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Best Buy knows a Bad Buy

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by Joe Williams, Mar 16, 2008.

  1. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Best Buy, the big box stores that sells all things electronic and home appliance, had a notice on the front of its usual Sunday insert ad brochure this morning. It read:

    ``Next week, our ad will ONLY be available at BestBuy.com/WeeklyAd. All stores are closed Easter Sunday.''

    To me, the Easter thing has little to do with this. It suggests to me that Best Buy is becoming increasingly comfortable with circumventing the traditional Sunday newspaper delivery system as a means of reaching its customers. I'm under the impression that these inserts don't generate the same sort of revenue that ads actually printed in the news sections do, but still, I'd bet that struggling newspapers don't want to lose this steady stream of income from a national retailer.

    Check out the Web page for that. It's as good or better than leafing through the paper version:

    www.BestBuy.com/WeeklyAd

    If the day comes when we can't even count of people to buy the Sunday paper "for the ads and coupons," then we're in a world of hurt.
     
  2. Norman Stansfield

    Norman Stansfield Active Member

    The Best Buy and Circuit City ads were something I always looked forward to pulling out and perusing.

    That's depressing if it is indeed a sign of things to come.
     
  3. Moderator1

    Moderator1 Moderator Staff Member

    I haven't seen a Best Buy flier in my hometown paper in a while.
     
  4. Agree. Those are the only ones I look at. The only time I go online to their sites is when I have a gift certificate.
     
  5. TheSportsPredictor

    TheSportsPredictor Well-Known Member

    Best Buy is a company which caters toward (presumably) tech-savvy people. You would think more of their customer base is used to going online and looking things up. So perhaps this is not really a trend.
     
  6. Hank_Scorpio

    Hank_Scorpio Active Member

    This isn't the first time a major retailer has gone online only with a weekly ad. Target did it during a holiday weekend (I forget which one now) too, although that was about a year ago.

    Since then, they've still printed the Sunday ad.
     
  7. BYH

    BYH Active Member

    Depressing, yes, but you can't really be surprised.
     
  8. mustangj17

    mustangj17 Active Member

    Best buy will come back in the papers near Christmas time.
     
  9. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    The papers will still be there? ;)
     
  10. chazp

    chazp Active Member

    We had the Best Buy flier and Target flier in the paper for the day after Thanksgiving sales. It's the only time either of them advertised with us for the past two years.
     
  11. Pilot

    Pilot Well-Known Member

    I think tech savvy people shy away from the big box stores assuming they can always get it cheaper/newer/geekier online.

    I like reading the paper version of almost everything better than I like reading it online. It just seems like a lot easier way to keep thoughts, ideas, products and prices more organized. I may check something out online before I go to a store and buy it, but buying and shopping online can be a clusterfuck. I'm obviously part of a dying breed (and I'm only 25) in that I hate to read stuff online. I surf the net a lot, but I always print out long stories I want to read. I hate reading local big daily on the web compared to flopping it down beside my bowl of cereal.

    My old roommate on the other hand, we had one of the best papers in the country delivered to our door every day and he never once opened it. If I was gone, they just piled up, no matter what day of the week it was. He only reads stuff online. He even reads books online. Bla. Yuck.
     
  12. Tom Petty

    Tom Petty Guest

    we'll survive the internet just like we survived the advent of tv.
     
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