
HP's New Strategy and Firesale Fiasco - jameshicks
http://www.thetechscoop.net/2011/08/21/hp-new-strategy-and-firesale-fiasco/#more-23527
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ddw
Saturday morning I drove to some stores looking for one. At Staples they said
that they weren't selling them and that corporate told them to return them.

Waited outside Best Buy for about 25 minutes with 15 other people and same
thing.

Radio Shack had them in the back room, but they hadn't marked them down.

THEN the next day Best Buy and Staples have them marked down on the web. I
randomly go to bestbuy.com that morning and buy a 32GB mere minutes before
they sell out.

I'm really curious as to why the stores changed their mind. If the employees
on Saturday are to be believed, corporate didn't want to sell them at a
reduced rate and just wanted to return them for refund to HP. What did HP say
to convince them to mark down the Touchpads?

And Staples had an additional $50 instant coupon on the 16GB! Did they drive a
hard bargain with HP and forced them to refund to Staples an additional $50
even though they sold them?

Did HP really not want them back that badly? Couldn't they just have them sent
back and sell them on HP.com themselves with some kind of actual communication
to the public?

It's all very strange and I would love to know the whole story. (I sometimes
spend my time pondering such trivial things)

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mvkel
It's so funny seeing people scramble for something they didn't know they
wanted 24 hours before, and not get it.

I went to a local Best Buy, which refused to drop the price. They stated they
were shipping all the TouchPads back to HP. One gentleman apparently REALLY
wanted a TouchPad, so even though he was there for the fire sale, he bought
one at full price. My head exploded.

