm in a hurry" and most sales people get the message.
Another note, the mass stores are not the only ones that do this. I regularly buy from a home theater store in the Chicago area, and they carry higher quality mainstream brands (Denon, Yamaha, Integra) up to very pricey exotic/boutique brands. Their sales staff is pretty knowledgeable. Yet, they only carry Monster Cable ("only the best"). Every time I buy a component, they try to sell me M-Series Monster interconnects. I did buy a very expensive subwoofer cable and some other expensive interconnects, but I have a Denon 2900 on order, and thanks to audioholics.com, I ordered interconnects from Blue Jean Cable. I'm convinced from my research this will be as good as or better (but probably indistinguishable) from the best Monster product I could have been sold. I have no complaints about Monster Cable, but I think there is a huge mark-up on their producst. BTW, Blue Jean's communication was excellent - product shipped priority mail in less than 24 hours. Thank you audioholics!
Top 5 things Best Buy doesn't want you to know
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