Okay, I will just clarify that I'm all for supporting local retailers.
Like a few people have pointed out, they rely on us to keep them afloat.
My issue is that they do not want to even try to get the sale.
When i point out that i can save up to twice the amount of the purchase price by shopping online overseas i would expect them to at least throw me a bone. Especially when i'm waving a wad of cash in their face. Not tell me the best you can do on a 600 dollar item is 50 miserable bucks. While i have three other items that total $1800 as well. And there are 6 of the same item on the shelf waiting for some other sucker.
Look i'm not ready to be outlaying 60k on a console yet, and if i was purchasing something in that price range then i wouldnt be expecting a 50% reduction on the price because i know i can't find that sort of deal anywhere on the planet. But when it's some that is mass produced, and readily available, globally, for that sort of price reduction why shouldn't i ask for the local seller to at least have a go at making the sale?
Having said that I have an account at Muso's Corner in Newcastle for consumables and bits and bobs, and I wouldn't like to be paying their wages and insurance bills at all. It's a money pit, any type of business, these days, and no one makes a quid out of tight arses like us, we are not the bread and butter of the music retail business.
As for operating retail business like these ones, yes i realise there are associated overheads, that if the place you are renting is a money pit then you need those inflated profits from sales but surely there are ways around this. Call me naive but there is always a way isn't there? a fire sale? a end of year tax write off? If you are not going to try then you will end up losing out, and that helps nobody.
You mustn't have been trying at Musos
And yes i did try at Musos Corner, i took three of my mates in there last christmas and collectively we spent over 6k in cash in the one go just on guitars. Plus the other 4 thousand on leads, monitors, mics and accessories etc. Scotty was loving life. Now you can say that 10k cash is a pittance when you talk about gear but for 3 blokes who hadn't ever spent over 500 bucks on gear from anywhere but Macron or those other consumer crap traps it was a lot of coin. I had to persuade them they were getting a good deal, which they did, some of the stuff they got 30% off on due to the amount of coin they were spending. Hard earned sweaty coin. But in reality the saving was just 30% of the profit they <musos corner> were making so really there wasn't a significant saving at all. So this year i've told them to import, and they are doing that.
Money leaving the Australian economy hurts all of us. Australian businesses closing and leaving their staff jobless means less customers with money to spend, which effects every other business in Australia, including recording studios and whatever jobs you Turtlerockers have. No customers, no business, and it has a domino effect. The guys that lose their jobs at the music/camera/hifi/jewellery/whatever shops stop spending at the local cafe and food shops, stop buying gear or renting studios themselves, and on it goes. Everyone suffers.
The way I see it, now that we have parity of the dollar I would expect retailers to want the sales, not turn them away. What kind of businessman/woman would turn away cash sales because the profit margin they will make will only be 1/3rd of what they would have made 6/12/18 months ago? Not me man. I want that old stock out the door so i can buy more at even cheaper prices. It's not my problem Westfield/Joe Bloggs etc is charging you excessive rent. Or that the wholesale mob who has a stranglehold over the imports is not playing ball with the prices of stock. Why punish me? I am a customer who wants to spend my money with your business rather than give it to some yank who i will never be able to have a face to face with to try and get a little bit better of a deal for my dollar.
I don't know about you lot but like i said before, until i have to start spending my money here again my buck is going where it suits me most, and that is in my back pocket or in my bank account. I went so beserk spending money lately overseas my missus has put me on a permanent ban on buying stuff till after christmas, F*ck i'm on a 24/7/365 ban! and she's making me sell stuff i don't use everyday to cover HER expenses
In fact the only place in Aus i have spent coin at recently was at Pony today for a Voxguard Screen, and that's for her. I can't convince her that it's gear that i will need one day, to her it's just gear. And thats it.
Thank the heavens for the sneaky TAB and Paypal account eh.
Better late than never!
and trying to get the most for my dollar has resulted in me being a little unfair on retailers in the Audio game. And to be honest i still have to get my hands dirty occasionally. Not that i mind having to do it.