From personal experience as an oldie, therefore a shopper for many years I can say that staff knowledge or lack sometimes of it can be tagged to a far wider range of retailers than Jessops. Electrical retailers, Hi Fi Retailers, Computer Retailers ......... the list goes on and I am sure anyone reading this can add their own examples.
As for Jessops I have made or been involved (for family) in 4 camera puchases at different branches over the last eight years. Of these one can be described as a pretty dire experience, but the others were fine. So in my case 3 out of 4 had knowledgeable and friendly staff. In my bad experience case it was after two good ones, so despite being pretty irate at the time I knew this was not a reflection of all their branches. If you are unlucky to have a poor one on your high street then you are unlucky as it is worth pointing out some have a grood one on theirs.
When it comes to prices then it should be recognised that a lot of Jessops stores have been moved into plush shopping centres which no doubt cost a lot in rent and rates, so they may have the buying power, but then their outgoings are far higher than somewhere like Warehouse Express which operates out of an Industrial Estate on the edge of town.
I note en830's and Wolfies comment re prices, but there are those of us that like to buy face to face, and although we may on one level pay more by doing that, on another level if we have a good dealer then it can make up for itself.
As we are into examples then here is one from my side of the street.
When the Nikon D200 came out I read all the reviews as part of my homework and ordered one from my local dealer. When it arrived they rang and I went over full of excitement. On having a play in the shop one thing not mentioned in any review showed itself immediately. ...... Lack of eye relief. To use it I had to press right up against the review screen, so in use that would be permenantly smeared. At the time the dealer was a Canon dealer and not a Nikon dealer, but they agreed to order a D2X for me to try as they felt in view of my wants that was possibly the machine for me. As it turned out they were absolutely right and I bought it. The point here is that they were prepared to specially order the second camera with no guarantee of a sale after I had rejected the first for the reason mentioned. Now I may have paid a bit more than the lowest internet price but for me it was well worth it. They are now a Nikon dealer and since then I have bought Stevies camera and three lenses from them.
Nothing wrong with buying off the internet if that is what you are happy with, but having read lots of forum threads on kit I am only too aware of the latest and best syndrome. The D200 was called a mini D2X in its time and it is far from it in my opinion. Now move to the D300, then on its announcement the specs looked good and previews were very good, so a huge number of D2X owners flooded the marked with their old camera to get the new ' D2X killer - the D300 ' before the X used values fell through the floor.
Even now if you read threads in DPR or Nikon Cafe the D2X is written off as old technology and the D300 is rated far higher, and a lot of these are by previous D2X owners. Not sure how many are self justifying what they did, but a few have said they regretted the move and swapped back.
The proof of the pudding as to how much waffle is posted really came home when I got Stevie a D300. As far as the net went then this was going to leave me with the D2X well behind. In fact compared to the D2X it turns out to only win on five counts. Better review screen, smaller and therefore lighter, live view, built in flash, and better performance from ISO600. For my needs the 'old technology D2X ' wins in all other areas most of which are never mentioned in those forum threads. Since we have had Stevies D300 I get a fair amount of amusement at reading those posts now.
So I feel high street dealers including Jessops, or other more backstreet dealers, have a role to play for those like me that do not necessarily believe all we read on the net, and like to actually try before we buy. If that tags me as to quote en830, " as having less than half a brain cell " then fine. All up I feel that in the long run having a relationship with a great dealer has actually saved me time, money, and hassel.
Don
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