Best Buy gouging on 360 accessory prices

by Kyle Orland on Aug 13th 2007 2:51PM

While the rampant price fixing in the video game industry can be annoying, at least you know that you'll usually pay the same price for new game hardware, software and accessories no matter where you shop. Not always though, as a quick glance at BestBuy.com show some Xbox 360 accessories being sold at inflated prices.

Best Buy's selection of Xbox 360 cables, controller-charging kits and the universal remote have all been marked up by $3 over the MSRP. Best Buy's price increase does not seem to apply to controllers, hard drives, memory units or the the wireless headset (oddly enough, the wired headset price has been increased). Other retailers continue to match or even beat Microsoft's set price on accessories -- Amazon has good deals on the Wi-Fi adapter and play-and-charge kit, while Circuit City goes below the MSRP on battery packs and faceplates.

Three dollars might not seem like much, but the increase is enough to make us reconsider Best Buy for our gaming needs. Here's hoping the extra money made off Halo 3-incensed dupes makes up for the loss of business.

[Via Gizmodo]

Source

Tags: best buy, BestBuy, gouging, pricing, retail, Xbox-360

Reader Comments (50)

Fuck you, Best Buy :(

ps. I want that shirt.

ZOMG....$3.00!

Thank God for free will and personal preference.

Price gouge FTL!

It's how the make up the money for their Rock Band "discount."

Even better is the slime covered maggot shit that is gamestop.

Here in Hawaii, they slap $5 on top of everything.

No other resellers do that on their games here. (Sears, Kmart, WalMart, Costco, etc)

If people want to overpay that's certainly their choice, but it doesn't make me want to buy Xbox 360 stuff from Best Buy.

Best Buy charges a lot more for many products than some other retailers though, so it's not that surprising. I haven't bought and HD DVD from Best Buy yet, because they are almost a few bucks cheaper at Amazon or DeepDiscount.

Best buy can go screw themselves after the whole Rockband fiasco.

I'm not surprised or upset that I didn't get it for the price I preordered it, I'm pissed at the way they handeled it telling me I'm wrong about what the product discription said.

Here is what they told me,

"I am Mitchell with Best Buy Customer Care.

I regret to inform you that those accessories are optional and are not
included. Below is a copy of the web advertisement:
Optional accessories, including a drum controller (not included), a
guitar controller modeled after the legendary Fender Stratocaster (not
included) and a handheld microphone with a karaoke-style interface (not
included)"

I tried to explain that it didn't say this when I preordered it but they told me I must have read it wrong.

For Best Buy, cables are the cash cow.

I was helping my father with his A/V setup last weekend, and drove him into Best Buy to pick up an optical audio cable. I was directed to a wall of nothing but Monster cables. The size we needed was $80.

I was confused, and asked the nearest sales guy where the non-Monster brands were. He sneered at me disdainfully and led me toward a dark, dusty corner where the 'off-brands' were. I picked up the $20 cable I needed while the sales guy gave a breathtaking technical breakdown of why everything was going to sound crappy on this cable. I laughed in his face and he stormed off.

I then turned to my dad, who looked really concerned. "Are you sure we should get this? He said the digital signal was going to get distorted without all the extra shielding!"

And that, my friends, is how Best Buy hits their profit numbers every quarter.

More consumers need to be educated or it's their own fault if they let themselves get ripped off.

An honest salesman is hard to find these days.

who doesnt?

I find the same thing at Best Buy. The associates make close to minimum wage without any sales incentives. Because of this, you trade product knowledge for assumptions.

Of course the most expensive X is better than the least expensive X... why else would it be more expensive?

For the most part, you should know what you're looking for when you go into a Best Buy. Getting a decent answer out of an employee is nearly impossible. It's almost as hard as as actually finding an employee at Home Depot.

My brother works at BB. The markup on accessories lies not just with 360. For example, Belkin USB cables in 1Meter length are $24.99!!! My brother looks up the SKu for me and their cost is $2.38. Underpants Gnomes indeed! I think BB copied them
1. Ridiculously markup electronic accessories
2. ???
3. Profit.

