Consumerist is now advertising for Best Buy?

so, the prices have been downgraded from "ludicrous" to "rediculous (after mail-in rebate)"?

Yeah seriously. An $800 savings on a $2300 television is still a $1500 television.

I was just at Best Buy tonight picking up some stuff I ordered and the guy in front of me was returning a 46" HDTV, told the girl he got a better price for it at a small mom & pop place. She immediately asked if he wanted to price match. She offered to drop it $200 from what he had paid at BB but it was only $100 less than he got at the other place. He tried to see if they would go lower to keep the sale, she offered to get her manager but the guy just got his refund and left.

I bet there will be intense pressure to buy a warranty or a $50 HDMI cable. You need to open the box at the store to make sure nothing is broken.

@edrebber: I'm sure the rocks inside the boxes are all intact.

@zacox: I don't think I've watched $1500 worth of tv in my life.

$1500 worth of books is so much sexier.

I am not impressed by these "deals."

I really don't get the whole HDTV thing, since it doesn't make the shows any better. Even with a couple hundred dollars off it isn't worth buying.

I HATE BEST BUY

@edrebber: ~$5 (incl. shipping) HDMI cables from Amazon FTW.

@gStein: To be fair, Best Buy doesn't do mail in rebates anymore. But those prices still aren't great. Amazon, to me, is the best way to buy a TV hands down.

@Vandelay Import Export: With the right looking, you can get a high quality name brand (Philips, Toshiba, Panasonic) 42" HDTV for around $800. A decent 42" CRT 10 years ago cost well over $1000.

@zacox: I feel like an outcast because I haven't spent more than $600 on a TV in my life. For some reason I feel less and less inclined to spend more now. Many friends and colleagues have bragged spending thousands on their new flat screens. Then they also get to feed that new toy with Comcast and other expensive (less than ideal HD signals). Mean while my old Sdef TV still works just fine and the programs gives me the same enjoyment.

@Vandelay Import Export: That's because you aren't seeing HDTV using Monster cable. They improve the shows.

@vastrightwing: me and the husband refuse to spend more than $100 (we also have 5 tv's...only 2 we've paid for) >.>

Ok let's be objective for you people who always go 'Amazon FTW' on here. Out of the TVs HDGuru posted a quick search on amazon yielded that all of the tvs but 2 were the same price as the sale, one was lower on sale at Bestbuy and one was lower on Amazon. So I find it quite interesting that they are doing a good sale (by using Amazon as the de facto standard of a good price) but yet all the posts above mine have taken the time to flame them?

You can also save an additional 15% if you have an Amex and purchase online through Amex's website. You can still do instore pickup as well.

See, I have the money and desire to upgrade from my 32" LCD from a few years ago. Problem is, everything at BB is coated in a bunch of high gloss crap. Like, every single model. Aside from being a huge eyesore, you can't even tell the brands apart. Oh well.

@edrebber: $50 HDMI cable? How about $130 with oxygen free copper and colinear razmatazz gold plated connectors?

I used to work Circuit City (yes, I'm sooooo evil, kill me), and well....those prices were just about the same as what we used to sell them during "big sales"...

I think Best Buy may need to rethink what the word "sale" means.....

@Neurotic1:

Well, at least the deal with Circuit City is now kaput.

@Neurotic1: Exactly. Since when is Best Buy having a mediocre sale a reason to make a Consumerist post? Especially without even referencing the DOZENS of negative articles on Best Buy's deplorable service / prices / utter lack of human decency that have been a staple of Consumerist reading for years?

@ColoradoShark: I was going to say...when did BB start selling $50 HDMI Cables? Or are they now stocking 4 inch HDMI Cables for $50?

@youbastid: A 42" Panasonic should be in the $600 range now. It keeps getting lower and lower and lower.

Also, pretty HD pictures do make iffy shows better.

@lvixen:

Ah yes, the price matching scam.

IF a business can afford to sell it to one person for less money then the business should sell it to all people (regardless of the their race or religion) for less money.

@FDCPAGuy: Independent research in generally frowned upon in the comments.

(Just kidding! Nice work.)

@lvixen: Good for him. I think that's awesome. That's the kind of stuff we preach here on Consumerist, but rarely hear stories about. Let's hope more people do this.

@FDCPAGuy: That may be true, but I think the tone of the article is that BestBuy is having a "huge" sale with "deep discounts" (emphasis mine) and these supposedly big price cuts are still just matching Amazon's normal sale prices. Which means that BestBuy is overpriced normally.

@dakotad555: Discounts of $500 to $1100 count as a "mediocre sale"?

