Brand Shops work for some sectors of retail and in others they really don't make since.  Take JCP for instance, I hated when they converted it from traditional apparel to this new "modern" retailer that Ron Johnson wanted it to be.  The reason why is you used to be able to go into JCP and go to Mensware and you had shirts, pants, etc.  In this new Brand Shop setup you have to know what "sub-brand" you're looking for, which something tells me there's a price game involved like putting the more expensive brands in more prominent locations and it actually makes it much harder to price compare.  Imagine if you came in to buy a camera and you had to go to the Sony brand-stand and to compare it you had to jump over to the Samsung brand-stand and the Canon brand-stand - after a while it just creates a really frustrating experience.  

 

Secondly, vendors in-store should go.  On weekends, it seems like there's more vendors then there are Best Buy employees, which I'm sure Best Buy loves because they save a ton of money on labor, but it's really a bad image for Best Buy, considering they are "supposed" to be there to train employees and educate customers.  The problem with this is most of these vendors are going to say whatever they need to say to land their sale and make their commission.  Try asking a Direct TV rep what they think about AT&T, Time Warner or Dish - OR - a Sony camera rep what they think about a Canon?   The bigger underlying issue that I've noticed is that customers don't realize they are talking to a vendor from XYZ company.  So when they ask why the Canon with higher MP is cheaper than the Sony, they don't realize they're talking to a Sony representative that is going to try his/her best to spotlight their product's features over the Canon and not-surprisingly if you pulled sales data for the weekend I'm sure you'd see an unusal spike in Sony camera sells, etc.   Nothing against Sony, I have their cameras and TVs but using them as an example.

 

On a larger scale the problem this creates is there's really no need to have as many Best Buy employees at that point.  Why blow money on labor when you have vendors paying for real estate in your store and providing the labor?  You really just need the blue shirts to run the registers at that point.  This will mark the beginning of the end for Best Buy though because you will no longer be able to get unbiased, HONEST advice.  For instance, the HTC One has been hailed as one of the best Android handsets on the market and the S4 was polar opposite from most professional review sites (i.e. Tech Radar), however the Samsung representatives in-store are going to play to all of the biases that have been created against HTC like the Sense interface sucks (which has actually been revamped on the One BTW), the battery is terrible, etc.  to better spotlight their product.   Think that's ridiculous?  Check out what's happening to Blackberry!  The Z10 was one of the best professionally reviewed smart phones and a lot of the ideas on it are fresh and intriguing yet many reviewers note it may be too little too late and thus employees talk customers out of it and into "trendier" handsets like an S4, iPhone, etc.  The Z10 has PRACTICAL features that you can actually use like separate profiles for home and business use so you don't have to carry two phones.  Samsung phones you can touch together to share things (which I know a lot of people with S3's and S4's and I have yet to see them use that feature once).  

 

So are brand shops a bad idea?  For a store like Best Buy it depends on how they were implemented. I've always liked Best Buy's traditional approach of being more departmentalized.  Cameras are all in the cameras area and Best Buy could use their new connected stores' runway tables to spotlight integration for specific brands.   I think having a store with like 10-15 vendor stores within it would create a flea market/farmer's market find of atmosphere similiar to that of Niemen Marcus.

I remember getting coupons in the mail every so often from best buy. What happened to those coupons? They were awesome and helpful in everyday as there was always something to buy whether it be an every day item or specialty item. Can best buy bring back the mailer coupons? Even if its only for silver members?

An idea to save space in stores and create a better buying environment while adding more product choices. What about having book, music and video kiosks to browse, sample and buy/download in-store? Dedicate an area in store buy creating a cafe-like area where people could browse digital media via kiosks/tables. People could dock their devices and use high-speed connections they may not have at home to download to phones and/or tablets. Have a deal with a service like iTunes/Amazon/Spotify/Google to sample content and buy using their store accounts.

A home theater setup has many parts and components- especially if you want a wireless setup (because you don't want to spend thousands of dollars in wiring). I think budget-friendly and resourceful customers (20-40somethings) would buy all the components if they knew which ones to get and then save on labor by doing it themselves (as opposed to hiring home theater installation experts).<br><br>So Best Buy could have &quot;recommended packages&quot; of components, then customers can easily understand the minimum setup requirements and tweak from there. I think this would be a tempting offer for customers with budgets in the $2000-5000 range for whom the full Magnolia-type setup is prohibitive but can/want to spend more than a 60&quot; smart TV. Plus, if you add a package discount plus Best Buy's financing... that seals the deal!<br><br>I think this would be even more valuable if you promised that all components in the package would be compatible (a scary risk for novice DIY-ers), and trained sales people on which &quot;splurge&quot; substitutes exist that were also compatible. Plus, since it's several components, if you offer free shipping you could probably send everything from a warehouse and potentially save a bit on in-store inventory.

These could be offered online or in-store. In-store, you could also showcase the packages in micro-showrooms so people know what to expect/dream about! (See my other post on micro showrooms.)

There should be more bonus points for new BluRay releases, like how Best Buy did for Zero Dark Thirty. Don't you think that could promote sales? Maybe instead of giving customers 100 points, you can boost it to 250 points for new releases?

Collector’s Editions/Limited Editions/Steel Books, some of us love then. Others could not care less. Often the difference compared to a “regular” edition can be nothing more than a different box art. There are gamers who do appreciate these little extras but sometimes the price requested is just not agreeable. So there can be instances when these special editions will sit on the shelf (taking up extra space) much longer than it’s vanilla counterpart who may gone on sale multiple times or who may be eligible on a certain month for an @gamer discount. It is that the collector’s editions(in terms of @Gamer sales coupons) seem to get… overlooked. 

