| A Guitar Center once had on one of their "super-mega-used-sale" lists a Studer A820 with an 8-track headstack on it for $995 (that's right, a grand!!! In US Dollars!). I was one of the first in the store, and walked up to a sales guy (who was already too busy to take cash being thrown at him), and said, "I want that" and pointed to the list. It was for sale, I had money. I should have been able to throw it in my truck and drive away.
I was told that it was offsite, and that i'd have to come back since they'd have to "Find it". How the **** do you lose a 2" machine? Anyways, I came back for 4 days in a row (and had purchased about $2500 of other equipment that was on sale) trying to get some info on when I could get the machine, or something about it's condition. One of the guys said they couldn't find it, another said that they knew of the machine and it was in perfect condition with new heads, etc... nothing was making sense.
I wanted to put money on it (and has asked about that initially). I was told that the items on the list were ONLY for sale starting that monday morning that I had initially inquired about it, so no-one could have gotten it before me. Believe me, I'd have been in there Sunday night picking up stuff and avoiding the crowd otherwise.
Finally on Thursday, i was told, "Oh the (name replaced) Super-High-End-Untouchable-by-managers-because-he-sells-to-Aerosmith sales guy sold it to Vintage King along with a stack of preamps that some other salesguy was trying to sell."
I was pissed. I had the cash in hand wanting to buy it, but because of the ineptness of the salespeople ( I used to be one there, but i never ****ed up anything that badly), poor organization, and some untouchable sales-ass doing something that kinda shady IMHO (why would he sell Vintage king a tape machine that they are going to sell for 10x as much for a grand?), I wasn't able to get it. The crap wasn't supposed to be sold before the sales day, and apparently he had somehow bypassed everyone anyways.
I wanted that Studer, but now it's sitting at VK, for 10x as much likely. |