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"I explained that I'd like to buy an iPad, and he went off to get one, or so I assumed. Wrong, he got another employee, who asked us some more questions, and then sent another employee over to help us - still no ipad"
You know that Best Buy has to follow Apple's rules regarding the sale of Apple products in Best Buy, right? You have to work with their specially trained Apple employee and follow a whole bunch of ridiculous protocols. You can't just go into an Apple store and buy a laptop or tablet. You have to tell the Apple Nerd what you want to use it for, and they will "select the device that is right for you". There are actually stories all over about Apple stores refusing to sell product to people based on this protocol.
The Best Buy employees were probably trying to convince you to buy a real piece of computer hardware (like an Asus Transformer Prime) rather than overpaying for a piece of junk Apple product with specs that are outdated by years.
I particularly enjoyed the utterly moronic person quoted in the article whining about Best Buy, when the actual problem was his own stupidity. I don't think he even knew that Best Buy doesn't have "defective merchandice [sic]" as Best Buy is a retail platform, not a vendor. The fact that Best Buy offers to warranty products produced by companies they have no control over is nothing short of miraculous. Not to mention that if "their products" actually broke as often as the whiny poster said, Best Buy would be broke from losing money on their warranty programs.
Finally, the obvious troll came full circle by claiming that Best Buy's model was to have low prices and hidden fees. It is no ones fault but your own that you are bad at math and lazy so you bought their Geek Squad service. On top of that, Best Buy actually prices high, usually 40%+ higher than Amazon. They will match any price online, given that it is by an actual company and not a random person hosting through Amazon.
Since I hate paying for shipping or waiting for product to ship, I find what I want to buy on Amazon, go into Best Buy and see what they have it priced at, and request a price match if there is a difference between the two. They give the price match 100% of the time and I don't have to wait 1-5 days for my product to arrive from Amazon.
Now... this model will never last if everyone does what I do at Best Buy. They'll go out of business because their overhead is far greater than Amazon's. We need to do everything we can to support Best Buy because otherwise there will be no way to look at electronics in person before buying them. Office Max and Office Depot suck in comparison, and Circuit City, CompUSA and many others have already bitten the bullet.
I've never had a problem with Target and I shop there every week for necessities. Good prices, good store layout, easy returns, good customer service.
Best Buy on the other hand . . just this weekend I went in a Best Buy with my wife as she wanted to buy a discounted iPad2 and we had been in a store next door. After finally getting an employees attention - he was chatting with other employees and ignoring us - I explained that I'd like to buy an iPad, and he went off to get one, or so I assumed. Wrong, he got another employee, who asked us some more questions, and then sent another employee over to help us - still no ipad. After the 3rd employee went to find someone, I gave up and went to the Apple store instead. Easy and done.
I personally dont have anything bad against Target. Best Buy for the most part is the same. The only reasons my vote went to them was based on the fact that they inflate the price of the cell phones they sell so here in CA you pay royally in sales tax on the discounted price since the tax is based on the full price. Also I purchased a display model Toshiba laptop from them to use as my day to day bruiser in place of my Macbook Pro which cost 5x as much. Upon purchase they had to remove the Best Buy demo software so I had to wait nearly an hour for them to do so upon returning the unit to me when I got home I discovered they removed it improperly leaving behind numerous files and crippling the windows since they managed to delete some key registry entries that point software to the desktop and start menu location for icon shortcuts, 2 hours of my own work later I could finally use the unit.
Best Buy's overt sales model is to bait and switch you into the store and pile on costs after the fact. They're in competition with their own website. Their floor staff are caught between being overbearing with their protection plan and accessories upsells or demoralized and listless (but at least not pressuring you to buy things you don't want or need). Either way, the technical competence floor of the floor staff is in the sub-basement; many will outright lie to get you to buy something, and they have little ability to control the circumstances of any sale. Every time I hear a manager has to get involved to give someone the deal they expected (or even slightly better), that's not good service. That's crap service with a bottleneck.
I will say this - i think it's unfair to put up these two businesses together. They're not similar enough in niche to be apples to apples. I get horrible service at target too, but I care about it less. It's designed for browsing, most of the merchandise you don't need advice about, and I need staff intervention much less when conducting purchases. They couldn't act like Best Buy, it's a different enough business.
I have been saying for six years on my blog site that target sucked, it sucked six years ago and still sucks today http://targetfiling.blogspot.com/
As to Best Buy, I have only shopped there one time, when I bought the computer I am using to look at your site. I had looked at this computer next door to Best Buy at an Office Max and was going to buy it. At the last minute I decided to see if BB had the same one. It did, I purchased it at BB and saved $160 over the Office Max price.
Went in to Best Buy to price a Dyson and left with a better deal than I could have gotten on Amazon. Just talked to the Manager and he matched Amazon plus deducted an extra few percent.
Target's new website is atrocious, terribly glitchy, and goes down all the time. Make me long for the old website. However Best Buy has to be the worst. Bought a washing machine from them and when I was being rung up at the register they started asking me all sorts of questions about my TV watching and service provider. So outraged as I was buying merchandise not even closely related to TV's or TV watching. No I don't want Direct TV! I just want to purchase this washing machine and get the hell out of here!
Went in to Best Buy a few weeks before Christmas to buy a low end lap top, saw one well priced on an end cap with a large price ticket of $329. Asked to buy , and told that they had no stock, along with the two others in the price bracket . Told that they would have others at that price point for the Sunday flyer. Went across the street to Comp USA ( we still have stores by that name in South Florida ) they sold me an ex demo for $250 after they took an hour to make sure it was restored to factory specs . Had no problems at Target stores , normally the staff seem happy to see you and sell stuff at prices advertised .