And "DOZENS" of negative articles pale in comparison to the MILLIONS of hassle-free transactions that have gone down at Best Buy. It's a breath of fresh air to see a post that's not overwhelming negative and critical of a company, even if the comments still are.

@Subliminal0182: No, ~$0.80 HDMI cables from Monoprice FTW.

@Vandelay Import Export: Sounds like someone's never actually watched anything in HD. If you watch TV in the first place, you'd be out of your mind to think that HDTV isn't an improvement.

@RogerTheAlien:
You cannot expect a brick and mortar store to cut it's margin levels to that of Amazon on all items and survive. It's surprising that BestBuy even cut them to Amazon levels frankly. You don't see any other big box retailers cutting 10 high margin items to almost no margin all in one weeks sales flyer (Christmas time might be the exception). BestBuy, and any other brick and mortar retailer for that matter, needs to maintain higher margin (prices, profit) on items to survive.

@FDCPAGuy:

I prefer to buy from Amazon..

No sales tax.
No California e-waste recycling fee.
No shipping fees.

The sale price might be the same from both Best Buy and Amazon, but Best Buy comes out to be more expensive if you factor in the other fees.

@supercereal: I have. The picture looked great, but I am first not going to get rid of a perfectly good TV, and second it isn't going to make the crappy shows any better.

@kateblack: @kateblack: And the oven door inside is nice and shiny.

Damned LCD boxes are too small to live in. At least I can watch my 50" plasma over the steam grate in a refrigerator box. Too bad refrigerators aren't selling much either.

@Vandelay Import Export:

Who says you have to get rid of your old TV to buy an HDTV?

As an employee, I can tell you this isn't a big deal.

Last Sunday I saw a HUGE increase in TV prices. Almost everything went off sale and was at normal price. Throughout the week a few prices did come down, but for the majority of the week the prices were high.

This weeks "discount" is just bringing them back down to what they were a few weeks ago. Down from the insane prices we had the week of August 23-29

@supercereal: I'd say it's a mediocre sale when you can still get a TV with the same specs online for half the price.

@Akanbe:

Actually I'm going to have to partially rescind that statement. Looking harder at the prices, some of them are lower than I recall them being during sale times. Some... but not all.

@kateblack: I have a $1000 projector. If you amortize the projector ($999) over the amount of TV I can watch until the bulb ($350) burns out, it comes out to 50¢ an hour for the first 2000 hours and 17.5¢ an hour after that. It's totally worth it to have an 80" screen in my living room.

Besides, I don't need to spend $1500 on books: $0 will last me a lifetime at the library.

@vastrightwing: Your cheap TV may give you the same enjoyment as a fancy one, but your cost function is not everyone's cost function. I can guarantee that I do not get the same enjoyment out of my bedroom TV that I get out of the living room projector.

Not great prices.......they actually brought their normally high prices down to almost regular prices......you can still find better deals on the same models. And dont bother paying for brand name.....only 3 makers of telivisions. Everyone else just puts there name on it.

@Neurotic1: If we still accepted ads (which we don't), Best Buy would be one of the last companies to sign on, I'm sure.

The interesting part of this story is that so few people are evidently interested in buying large-screen HDTVs [at all]/[at Best Buy] that they feel the need to take $500-$1100 off the prices. That tells us that Best Buy is hurting, they ordered way too many huge TVs for a bad economy, or they're grossly overpriced.

My guess: all three.

@vastrightwing: The most I've spent on a TV is $35. Used off Craigslist.

I suspect, however, that I've spent a lot more than that supplying the cathode ray monstrosity with electricity.

@Vandelay Import Export: My sentiments exactly, though I will admit that I am tempted by the idea of a tv that I can mount up on the wall.

the prices are still too high to consider getting one

@Laura Northrup: Yeah, still not a story. This whole post still stinks of an advertisement, whether it's meant to be or not. Hey, I'm selling a cardboard box, originally priced at $1100, now priced for quite a steal at $50. That's a savings of $1050! Do I get a headline here?

I evidently [at the jackal676 Box Sale Consortium] ordered way too many [or too few] boxes: one. I only need none. I am hurting, and I was originally overpriced [ahem, my Box Consortium is always overpriced, chortle]. Please buy from me. Real consumers need to know about this.

I would guess that the Box Consortium is hurting big time. But skewing data is my strong suit, so who really knows?! Lol rotf.

@jackal676: Hey jackal676, you're a total dick! Posts like yours are why I quit reading The Consumerist. I personally like nonstories that are big on gut reactions. How dare you make fun of these hardworking people! Maybe you should get a job or something and quit raping babies.

P.S. Your wolf t-shirt is totally gay.