Best Buy Is Thriving in the Age of Amazon

Post by octorian » Thu, Jul 19, 2018, 4:03 PM UTC

mikec3010 wrote: post #162

LyndsySimon wrote: post #51

This is rather off-topic, but the only thing that saddens me about Best Buy is that it just doesn't feel the same walking in as it used to. I remember when I got my first job, at age 14, in 1998. I cut, baled, loaded, hauled, and stacked hay in a barn for a local farmer. It was extremely hot and tiring work for an overweight geek, but it paid better than anything else I could have gotten at that age - I was paid by t…

We're the same age and this was exactly how I felt going to CompUSA in the late 90s. My first big purchase was spending $85 on a 32mb SIMM module for my Pentium 1 system (maybe it was 2 16mb, I can't remember if they needed to be installed in pairs, maybe that was only ECC?). I would ogle the DVD burners and SCSI cards but couldn't afford either.

Post by scarface74 » Thu, Jul 19, 2018, 4:07 PM UTC

RoyTyrell wrote: post #163

scarface74 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would never buy a laptop from Best Buy, Amazon, or any other third party retailer. Consumer PC laptops are like most Android phones -- full of third party crapware. I only buy either the business line of laptops from Dell or HP or I'll buy from the Microsoft Store - either online or physical store.

I bought a MS Surface Pro a couple months back and they load it up full of "crapware" too. Thee are numerous games with constant pop-ups indicating what a deal I'll be getting if I only spend $99.95 for credits to keep playing, as well as the trial versions of MS Office that expire after 30 days.

Post by npongratz » Thu, Jul 19, 2018, 4:09 PM UTC

prepend wrote: post #157

bachmeier wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hate to be that guy, but I have Amazon Prime in my household because my wife uses it just enough to be worthwhile. She makes only a small percentage of her purchases there, and the others in our household make none. The 43% figure is more relevant, and that's 43% of a relatively small share of all consumer spending, with much of it being done by a small group of large Amazon customers. So I don't think it's accurate…

Amazon’s US retail revenue was $318B for 2017 [0]. There are 126M households in the US in census’ 2017 data [1]. Thats $2,500/household. That’s definitely a shitload bought by most people. Comically shitloads are pretty cheap and are $210/ton (a big pickup kid) if you’re in New Hampshire [2]. So pedantically, we’re all buying 10 shitloads. [0] https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/15/amazons-us-sales-to-match-wa... [1] https:…

Post by sonnyblarney » Thu, Jul 19, 2018, 4:12 PM UTC

superflyguy wrote: post #176

reaperducer wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Visa/MC/Amex will literally sell your transaction data to almost anyone There was an article linked on HN last year which indicated that Google gets 80% of all card transactions. My guess is that it's more by now.

"gets"? You mean processes? Or obtains, like from buying the information, reading emails etc?

Post by misterbwong » Thu, Jul 19, 2018, 4:15 PM UTC

kop316 wrote: post #10

I can't speak for the Geek Squad (as I have never needed to use them), but they price match to Amazon (and several other online stores), and will generally have what I am looking for (at least for consumer electronics). I know that I will get it that day (vs. Amazon's "two day shipping" that regularly turned into three or four days) at an Amazon price, it will certainly NOT be a counterfeit, and I don't have to give…