Supreme Court just came out with a case a week or two that said stores can do this. So you're seeing a change in the law that Best Buy did not hesitate to take advantage of. Before, they couldn't do that. let's hope other stores don't do it as well.

"Gouging"?

I guess this again goes to show the near complete lack of understanding when it comes to economics.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0809/p13s01-legn.html

is that the same mc hamster from slakerz comics?

Nope, never heard of it.

you put a nigerian out on the street selling these[igloo's] for $3 whos not gonna say 'fuck it, give me one'

Ha ha... I don't even know what the f*ck that MEANS.

I think foxxdie's point is that 3 dollars isn't much money. But I've got news, motherfucker. 3 dollars is a taco bell quesadilla.

So if you bought, 2 extra controllers and maybe a headset or something else, that's an entire meal you've lost!

This made me giggle because yesterday I randomly chose to go to K-Mart rather than Best Buy. In their clearance section I picked up a Viva Pinata face plate for $1.40! That doesn't even cover Best Buy's $3 mark up.

Bestbuy makes their money on accessories.

I used to work at Bestbuy a few years back in their PC/HO dept. when they first opened up here in NYC. They would tell us that accessories and PRPs were more important than selling computers or printers.

If someone did buy a printer we would have to sell them, paper, ink, $30 USB cable and a Product Replacement Plan.

I was in Best Buy over the weekend and saw the Nintendo branded Wii component cables selling for $54.99. I had to do a double take to make sure I was reading it correctly. The Nintendo store online still shows them for $29.99. YIkes....

I saw them at that price too.

Best Buy isn't the place to go if you want a bargain.

I used to shop there when they had good deals. Everything seems really overpriced there. I stick with eBay or NewEgg.

I find this to be a wholly irresponsible article on the part of Joystiq. This is NOT "price gouging". Price gouging occurs when you inflate the price of a CRITICAL resource for which there are few or no substitutes. This is a complimentary premium and is completely legal and desirable given the scope of this launch. Any money making business would be nuts not to at least consider it. (Just like Joystiq loves to write perpetual flamebait to inflate their page views.)

GameStops are more numerous than McDonald's in my area, so I would have no excuse whatsoever for paying +$3 for an accessory.

Now, if you want to leverage the other part of capitalism and choose the lesser price over the convenience of one stop shopping for these items, it's clearly up to you. But don't misrepresent the situation. Don't use "gouging" just because it sounds more insidious than what they are really doing.

Seriously, Joystiq. Hire me to fact check your stories. You sound like you need it.

I agree with what you're saying but, How the hell did you bring McDonald's into this whole thing? lol

:-) I'm establishing that there is no lack of other places to buy game accessories, an essential part of showing that this is, in fact, not price gouging.

McDonald's is everywhere. Or Starbucks. Or Vietnamese noodle places.

I want to know where you live. Here we have one GameStop (but we have a Software Etc. in the mall which is owned by them), no Starbucks (the only one in town is in a Barnes and Noble) and eleven McDonalds (that I can find in town on Google).

Hamster beat me to it, but this is not price gouging. Price gouging is requires monopolies or near-monopolies, and then exploitation. I don't see who is being exploited except for people too dumb or lazy to compare prices (especially on the internet). 360 accessories are not exactly difficult to come by.

Not only is this not price gouging, I don't see what's wrong with it. Different stores can charge different prices if they want. Why is this such a big deal as long as we have other options?

"This just in: Business charges more than it costs to purchase products in some lame attempt to make money. News at 11."(From Altanar on Digg)Gamers are lucky, Very few industries have so little "gouging". Different stores have different prices.

at least they have free shipping online

Free shipping? They charge you sales tax...

How does the fact they charge you tax mean shipping isn't free?

I work at Best Buy and noticed the $3 price hike on 360 accessories a few months back. For anyone who has never worked retail, accessories are a brick-and-mortar store's bread and butter. Best Buy frequently inflates the price of incidental accessories in order to compensate on the lower margins on big ticket items. They hope to capitalize on the customer's ignorance, charging $100+ for HDMI cables, $40 USB cables, etc. Be informed, buy your accessories elsewhere.

