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360 Bundles Lead To Best Buy Housecleaning
Groo Wanderer writes "At the launch of the XBox 360, there were reports of forced and unwanted bundling by several companies, most notably Best Buy. There were things said back and forth, and the usual corporate banter. They have followed through, this time, and a good number of people lost their jobs." From the article: "We are told a manager that started the procedure is no longer employed at Best Buy. At least one senior district manager is no longer employed, and some of the nailings are rumored to have gone even higher. The big yellow inquisition did not stop there, and several other managers and assorted white collar workers were given an escorted walk to the parking lot."
I wouldn't mind bundling if it weren't for the fact that every bundle usually comes with a game that no one in their right minds would want to buy..
It wouldn't be wrong, except for the fact they advertised that you could buy a basic unit for a specific price, and then wouldn't sell you just that unit at that price. It's false advertising. If they hadn't advertised the basic unit by itself, that would have been honest and ethical. But since they did advertise it, they had a moral obligation to provide it as long as it was physically possible to do so.
The problem with bundling is Bestbuy advertised the systems at the regular price - but then some locations did not honour this. They *ONLY* sold the systems as a part of a bundle - and only told people of this after they had lined up for hours.
I am the maverick of Slashdot
I don't get it, what is wrong with a store saying "Sure I will sell you this thing you really want, but at the price I want to charge. I will even include some crap you don't really want, but you still have to pay the price I want to charge"
Well, if that price is above MSRP ($399.00 for an Xbox 360), it could be seen as a massive retailer abusing their market position to force customers to pay more than retail price on a scarce product. That is "frowned upon."
Add in that they advertised the Xbox 360 at $399.00, then when customers waste time and gas driving to their store they inform them that no, you must buy a bundle. But you're still getting the Xbox 360 portion of that bundle for $399.00, so it's fair, right?
Oh, and the one store listed in the article that advertised the Xbox 360 at $299.00, and posted a notice at the door explaining that it was a misprint. I wonder just how many hundred-dollar misprints that store has in a given year, and how many are for high-demand items on release date. I'm guessing in 2005 that number was one, and it was the Xbox 360.
Oh, and as for:
Seems that if you don't want to pay the price you go elsewhere or you don't buy the product.
On a major release such as this, that isn't always an option...sometimes there isn't anywhere else with any in stock. Hence the reason that retailers think they can get away with crap like this.