BrianAndPamela.com

The Unethical but (Mostly) Legal Retail Shopping Tactics of Devil Consumers - SixWise.com

Learn before you return - Charlotte Observer

There's a fine line between protecting your bottom line and punishing your customers.  Best Buy, Target and other retailers are pursuing ways to stop you from being a "Devil Shopper" that costs them money. 

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There are tons of Online Deal aggregator. I'm going to tell you about another one… And yeah, it's got a weird name: Wubee.com.
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Link to Why you can't get iPods at a discount. - By Sean Cooper - Slate Magazine

Ever wonder why the prices for some things vary so wildly from store to store, even from week to week?  Ever notice that iPods, in fact ALL Apple products, are the same price no matter where you go?  Ever been shopping online and found an item that you had to add to your cart to find out the price?  Slate's got the answer, and I'll reveal it all, just read more… (more…)

eToys: GR8 TaT2 Maker from Spin Master Toys

Because kids today don't draw on themselves with quite enough reckless abandon, Spin Master Toys presents the gift that every child in the lower socio-economic strata wants this Christmas:  The GR8 TaT2 Maker.  In the immortal words of Dave Barry, I am not making this up.  Sadly I'm not changing the spelling either, that bit of psuedo-hip leet/txt tlk is straight off the desk of some marketing genius at Spin Master (who, it seems, also makes the 7-11 Slurpee maker and the "Airbrush Tattoos" system targeted at little girls).  So now little Billy can get himself tatted up, and pretend to work at the McDonalds Drive Through.  ((Comments about after work activities including his rusted out Big Wheel etc.. have been withheld.)) (more…)

Critical - Hits Dot Net » Amazon Wii Launch! Estimated Arrival
So the gist of the linked story is that this guy waited in line at Best Buy to get a Wii and missed out.  Well, too bad, but it has to happen to someone, right?  Anyway, he comes home and hops on Amazon, thinking that he might get lucky and get one from them and have it shipped.  So he gets the one-click all set up and after several reloads gets the order button to pop up.  Good for him, right?  Not so, seems Amazon is more than willing to take his payment and THEN inform him that his Wii is estimated to ship in the MIDDLE OF JANUARY.  Might have been nice of them to mention before he payed them and payed for overnight shipping. 

In my case I pre-ordered a CD.  Now last time I did this Amazon actually shipped it so that it arrived at my house on the day it was released.  That and the CD was actually a couple of dollars cheaper than it was at Best Buy or wherever so the shipping costs evened out.  This time, it worked out to be a little more, but I figured it was worth it to not have to run down to the store, right?  No.  They shipped it the day AFTER launch.  So I payed more and had to wait three days. 

I'm telling you, I'm done with Amazon.  They're only good for wishlists and grabbing missing album art pictures for iTunes.

Lillian Vernon: McDonald's Playset

For those kids you just don't expect too much from, Lillian Vernon offers the McDonalds Drive-Thru playset.  Complete with cash register, play money credit card scanner (with credit cards… there's a whole 'nother blog post there) and fake food, trans-fats not included.  Next year, I hear they have plans for a toy that lets you pretend to be the guy that scrapes gum off the bottom of bus seats.

Techcrunch » Blog Archive » My CarsDirect Experience

Michael Arrington just bought a new car through Cars Direct and has a great write up of exactly how the process worked.  If you're interested in how new car buying online works, it's a great read. 

Sorry, was that out loud?  There's a new man in our family.  I don't even know his last name, but I know he's a genius.  He helped me shop for my son's last birthday present and recently assisted me in the bargain find of the year, a new stove and microwave for $100 cash.  Want to know more about him?  Try www.craigslist.org   That's right, my new best friend can be yours too with any internet connection!  

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