Bundling problems hit Best Buy and it’s happening in the UK too!
A leaked internal memo from Best Buy reveals that some managers appeared to take it upon themselves to do what amounts to a ‘hard sell’ and pressure customers into buying the more expensive bundles. According to The Inquirer, the memo is telling managers to accept bundles back for refund and allow customers to choose what they want to buy.
But it’s not just in the US that this bundling ‘deal’ is making an appearance. The scarcity of Xbox 360 stock has prompted store managers of UK shops to bundle up the console to make a lot of money.
HEXUS.gaming popped into GAME in Milton Keynes on Saturday and upon asking about the availability of an Xbox 360 Premium console we wereoffered one as part of a bundle. This so-called ‘deal’ was for the Premium console, one wireless controller and 15 games… all for the princely sum of £969 GBP! But there was a catch… GAME didn’t actually have 15 different Xbox 360 games in-stock but we still had to buy all 15 to get the console.
We were told that there was no chance of splitting the offer down in price and just buying one of each game they had in stock… You either took all fifteenor have nothing at all. The GAME employee then told us that we would be able to sell the duplicated games on Ebay for £80 GBP each making enough profit from the sale of ten games to fund the cost of the console. This was, of course, utterly wrong as the games themselves are easily available and even on Ebay were fetching no more than retail price meaning an unwary customer, acting on spurious information, would be paying an awful lot of money and ending up out of pocket whilst GAME racked up a tidy sum in sales.
At the time of writing GAME have yet to respond to enquires made about this possibly unintentional misleading of customers to benefit sales.
Update:A GAME spokesperson has been in touch to say that they will look into this issue and be back with a reply as soon as possible. Now the company is aware they will look into it straight away.
Update Two:
Following a phone conversation with Anna Macario, Marketing Director for GAME Stores Group Ltd, GAME have made the following response to the report of our experience in their Milton Keynes Midsummer Place store:
"I’m sorry to hear that you were treated this way in our Milton Keynes store. We only actually marketed 3 bundles in the stores, the most expensive of which being a £769.99 bundle, and it included the Xbox 360 console, a wireless pad, a CD wallet and 10 games, which in itself represents really good value for money. I have spoken to the sales director here, and your conversations with the store will be addressed directly, as it is not something we either endorse or wish to continue. As I mentioned to you in our telephone conversation, we did actually sell some consoles on their own, with no software or accessories over the weekend, and at the end of the day, the customer should be allowed to buy exactly what they want."
So that's good to hear. We have to admit that it's rather saddening to know that we should have been able to buy that console. Anna did mention that GAME have gone to some lengths in double checking pre-orders to try and prevent profiteering from people trying to buy multiple consoles purely to make a fast buck on Ebay and we fully support that move. At the same time, we can understand that from a business point of view, any retailer would try and encourage the consumer to 'trade up' and buy the extras at the same time as buying a console. That is purely good business sense. It looks as if someone at GAME has just taken things a little too far...
