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Looper's Delight
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--- Keith Kotay <kotay@stilton.cs.dartmouth.edu> wrote: > Since I never return things that are not broken, I'm not trying to > have it both ways. I do a lot of research before I buy things and > therefore I know what I want before I make the purchase. How can you do that 100% of the time? A lot of musical gear is highly subjective, and you can read reviews for weeks and never know if YOU will like the sound of a particular unit until you can play with it yourself. Do you go to the local music store (LMS) and use them as a demo center, and then make your purchase from an online vendor? I don't do that myself. I'll only try something in an LMS if I think I might buy it there. Anything beyond that seems like I'm taking advantage of them. > Not to get too > philosophical here, but the real problem is that the "try before you > buy" shopping strategy is best suited to your local music store, not > to online merchants. Sure. You focused on the convenience to the vendor, but it's also more convenient to you. It costs you nothing to wander into Joe's Music to try out that distortion box that you end up not liking. If you buy it online and don't like it, you have to 1) pay for it up front, 2) pay for the shipping, 3) wait a few days to get it, 4) keep it in pristine condition while you try it to find you don't like it, 5) call up for an RMA, 6) take it to the shipping vendor, 6) pay return shipping. > So the real fault is ours--we > want to save a few bucks therefore we don't go to our local dealer > and> we create this poor business model that requires online > retailers to send us non-factory-sealed units. (Or even worse, we > go to our local dealer to try out the unit and *then* we buy from an > online merchant.) I might disagree. the LMS's have created a lot of this problem themselves. Many of them charge absolutely usury prices on things, unless you argue like you're in a Middle Eastern Bazarre, and a lot of people just don't like doing that. Many of them have the rudest employees I've ever encountered in a retail establishment. Seriously, the only retail place I can think of where I feel less comfortable then most music shops is a used car lot. I find them both distasteful and avoid most of the time. Beyond that, the other clientelle is often even more rude then the employees. How can you demo a piece of studio-quality gear when you have Eddie Van Kornhead blasting a Marshall stack 10 feet away? How long does it take to demo something? The last time I went to an LMS, I was there for half an hour looking around and a young man sat there playing a high powered halfstack the entire time (he was there before I came in, and was still there when I left...) WITHOUT CHANGING THE SETTINGS ON EITHER THE AMP OR THE GUITAR! Literally over an hour with one tone. It would have been pretty hard to try something out that day... Ok, so I try something out in the store, think I like it, but then get it home and find it has some fatal flaw (like the midi implementation is so bad that it won't work with my other equipment). Many LMS's I've encountered had terrible return policies. I guess it gets better when you've established a relationship with someone at the store. I had a store where we used to live that consistantly gave me good deals, and treated me great. I bought a lot of gear there. Other stores treated me like crap, there were a lot more of those. The problem is that you generally have to spend both a lot of time and a lot of money at a shop before they'll recognize you that way. Unfortunately, I don't get regular money to spend on stuff like this, and I don't have time to go hang around music stores any more. What little time I have, I'd much rather be PLAYING some music then hanging around a shop discussing it. The price issue is tough. It'd be a lot easier to deal with if the difference wasn't so big. I've frequently found things through mail order for (say..) $75 that a LMS absolutely won't budge below $150. Sorry, but that's double the price. My equipment budget is pretty limited as it is. > So, I suppose I should take my own advice and buy from a local dealer > if I can find one that carries Line 6 products--it may not be > possbile up here in the wilds of New Hampshire but I'll try... That's the other problem. At least in NH, you have the greater Boston area within driving distance. Here in Kansas, it's a 3 hour drive to get to anything beyond a Mom & Pop sized music store. Pro audio? Not in this state. > I know this is stretching > things, but I still feel I have a right to get what I paid for: a > *new* unit. I don't have a problem with them sending me something that someone else tried out (and returned in perfect condition), EXCEPT if they tell me it hadn't been opened. That's really the only issue I see in your original gripe. You asked for an unopened box, and they told you that's what you'd get. That should have been the end of it. If they'd told you that they couldn't insure the one you got hadn't been opened, then that'd be a different thing, but that's what they promised you, so that's what you expect. > My real concern is that almost every company that sells effects seems > to have very poor support. I've heard stories about units taking > months to be repaired, or even being sent back after repair and not > working. I'm trying to avoid this as much as possible by getting a > unit that's brand new. Then, if it fails it is either my fault or > Line 6's, not some unknown person who used it for 3 weeks and then > returned it. Service is a commodity we're all suffering problems with, and it's not just music stores. Local computer stores are just almost as bad. When I call for customer support at many places, I get the run around. Stores treat you like dirt. Etc. That's basically what I'm complaining about with local stores. If they offered better service, and a fair price (not necessarily a LOWER, or equal price) it would be a hands down win. But...they offer lousy service, rude employees, an uninviting atmosphere, very high prices, poor selection, etc. About the only advantage is that they might have the thing in stock where you could try it. Even that doesn't always happen. I went to a music store one time to try out a guitar, and the sales person offered to PLAY IT FOR ME, "so I could hear it". I told him that I wouldn't buy anything I couldn't try myself and was told "you might scratch it". (and it wasn't like they had any reason to think I wouldn't be careful, I was like 32 years old at the time, dressed well, etc!) I walked, never went back. What a joke. It's stuff like that which makes me want to buy mail order. But..even then, I'd be hesitant to buy something liek a guitar mail order, even within the same make & model, they feel and sound different. How could you know what you were getting? Greg __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com