I was finally able to buy a Wii three weeks ago from a Best Buy. I was told the Wii had a 60% return rate when I told them I didn't want the protection agreement, and they made me sign some paper stating that I turned it down.

With a 60% return rate how come there were never any on the shelves... ever?

60%... I call BS

Nice made up story Jason. Good try. You might have had some people if you hadn't added that part about them making you sign something.

What's more incredible is the implication that you're buying a shitty product.

I don't know if any of you have read "Shortpacked!", but I totally feel like I'm getting threatened with being kicked in the nutsack by Mike if I shake my head no to the stuff they're obligated to try to sell me on. Thankfully, these tacts are killing corporations like RadioShack and BestBuy is next.

The 60% statistic sounds a extremely iffy, but I have seen employees (under manager pressure) require a customer to sign a CPO (a form typically used for totaling up a big sale before purchase) when they've turned down the service plan on an expensive item (say a laptop or HDTV). This practice is highly unethical and is discouraged by corporate. In fact, if it happens, you should call 1-888-Best-Buy and complain, providing names for anyone involved. Making a customer sign something explicitly stating that they rejected the service plan is a method of intimidation designed to scare them into reconsidering, as it otherwise adds a sense of finality to their decision (nevermind the fact that you can buy it anytime during the return/exchange period).

I am a little skeptical though that they'd try such a desperate tactic on a measly $20 replacement plan for a Wii.

Brian I didn't make it up, I actually have the paper they made me sign, it was all their general info on the protection agreements for all the gaming consoles. It's kind of weird that they made me sign it, but then gave it to me. I took it as them trying to be more threatening by making me put my signature on something so maybe I would back out and just buy the protection plan.

And there were folks a few days ago "defending" Best Buy about the Rock Band snafu... where are they now?

Technically there is no such thing as price gouging... You have every right to buy it or not from Best Buy.

These items are called Blind Items in the retail world, items that people are going to pick up and not shop around on the price. BUT I don't think retailers have kept up with the times and the internet where the consumer has instant access to pricing from multiple stores. On the other hand, parents that their kids send into the store to pick them up something are not going to know the difference or going to worry about it. So this does have its ups and downs.

All these items are set at a pricing called MAP, Minimum Advertised Price. Which is the lowest price possible by a Best Buy or Circuit City, if they break that pricing they risk being cut off from their Vendor (Microsoft, Sony, etc.) this doesn't mean that they cant go up from there and make a little more money.

Best buy sounds like HMV here in the UK.
They're charging 19 or 20 pounds for Wii points.
Fricking Wii points that cost 15 every where else.

Not to mention that basically all the games are like £40, no matter how crappy they are.

Rant over, F Y though HMV.

Pick your poison.

Pay a couple of bucks extra for some accessories at Best Buy or be strong armed into reserving all your stuff at Gamestop. Personally I have more of a problem being told that I need to reserve a less popular game title if I want to be able to buy it.

Resist bad economic thinking.

As others have pointed out, this isn't anything even close to price gouging. Also, remember that if people wouldn't buy it at that price, Best Buy wouldn't sell it at that price.

We all live in basically free market countries. Why not use that advantage, and, you know, shop around rather than bitch that someone is "price gouging"?

After EB dropped used PC games I dropped them then they bought gamestop I guess best buy is another place to boycott for anti consumer practices too LOL

I know price gouging, in layman's terms, means that you think the price is too high, which is different from the legal or economic definition. But it's still an annoying colloquialism, because it confuses people. Glad to see most of the comments are just "don't buy from Best Buy", because that's really the only thing you should say. Evidently the people at best buy corporate think (and their profits depend on it, so I'd bet on them rather than myself), that they'll make more money this way because people are willing to pay.

I don't know who's a bigger ripoff, Best Buy or Gamestop?

I remember the commercials for BB when this pops on the screen and says he goes around to competitors checking prices making sure that BB has the lowest prices around.

I guess they dumped this tactic a long time ago. Usually what I do is find the lowest advertised price then go find the #1 irritating sales person on my sales person s-list and make them price match it.

It really pisses them off. I try to do this with accessories most of the time and only buy that price matched item.

Best Buy gouging on 360 accessory prices

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