 

 

Just an example, the @Gamer coupons could be a 50% off to include all boxed variations and platforms (when applicable). That way there is no need for BB staff to concern themselves with or worry about “questionable” coupons as all variances of a game are covered on ONE coupon. I know this would alleviate a lot of “I need to check this out with my manager”, or “I’m not sure if this is the correct title”. Simplifying the BB reps duties and streamline the customers experience created a better shopping (and working) experience for all parties involved.

I absolutely love the "Upgrade & Save" program where you can trade in a DVD for $5 off of a bluray.  Absolutely love it!  However, it would be even better if there was a way to apply the $5 to online orders as well.  This should be fairly easily achieved by having the computer generate a code one could then use when placing an order online.

 

If I were able to use the $5 upgrade certificates online, there are a LOT more blurays I would buy that Best Buy doesn't carry in stores.

 

Thanks for reading!

I've been at Best Buy for about 2.5 months and, as it being holiday season, I'm thinking of my employee discount. To receive our employee discount, we can either buy in-store or by calling a phone number to make our order. I think it would be awesome if we could do the orders online by having an employee link or something where we can log in (via employee login information) and make purchases. Has this been talked or thought about before? Is there any chance of this happening?

I've noticed since after Christmas 2012, Best Buy stopped selling the Playstation Vita bundles...Sony still carries these so why doesn't Best Buy carry them as well???  Bring them back!  They were a great value for the price.

I would like the ability to pre-order items that are "coming soon" (example: the Kobo Glo) and be notified whe the item is ready to be shipped / picked up at a store so that I can move on with my life and not have to check back at bestbuy.com every day to see if it's out yet.

I have been a Best Buy customer since you were named "Sound of Music" store. I was just at the big Best Buy in Bloomington near your corporate headquarters. I saw the new design, thought everthing looked nice but I think one HUGE mistake was made. You reduced your packaged media to alomost nothing. Gone are the rows and rows of Blu-ray disc (format is gaining in sales every year, in fact new records are being broken every quarter), and there were only 2 isles of Blu-rays to choose from (one on each side, so actually 4 isles). Plus, he isles were 1/5 the size of the previous ones. I went shopping the day ready to spend about 500.00 on catalog titles and a few releases, and out of what you carried, I spent $86.00. Nothing else was there that I wanted. And I did not look for obscure titles but major studio catalog releases. I also noticed a huge reduction in DVD, which I can understand as more people are buying and replacing their movies from DVD to Blu-ray than ever before. The studios are releasing tremendous catalog titles, and the selection was so bad it made me sick to see this happened.

 

I am deeply saddened that you, the only remaining retail store carrying a great selection of Blu-ray discs, have reduced the amount you carry in the huge way. I have read the trade magazines, that some people seem to be coming in, looking at things and then ordering online. I do not believe this to be true of packaged media, especially Blu-ray disc. These are many times impulse buys, and if not people come in with titles in mind and want them now. I do not mail order, but I guess I will have to start. This is one instance when you have forced customers to shop online and it doesn't always end up at Best Buy.

 

PLEASE bring back your in-store Blu-ray disc selection to what it was. There was no need to reduce that department so such a small section. Then I will come in and start shopping movies with you again.

Some of this surely isn't BB's fault but it still makes the company look bad when it can't be trusted to provide the promised pre-order incentive to customers. My suggestion would be for BB to secure as many exclsuinve steelbox packaging promos as possible & have the DLC codes sealed in them.

 

Because this method can be abused for codes that wouldn't equal sales it needs to be clearly printed on the steelbox packaging & the receipt that if the $5 pre-order can not be refunded if the steelbox is opened & the game itself will not be fully refunded if the sealed steelbox isn't also returned.

 

Also, you should try to score more impressive DLC like characters and/or levels not just costumes/weapons packs. They have more "value" & will have a much greater impact on increasing your total pre-orders.

Myself and tons of artists that I work with would love a Wacom Cintiq, however the pricepoint makes it a hard sell.

Yiynova has come out with a tablet at a quarter of the cost of a Cintiq, but the supply has been very limited.

 

 

If BestBuy offered the Yiynova at $500, I would immediately order one (as I'm sure countless other artists would too).

I can order one off Amazon (when they are in stock), but I trust the customer service of my local BestBuy much more.

So many people would love to have A Cafe In the larger Best Buy Stores. I have seen many employees talk about this idea on this site. If so many people what this to happen let’s start a few in the most popular stores a.k.a. the big $ stores. There are a few ways to go about this. 1. Lease out a part of the store to a Starbucks or other café chain/ 3rd party. 2. Find out if a vendor our company is already doing business with has an established café we could put into our stores or 3. Start our own in store café from scratch with my help since I have a pastry arts degree and have worked in the food industry - hotel/restaurant /bakery. All baking would have to be done off premises or purchased threw a 3rd party bakery. The coffee we could sell could be a simple as a Keurig  Coffee setup since we already  do business with that vendor plus they have 100s of varieties’ of coffee, tea, hot chocolate etc.

This Idea would make  the store  a lot more revenue not only from the employees  but  also the customers  would shop longer too  give us a chance to sell them more products  & services  plus after a customer buys  a new laptop, phone, tablet etc.  They will have a place to go and have a coffee while they test out there new device and if they have any questions they can ask a GS agent that could poss. Up sell them.  Another great Idea is too show food channel or other food inspired shows on our big T.V.s so the customers will get hungry and by food and snacks from out café.  The name of best buys café should be called “THE BEST CAFÉ “.  A perfect name since we are the BEST!!

 

I have noticed several of the gaming computers on the site just have a general model information and not the actual model from that company that best buy is selling for. For example:

 

the cyberpower PC series "revolt" there are several versions of the revolt with different specs however it is hard to find actual reviews that are not on the site due to this.