Bestbuy price matching confused by product sku though same product?

davidm71

[H]ard|Gawd
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Feb 11, 2004
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Hi,

Other day I bought a Corsair MK.2 RGB K70 keyboard from Bestbuy and when I found it on Amazon like $25 cheaper few days later they refused to pricematch it citing that the product sku was different but looks like same product! Makes me wonder if this is the new way out of Pricematching by having Corsair make specific but same product only for Bestbuy so they can fix the price?

Thanks
 
This has been a common practice for decades.
Circuit City used to do this with speakers. The model number would be just a little different for the same product.
Watch close and you will see it with TV at many different retailers.
 
And if I return it they'll black list me. What a joke.
Many people remember when there wa no such thing as price matching. You bought what you bought.

This is part of the reason many major credit cards stopped doing the price rewind thing. People were going nuts with it. They’d buy products from retailers that had the item in stock, and price match to someone who didn’t but it was cheaper or clearanced.
 
You got it. Best buy gets virtually identical products from certain manufacturers (notably graphics cards) under unique skus in order to avoid price matching.

Bingo. It's a very common practice in retail stores. Also, sometimes there are some actual differences in what's in the box. The product itself could even have a slight variation to make it different. It wouldn't be the first time I saw something like that.
 
I worked at "The Good Guys" electronics store in the early 90s and this happened all the time - especially with the bottom of the barrel Packard Bell computers as well as other products.

All the competitors carried the same products, but we all had unique model numbers.

"Yes, sir, I see that the specs are the same and that is an amazing deal, but we don't carry that model..."
 
At my best buy if you're a good customer, frequently buy accessories, buy extended warranty etc you can usually get a manager to scratch your back (i.e, they will price match this item to keep you as a customer)

If you're one of those annoying people that just comes in to price match and you don't get any accessories or plans for them to make a profit on, why should they go out of their way?
 
Hi,

Other day I bought a Corsair MK.2 RGB K70 keyboard from Bestbuy and when I found it on Amazon like $25 cheaper few days later they refused to pricematch it citing that the product sku was different but looks like same product! Makes me wonder if this is the new way out of Pricematching by having Corsair make specific but same product only for Bestbuy so they can fix the price?

Thanks

Stores have been doing this for 20 years.
 
I was once blacklisted by Bestbuy for making a couple returns and couldnt return anything for about a year or so, but got to say that was even though I had spent 1000s of dollars in their store. Overall I think theyre price matching policy is fair though this product is advertised as being on sale so not sure it was a Bestbuy or not. Was an impulse purchase so probably not going to return it just think the fix is in here.
 
same thing happens with buy this car for an absurdly low price... go in and bam! car is gone lolol even though it is still sitting on said lot :p
 
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You got it. Best buy gets virtually identical products from certain manufacturers (notably graphics cards) under unique skus in order to avoid price matching.

Kind of shitty practice because honestly if it wasn't for price-matching these electronic retailers would have long bit the dust.
 
Why would you care if they black listed you anyway lol?
 
Kind of shitty practice because honestly if it wasn't for price-matching these electronic retailers would have long bit the dust.

They are shitty, think about what price matching really is..... Its a scam in which you rip off your loyal and faithful customers by jacking them for a higher price. Then you also try to steal business from your competitors that you didn't earn. And the worse part is you are trying to give people the false illusion that you have such low prices they don't need to check elsewhere, this further allows you to RIP them off even more.




The only price match I think is good is like the old home depot one, where they give you 10% more than the lowest price as a thank you for alerting them to a lower price. But those old days of companies actually lowering the listed price are gone.
 
Can’t buy cheap shuckable drives? (The 10TB are going for $160 again today)

They arent going to stop you from buying anything are they, maybe just limit your returns which shouldn't happen often anyway.
 
Ah, fair enough, but what if you get a bad drive? I guess exchange is maybe allowed.
 
You got it. Best buy gets virtually identical products from certain manufacturers (notably graphics cards) under unique skus in order to avoid price matching.

This is a game that goes way back to the 1990's if not earlier. Best Buy's history of price matching as a marketing ploy goes well back into the company's history. Of course other companies adopted the practice as well. So specific retail chains would often get the same product under slightly different SKU's so they didn't have to price match their competition. This allowed them to still advertise price matching without actually having to do it. We all knew it was bullshit, but had no choice but to deny the price match under company policy.
 
Two weeks ago I bought my son a new IPod Pro in BestBuy. They offered a 10% off of next purchase since I renewed my BB credit. I thought not a bad deal let me grab a Radeon VII while im here.
Turns out their RVII is priced at $ 749 with the 10% off I saved $4 on the purchase vs newegg - amazon. What a deal....:D
 
In the battle of getting the customer where price is king, there's not much you can do if you don't have the buying power of someone larger. So instead you come up with a creative solution that allows you to keep your margins and get some customers. It's just marketing with fine print as its always been--a fool and his/her money will soon be parted!

It just sucks that the games like this have gotten more and more. I'm going to have to fight an airline because they told my wife to fill out a form online for a 24hr refund and instead it was supposed to be an email. Now, they're like 'too bad'. Too bad? wtf? That's $470!!
 
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