Best place to buy car audio?

Honestly, your not thinking like a shop owner. If you had a customer that bought a system from another place and installed it themselves or got the other place to install it and came to you when there was a problem ( because the other place was not longer in business or just couldn'r fix the problem ) and expected you to take the time to send it in for warranty while trying to explain to the company and the rep that you deal with that this was a "favor" for a customer that didn't buy from you......... Your telling me that you wouldn't take offence to this ?

I wouldn't even consider helping the person because this would teach them a lessen about loyalty and what to expect from shopping a non-authorized dealers & shops that are not capable of servicing their own equipment. I'm in the business to make a living.... not by gouging the customer but by selling the equipment and the service for a reasonable price.

Selling equipment at cost in a shop and raping my customer's for shipping costs is not my cup of tea. If someone came to my shop and said that he/she could get  an amp for $ 100 and I sell it for $ 150.00 and they want it for the same price I'd tell them to go elsewhere  cause I know that there's more to the costs of the equipment than $ 100. There's also shipping, duties, taxes and time spent to go and get the item. Not to mention that I would have the amp installed properly with a discount on the wiring and the installation AND I would wararnty the item for the full term of the manfacturer wararnty period.

Now with that being said, I never sell any of my inventory at full MSRP because in my area I really can't do that because of the customer base we draw from is about 20,000 people and there's a city within 1 hour of us with 800,000 people & alot more stores like mine. So to be competitive I sell for a regular price of 25 % less than MSRP. If this is capatalism then I'm guity as charged, but don't you dare come into my shop and tell me that my prices are too high when I know that the box stores use manfacturer's as lost leaders and the internet doesn't care about customer service after the sale is complete.

If that post was toward me, i think you took what i said out of context or just didnt read it properly. My point was that sometimes a local dealer is close enough in price to make it worth buying from them. However that is not always the case. If an amp for example is 50$ more at a dealer, I will but it there. First of all, there is no shipping, secondly, you have a real warranty and a real person to talk to if something goes wrong, besides you are supporting your local economy which helps everyone. The amp I just bought last week I paid 279 for including shipping. A local shop wanted about 500 for same amp. As much as I like supporting the locals, Im not stupid either. That 200$ paid for all my wiring and fuse holders/dist. blocks that I DID buy from my local guy.

my only point is if i can buy my produce at Walmart for 20$ a week, and that same exact stuff is at a local stand for 40, Im going to Walmart, and all you shop owners shop there too to save money. Take your own advices and stop shopping at Walmart and Home Depot all together and only buy from local businesses. You will see how quickly your money gets thrown away.

racefan, the post was towrads the thread in general ( no pot shots taken at anyone ). I took from each post and IMO the internet is still causing quality equipment to become cheap. That is why there are so many of the manufacturer's out there that are targeting the online stores & auctions and shutting them down. There's nothing wrong with getting a good deal and in some cases it will be online, but in the end the decision that you choose you will have to live with and when/or if you require support in the form of either warranty or technical support your going to be alone cause you don't have that slip of paper that says it's from an authorized dealer.

In your case the $ 500 was probably a MSRP am I correct ? The $ 279 is probably about 5-10 % above cost if not lower so the person who sold it to you made money off the shipping as well.

Velocity, I agree with you 100%. And like i said, i do try to buy local whenever I can. I appreciate al lthe hard work you guys have put into your businesses and will support you as much as my budget allows. I used to manage a car audio shop out of Watertown NY called Audio Junction. Thankfully that was before the big internet craze. We still had the competition from Best Buy/ Circuit City and places like that. Fortunately they didnt carry Hifonics and Orion like we did. They just had cheaper stuff. But still a customer comes in comparing a 200$ 300w amp from Best buy and expect you to match it price wise against your 300w Orion because they are both 300w. Sorry, aint gonna happen. Service and warranty are a big deal and in my opinion worth a little more than a just saving a few bucks on the internet.

In my last amp purchase (the new hifonics bx1606i) I paid 279, and local wanted around 500. So that made it worth it enough to try it online. But I have to take the chance that it works once i hook it up, and it lasts long enough to exceed the warranty, cuz if anything happens, its my problem.

i think the juxt of this whole thread is that there will always be people who shop online and always be people who prefer to support local business.....  Jeff briefly touched on some of what you dont realize when you shop locally.... i tried to explain this just this week to my wife who also thinks Cheat-me-bay is so great.... when i buy a sub for $100 and sell it for $150.. i dont make $50 profit... i make $50 minus the cost of my rent, heat, power, sewage, telephone, business cards, business taxes, etc, etc.....

i think what any shop owner like Jeff, Rob or myself will try to explain is that there is an inherent cost to doing business and even having our doors open to be able to provide you with the services we do..... if i had no other cost in the world than the cost of the product i buy, then i could probably match an online retailers price everyday..... so to the guys that say "get competetive or go out of business" i would say.. who are you going to take your system to when you have all the gear installed and something isnt working... are you going to drive your vehicle to Sound Domain?  to Crutchfield??      in all likelihood you'll drive it to a local install shop and ask for their help......

just try to remember when we open our doors at 8:00 am.. we are starting at a negative and have to at least be able to earn enough to cover the cost of having that door open to be able to service you..... which we do gladly (cause weirdly after 25 years i still really love car audio/media)   so next time you price shop something between an online retailer and a local retailer i hope y'all try to consider some of this......

Thank you Kevin, couldn't have said it better myself.

Let me explain why this isnt gonna be the case alot of the time. I work for a big box store so Im not helping the little guy out either, but I bet the indy shops can Identify with this little story. I had a customer come in with some flee bay knock off POS amp that wasnt working, he installed it himself and the amp came on but the sub made no sound at all. I followed normal trouble shooting procedures for this customer, who buy the way had bought several thousand dollars in gear off me for his good car and this was in his beater. I pulled the sub outta the box and bumped it, it worked fine, put it back in the box, which I had disconected from the amp, and bumped the box, it worked fine as well. I tested the ground, it was garbage so redid the ground and it know tested fine but the amp still did not work. The lights were on but no one was home. I checked the power and it was providing 13. something or other volts when running so it was fine, remote was the same. I tried the output on the deck and it was delivering signal as well so it was clearly the amp. Out of intrest I hit my hand on the top of the amp and it started to work for about 15 seconds then stopped. I repeated this process a couple times with the same results everytime. I showed the customer and he looked at me and asked what I did to his amp. I said that it was clearly defective and explained how his ground was trash but I fixed that and that if he hooked up another amp it would work fine. I did not charge to do any of this either. Long story short he was saying that the amp was fine and should have worked after I fixed HIS IMPROPER ground and that I must have damaged his amp and he wanted me to replace it for him. I politly told him to hit the bricks. Long story short is do you think I am ever gonna help out some cheap skate again, esspecially for free, regardless of what he has boughten off me in the past. Its not worth it as it just opens up doors to problems. Try looking at it from both sides next time and you'll see that as much as you want to save your money, I still need to make money and I dont do that by fixing problems of people who buy wire and distrobution blocks off me.