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A few days ago we tried to help our readers a quick rundown on the lost art of haggling. Haggle 101 if you will. Unfortunately, we have very short attention spans over here OOH STRING!!! What was I saying? Oh yea, we simply couldn’t fit enough information into the last article so here we are with some more tips.

In our first article we mostly focused on renegotiating existing bills (cable, internet, phone) for the better. However, after a few days of calling your utilities, you invariably will be running out of things to do with your newly found bartering skills. So, as promised, this article will focus more on getting deals locally. If you read this post and have something to add, correct, have a better method, a suggestion to make something work better… or simply want to say thank you, please take the time to post it below.

Ok, I will start off by saying one thing, then contridicting myself. Just hear out my train of thought. First, It does not REALLY matter what store you go to, you can barter ANYWHERE. You can haggle at the supermarket, department store, high end mall shops, everywhere. With that said, those places are all much harder, not always guaranteed, so we’re going to take baby steps.

If you want the best chances of successfully haggling a better deal, start practicing at the high end/boutique stores.  Here are a couple reasons:

1. These stores have the highest prices, but it might surprise you to know that they often pay the same or less than the ‘cheap’ stores. What that means to you, is that they have the largest margin to play with IF they want to. The larger their margin, the farther they can drop the price and still make a profit.
2. Because of their higher prices, they are less crowded, and will be more apt to make a smaller profit if they believe you are/will be a valuable return customer. If you happen to be in the service industry related to the product they sell, this is a good thing to stress. For instance, if you repair computers, or you install car stereos and they sell amps and subwoofers… your referral to purchase parts at their store holds a lot of weight to your customers.
3. They are usually privately owned. There is a good chance that if the manager isn’t related to the owner, they still carry REAL power in the store to mostly do whatever they want. Along the same lines, you may want to go during ‘normal’ business hours. The main manager will often leave at 5, even if the store is open longer; they are also hard to catch on weekends. If you go outside these hours, you will be left with employees only, or a night manager with significantly less power (even if they claim otherwise).
4. High end boutique stores often sell wholesale to other local businesses. They do this so that they have more ‘buying power’ when they negotiate rates when THEY buy. Because of these wholesale deals that the stores make on an every day basis, their computers are already set up for discounting equipment/products for whatever reason they want. In some cases meager employees are capable of dropping the price 10% or more. Managers in these stores have even more discounting power.

After reading these reasons you probably have a store or two in mind already, feel free to post them below. If not, start thinking. Next week I’ll post part 3, and you’ll need to at least have an idea of what store you will be practicing on.

Just to get the ball rolling, I have had good experience at Guitar Center, and the now defunct Sound Advice/Tweeter chains. However my best experience has always been with locally owned businesses where the manager on site IS the owner.