West Marine Matches [Amazon] price...

jbdba01 · Joined: 18 Nov 2014 Posts: 172 State or Province: FL

The times they are a changing...I always considered West Marine a "last/emergency option" .

From their website...

"Won’t Be Beat—Price Match Guarantee
We want you to shop with confidence and WE WON’T BE BEAT ON PRICE!

If you find a lower price on an identical product (Brand and Model) at a retail competitor’s store or website within 30 days of purchase, West Marine will match that price."

Full details below.

https://www.westmarine.com/CustomerService/Price-Policy

Now at least I have a reason to go there.

PaulNBriannaLynn · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 8:24 am Post subject:

Yeah I hate to say it, because it goes against everything Ive ever said previously.... but I just bought two racor water separators there over the weekend and they were 4 dollars cheaper a piece than my usual local shop which was sold out. Maybe they're attempting to be more competitive?

srbaum · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 8:57 am Post subject:

West has been my last stop when shopping for the past 20 years or so. Years ago they did price match, but that ended about the same time that they raised all of their prices.
I have learned over the years to TRY and plan for my needs, so that I only have to give West "gold" only on occasion. As a matter of fact, I have several gift cards in my wallet, worth several hundred dollars, but am waiting to buy something worthwhile, vice a simple bag of fasteners. My go-to for stuff is boats.net (engine parts), Defender, Fisheries, Hamilton for powerboat and sailboat stuff. This past fall I purchased a new furler and headstay for one of my sailboats and tried to get West to cut a deal. They would not budge, so Defender provided it at 25% less then West (same product model).
I am glad to hear that they are finally making an effort, because things like Amazon will eventually crush them. The real plus of this benefit, is that (maybe) we can get glue/paint locally, without paying the additional hazmat fee, related to most all mail orders...

jkidd · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 8:58 am Post subject:

They closed the store in Salt Lake City and would imagine many others. They have been gouging everyone for the last five years or so now they are trying to buy back customers. They give the old story of brick and mortar being so much more expensive to operate. I would think that Amazon's automation costs a lot more and their employees make better wages too. Will see if they survive.

RobLL · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 11:34 am Post subject:

The first two times I went to Westmarine I was met by really knowledgeable people. So I assumed that would always be the case. LOL - I quickly learned. But I often have wondered, why doesn't Westmarine sell time with people who know a lot. I would happily pay for hours of time for various tutoring on a variety of marine issues. Appointments would be fine, and likely tutors could be rated online.

Good information is cheap at twice the price.

ssobol · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 1:14 pm Post subject:

To me West Marine is like Best Buy, a showroom. Once I find something I want/need I find it somewhere else at a better price. Sometimes it is online, sometimes it is the other boat store down the street. In one instance, some hardware I was looking at was 2x the price at WM compared to down the street.

Occasionally WM does offer something at a really good deal, but that is kind of rare.

One thing about WM is that they devote a good chunk of the floor space to apparel that most other marine supply places do not. Maybe that brings them a lot of money or maybe they could remove that stuff and reduce the store footprint to be more efficient.

It could also be that most C-Dory owners are more (ahem) frugal than your typical boat owner. While we may baulk at the prices, maybe others do not. I know in places like Ft. Lauderdale where I go to WM, there is plenty of money for expensive toys. Maybe those people just don't care about the price and pay for the convenience.

robhwa · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 1:14 pm Post subject:

My son is an automation geek for Amazon. In many ways that count, Amazon is a nearly perfect place to buy, usually free shipping, usually lower prices, if you need/want to return something they immediately credit your account. I ordered a Canon downrigger depthfinder once, listed through an Amazon retailer with a picture. I had bought the downrigger from SportCo, but they didn't have the depthfinder. I was sent the packaging of a Canon with a different depthfinder inside. It took about 2 minutes to resolve the issue, all online with the Amazon site, my account was credited, and UPS picked it up from my porch the next day, free of charge.

I have rarely received anything from Amazon or an Amazon retailer that wasn't well packed. I now live on an island, so going to a store is an expensive, time-consuming effort, and often what you need isn't there anyway. I ordered unusual saw blades for a brushcutter on Tuesday and got them Wednesday from Amazon. I once ordered a boat part about 10:00 AM and it was on my porch at 3:00 PM the same day. Online it said it would come from Connecticut, but when my son looked, it had been pre-shipped from Connecticut, to the Kent, Washington, facility in anticipation of me buying it. Apparently, an algorithm had determined that I visited the Amazon site enough times, and availability elsewhere was low, and when I looked for boat parts I did buy them, so they preshipped to near me. That is kind of scary.

Amazon invests all of its revenues back into the company rather than try and generate an annual or quarterly profit to payout to owners. Amazon collects and pays state and local taxes for online sales, which I believe is fair. Many online companies don't.

Like me, my son isn't so great in the social skills department, but at Amazon, monitored performance seems to be what you are judged on, not how well you cozy up to a supervisor, and not that you always say politically-correct things.

I'm happy to have a company like Amazon available. I just hope the service it delivers doesn't change, since I rely so much on it. I am also glad to see West Marine, where I often shop at the Tacoma store, make its prices competitive, and I hope that they can stay in business. I often buy things at regular retail stores, for what I know are higher prices, just because I like the people that work there, and usually talk to them about crabbing, fishing, boats, etc. I often get good information, like we see on this site, so please do try and support companies like West Marine when you can, and order from Amazon when you can't.

hardee · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 2:09 pm Post subject:

When I first bought SleepyC, West marine offered a new boat owners special. I don't remember the details but it was a substantially better deal that I could get anywhere else, plus, I got rebate credits for future purchases. it was worth it, and the folks there were all into boating, knew their way around both sail and power, and if they didn't they would get tho other person in the store to help. They even had one guy who was good in electronics, not just selling but knowing his way around in most of the brands.

My local WM is about 40 miles away but it beats anything I have locally and right across the street is the best fish and chips in WA state, SeaJ's in Port Townsend.

Harvey
SleepyC Moon

localboy · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 2:51 pm Post subject:

colbysmith · Posted: Thu Mar 08, 2018 8:16 pm Post subject:

While I don't disagree much with everything being said here, I will say WM has been great when it comes to returning or exchanging merchandise. And on many things, the price really isn't much more than anywhere else. In fact many times I've ended up buying filters from WM rather than Amazon as they've actually beat Amazon by a few cents or dollars. Colby