>This is the conundrum of the modern photographer. >Back when people were willing to support their local camera store, it was >easy.
Here we go again. :-) We'll have to agree to disagree. >You decided what you wanted, you went in to buy it. >If they had to special order it, then there was a delay, but ultimately, >you >got to handle and try out the actual item you were going to purchase. >Now, no one wants to buy from a local shop, since they have the temerity to >charge a premium price for the pleasure of serving their customers. I, for one, would be willing to pay a local camera store more, for service. I'd probably be willing to pay between 6 - 10% more than what I would pay over the web. I'm not willing to pay mfrs. list price or close to it, for some salesperson to let me handle a camera when I likely already know far more about it, and photography in general, than they do. There's no reason to pay more when service is non-existent. For like reasons I have almost no reason to pay anything more at a Big Box store than I would over the web. The Big Box store price is likely higher and will include sales tax. >So, we are stuck with online reviews of questionable merit, and buy >products >based on the opinions of people who may or may not be photographers, and >who >may, or may not (mostly not from the web reviews I have seen), have a clue >about how to run an equipment test. I find the online reviews by sites like dpreview flawed to a degree, but they're far more meaningful, and contain far more content, than a salesperson's non-ancedotal, unsupported, undemonstrated words do. >And, we are increasingly being stuck with having to buy equipment sight >unseen from faceless big box vendors who don't care if we are happy with >what they are flogging or not, since there are a thousand other suckers >that >day trying to buy other pieces of sight unseen junk based on reviews of >questionable merit. As a customer I perceive this differently. When camera retailers, at large, stopped caring about quality customer service, customers, at large, stopped caring about buying from them. I bought my first SLR (MX) from a small privately-owned camera store. Granted it was used. I couldn't afford much and they likely did not make much from the sale. But that is the business they are in. When I bought my second SLR (PZ-1p), I went to a camera store again. The salesman did not have any interest in showing me the PZ-1p, wanted to sell me Nikons and Quantaray lenses, and the PZ-1p was going for hundreds more than if I purchased it online. Granted, this is my experience in Denver and Seattle, but that's what I have to go on. I believe what you are lamenting over is a continued paradigm shift that can be traced back to at least when Sears and Roebuck published their first catalog, if not far earlier. >William Robb > Respectfully, as always. Tom C. -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
