These days I do all of my shopping online. And so when I wanted to get a TV for my new home, I went online. During the previous month when I had gone grocery shopping to Costco, I had noticed and noted the prices of TV's in general. And so I had a minor shock when I realized that not only were the online offers not significantly cheaper as in most other items, they seemed to be more expensive.
And so I decided to do a combination of online and offline shopping. After extensive research which lasted a full 5 minutes, I narrowed down my offline shopping to Best Buy and Costco. The goal for today was to have a working TV. I already had the cable connection even before moving in, since I needed internet and the most cost effective package was the heavily advertised Optimum Triple Play, which consisted of the Cable and Telephone in addition to the Internet. Strangely enough even though I don't intend to use the telephone, it just works out cheaper to have it, than not to have it. Strange and stupid, but true.
We started with Best Buy and they had a huge collection of TV's. All shapes and sizes and brands. And they were quite attractively priced. We narrowed our choice to a Samsung 50". And then set off to compare with Costco. As we were driving towards Costco, we saw a shop, "PC Richards". Frank, who was with me, mentioned that maybe we should check it out. And since we had a full Sunday ahead of us, we decided that we had nothing to lose. And so I entered PC Richards for the very first time.
At the entrance, there was a 60" Panasonic TV with a sound bar system for just over $1,000. The Samsung 50" system we had liked was around $1,500. And now we were suddenly interested. We browsed some more and found several interesting deals. By now, I had started looking at the 60" TVs. Too big for my place, but I was beginning to get hooked. And the we saw the Bose sound-bar. Compared to the other music systems, it seemed to be in a class of its own. I was in love. But when we added all of the various items, including the 5 year support, it was adding up to a list price of over $7,000 and a discounted price of $5,000. My budget when I walked in was under $2,000. And so we decided to check out Costco.
At Costco, the pricing seemed to be at par with Best Buy. Interestingly what all of the retailers seemed to have done is have slightly different models from each other. And although the same brands were available, the models were different. And so it was not easy to compare exact pricing. By now, we were convinced that PC Richards was the place we were going to buy the TV.
And so back we went. We sought out the salesman Ahmed, who we had interacted with in the morning. He was very good. Knowledgeable and helpful, but not pushy. He had mentioned that once we made up our mind, he may be able to get his Manager to get a further discount. And that's when we decided to try our luck. I really liked the 60" Samsung 3D Smart TV with all of its cool features, including the camera, Skype, Netflix, ... Along with the Bose soundbar and wireless woofer. And a 3D DVD player. And 5 years warranties for each of them. And since we were getting a hi-fi system, we needed hi-fi HDMI cables. The discounted total for this was around $5,200. We asked Ahmed to see what he could do. I really did not want to spend so much money, so had decided that if it was any number that started with 4 or more, I would settle for a smaller TV and a not so awesome sound system. With a regular DVD player.
Ahmed came back with a number. It was the best he and his manager could do. It was $4,200. I was shocked. It was an unbelievably good deal. But I had drawn a line. At $4,000. And was unwilling to cross it. Ahmed said that maybe his Manager could help. So he got him. I spoke with him and was upfront about my problem. I had a line and wasn't willing to cross it. If he could help, great. Else I liked his store and so would pick something else. He sensed that we were genuine. He got on the phone. Spoke to his seniors at HQ and came up with $3,999.97. Unbelievable. But I was thrilled. And ended up spending twice as much as I had set out to.
In the meanwhile Frank, decided to present me with a Monster Power Cleaning system on which they gave him a great deal too. We walked out with the system and were thrilled with the human touch. As I walked out, I thanked Ahmed and his Manager and made a comment that I meant, "This is the first time I've visited PC Richard, but it certainly won't be the last."
Back home, we setup everything and watched our first movie, "Casino Royale", and were fast asleep before 007 could use his license to kill.
And so I decided to do a combination of online and offline shopping. After extensive research which lasted a full 5 minutes, I narrowed down my offline shopping to Best Buy and Costco. The goal for today was to have a working TV. I already had the cable connection even before moving in, since I needed internet and the most cost effective package was the heavily advertised Optimum Triple Play, which consisted of the Cable and Telephone in addition to the Internet. Strangely enough even though I don't intend to use the telephone, it just works out cheaper to have it, than not to have it. Strange and stupid, but true.
We started with Best Buy and they had a huge collection of TV's. All shapes and sizes and brands. And they were quite attractively priced. We narrowed our choice to a Samsung 50". And then set off to compare with Costco. As we were driving towards Costco, we saw a shop, "PC Richards". Frank, who was with me, mentioned that maybe we should check it out. And since we had a full Sunday ahead of us, we decided that we had nothing to lose. And so I entered PC Richards for the very first time.
At the entrance, there was a 60" Panasonic TV with a sound bar system for just over $1,000. The Samsung 50" system we had liked was around $1,500. And now we were suddenly interested. We browsed some more and found several interesting deals. By now, I had started looking at the 60" TVs. Too big for my place, but I was beginning to get hooked. And the we saw the Bose sound-bar. Compared to the other music systems, it seemed to be in a class of its own. I was in love. But when we added all of the various items, including the 5 year support, it was adding up to a list price of over $7,000 and a discounted price of $5,000. My budget when I walked in was under $2,000. And so we decided to check out Costco.
At Costco, the pricing seemed to be at par with Best Buy. Interestingly what all of the retailers seemed to have done is have slightly different models from each other. And although the same brands were available, the models were different. And so it was not easy to compare exact pricing. By now, we were convinced that PC Richards was the place we were going to buy the TV.
And so back we went. We sought out the salesman Ahmed, who we had interacted with in the morning. He was very good. Knowledgeable and helpful, but not pushy. He had mentioned that once we made up our mind, he may be able to get his Manager to get a further discount. And that's when we decided to try our luck. I really liked the 60" Samsung 3D Smart TV with all of its cool features, including the camera, Skype, Netflix, ... Along with the Bose soundbar and wireless woofer. And a 3D DVD player. And 5 years warranties for each of them. And since we were getting a hi-fi system, we needed hi-fi HDMI cables. The discounted total for this was around $5,200. We asked Ahmed to see what he could do. I really did not want to spend so much money, so had decided that if it was any number that started with 4 or more, I would settle for a smaller TV and a not so awesome sound system. With a regular DVD player.
Ahmed came back with a number. It was the best he and his manager could do. It was $4,200. I was shocked. It was an unbelievably good deal. But I had drawn a line. At $4,000. And was unwilling to cross it. Ahmed said that maybe his Manager could help. So he got him. I spoke with him and was upfront about my problem. I had a line and wasn't willing to cross it. If he could help, great. Else I liked his store and so would pick something else. He sensed that we were genuine. He got on the phone. Spoke to his seniors at HQ and came up with $3,999.97. Unbelievable. But I was thrilled. And ended up spending twice as much as I had set out to.
In the meanwhile Frank, decided to present me with a Monster Power Cleaning system on which they gave him a great deal too. We walked out with the system and were thrilled with the human touch. As I walked out, I thanked Ahmed and his Manager and made a comment that I meant, "This is the first time I've visited PC Richard, but it certainly won't be the last."
Back home, we setup everything and watched our first movie, "Casino Royale", and were fast asleep before 007 could use his license to kill.
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