they were empty when i walked in and wouldn't help me at first even though all their sales people were just standing around. i even said "Excuse me" to one salesperson who just kept walking and ignored me.
i later heard from other friends that if you weren't a 50+ year old white guy, the salespeople there just refuse to help out. One of my friends went in there to buy some gear not long after me. when he went in and asked where their headphone section was, they told him the Best Buy was across the street, laughed and turned their backs on him.
I ended up buying from another brick and mortar shop a friend recommended and they couldn’t have been more helpful. This was probably 15 years ago now and many hi-fi shops I’ve been to since haven’t been as “old-school” with the snobbery
Here's the thing, you don't need to be a tool.
The closest HiFi shop to me is MD and that's over an hour away, the closest record store, not Walmart, is about 45 minutes away. To bring my tool comment full circle, a simple "Hello, let me know if you have any questions" will suffice, even if you walk in with tattered clothes.
Same with record stores, I went into this one once and had 2 binders of 78's that were just collecting dust, my intention was to just give them to the place in case they had any 78 collectors, so when I said "Hey, I'm gonna look around, but I have these 78's I just don't need, I'd like to donate them in case you have any customers who might be interested", your response should be...........
A. Thank you
B. Thank you, but we really don't have anyone ever looking
It shouldn't be..........
"Here's what you do, go down the street to Goodwill and just drop them off there", that's what I was told verbatim.
So, as my pappy used to tell me "Son, there's a right way and wrong way to do EVERYTHING"