I have a 6-year-old son, and we just got into the RC hobby; in the past 4 months, I've spent over 3k at the Northbrook, IL, location. I got a TRX-4, Kraton S6, Bandit XL-5, lots of accessories, replacement parts, and 1 repair. During my shopping experiences, their customer service has been substandard at best. I got a TRX-4 repaired, and it took them about 2 months to get it fixed; it's not so much that it took them such a long time to repair it; what makes this frustrating is their inability to do a simple follow-up.
Six weeks ago, I purchased a Kraton S6, and after the second week and 10 uses, it stopped working. I called the store and talked to the salesperson who sold it to me; I explained that the pinion was out of line and grinding the spur. The salesperson told me that he knew what I was talking about and that this was a manufacturer defect.
* On the first phone call, I was told that I should reach out to Arrma; no luck; they are based out of England.
* On the second phone call to the store, I was told that they could look at it but could not fix it until Horizon Hobby would approve the repair.
* On the third phone call, I reached out to Horizon Hobby, and they told me to take it to Hobby Town and that they could repair it, and that this was a normal procedure.
* On the fourth phone call on December 13th, I called Hobby Town and told them that per Horizon Hobby, I could bring it in for repair, and this was a normal repair process. They told me that this was correct and to bring it in.
* On the 14th of December, I brought it to the store; the salesperson who took it from me was vague about the process but told me that they would wait for Horizon Hobby to approve the repair and that I would get a phone call on the 17th of December.
* On December 21st, no one had followed up with me, so I went to the store to see if they had done anything with it.
* During my visit, the person that sold it to me was dismissive and gave me this song and dance about the RC not being in the store because it "was sent for repairing", and walked away.
* By now, I'm just irritated that I've made so many phone calls and two visits to get this RC repaired.
* I left, and a few minutes later, I just decided that this was enough of having to deal with this and went back to the store and took the RC back. When I demanded to have it, it suddenly became available.
* I have now reached out to Horizon Hobby, and they will repair it. I'm almost sure that they will not take 2 months to repair it.
My position on this is straightforward, Hobby Town takes my money with 0 issues but does as little as possible to provide any basic support. As I mentioned above, I have spent over 3k in the past few months. Hobby Town knowingly selling a product with a manufacturer defect is, by FTC guidelines, a deceptive business practice. Personally, as someone who analyzes industries in the stock markets around the world, the writing is on the wall; retail is in a steep decline that, unfortunately, is a self-fulfilling prophecy. The example above plays out repeatedly, and it drives customers to third-party platforms like Amazon, e-Bay, etc.; analyzing the future of retail is incredibly simple; you can see the behavior and evaluation of market caps, and it is clear that retailers are literally forcing customers to purchase the product elsewhere.
If I had purchased any of these RCs on Amazon, I could've easily gotten a replacement with 0 hassles within 2 days or less. The only reason why I purchased products in a retail store near me was that I wanted product support at the local level. Unfortunately, Hobby Town is unable to do the basics, and it goes out of its way not to provide any support. The equation for profitability is straightforward. When a customer purchases one RC, the wear and tear on these toys creates a long term need for accessories and replacement parts. When I purchased the Kraton S6, I also purchased 4 batteries, 1 charger, and accessories. The RC was $546.00; the batteries were $450.00. accessories were $150.00, and I was planning to get them installed; I'm guessing that manual labor would be around $150.00; my $546.00 RC has generated an additional $750.00 / 138% in revenue. In addition to that, I was planning to purchase an Arrma, Outcast 8S with 4 batteries. The total cost would be $1496.00; that said, this would have brought the total revenue to about $4500.00 in a 5-month time span. I placed an order for an Outcast S8 and 6 batteries and lots of accessories for about $2300.00 from Amazon.
In addition to this, I have noticed that when I'm shopping at this store, I'm always being followed and get the sense that the people there think that I'm going to steal something. Not sure what gives anyone that impression after being there so often and buying a significant number of accessories. It is more than likely the obvious, and I will leave it at that. I will never purchase anything from your stores. read more
