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From: haferman@audry.gsfc.nasa.gov (Jeff Haferman) Subject: BBY (Best Buy) Washington Post Article Date: 1997/02/28 Message-ID: <5f6rf6@post.gsfc.nasa.gov> Organization: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center -- Greenbelt, Maryland USA Newsgroups: misc.invest.stocks Originator: haferman@audry.gsfc.nasa.gov

At Best Buy, an Arresting Price Policy

By Peter Finn Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, February 28, 1997; Page A01

There are comparison shoppers.

And then there's Ronald Kahlow.

Kahlow, 54, wanted a TV set. So he created a program on his laptop computer that would let him record the model number and price of every television in a string of stores near his Reston home.

First stop: Best Buy.

And that's where things started to get, um, bizarre. Kahlow, a computer jock who owns a small software company, was arrested twice and led away in handcuffs when he refused to stop recording TV prices. In court, he read a poem by Robert F. Kennedy to the judge, who declared him not guilty of trespass. The judge, Donald P. McDonough, compared Kahlow to the civil rights demonstrators of the 1960s.

Now Kahlow is suing Best Buy for $90,000.

All for a good deal on a TV.

Best Buy officials said the company, which is based in Minneapolis, has an unwritten policy not to allow anyone to record prices in its stores.

"For competitive reasons, we ask that pricing not be written down," said spokeswoman Laurie Bauer. "It's a disruption of other customers. [The policy is] so other customers will not feel threatened or disrupted."

Bauer declined to discuss either the trespassing case brought against Kahlow or his civil suit.

It all started in July. Looking like a gunslinger with a laptop, Kahlow sauntered into Best Buy in Reston with his computer strapped around his waist. He said he was leaning toward a big screen model but was pricing everything. Kahlow said he was keying in the information when store employees asked him to stop. Kahlow said he explained what he was doing and refused to stop.

According to court testimony, Best Buy employees stood in front of Kahlow and pulled the tags off every television he had not yet priced.

The store also called the police, who asked Kahlow to leave. He refused and was arrested on a trespassing charge.

The next day, Kahlow came backarmed with pad and paper.

He started taking down prices again. The police were called again. Kahlow was arrested again.

"I felt very intimidated," Kahlow said. "Each step of the way, I felt more and more furious. I mean, come on, I'm a consumer. I was totally in the right. When something is plumb wrong, you have to stand up."

Retail analyst Ken Gassman, who secretly records prices all the time to compare different companies, said some stores do throw out professional shoppersif they can detect them. But, Gassman said, Best Buy's competitors and price analysts such as him never would be as obvious as Kahlow.

"Is Best Buy out of its mind?" asked Gassman, of Davenport and Co., a brokerage house in Richmond. "This is so anti-consumer, it's unbelievable. And it raises the question about whether they are the lowest priced. . . . If you call yourself Best Buy and you are the best buy, then why would you worry about comparison shopping?"

One of Best Buy's main competitors said it doesn't proscribe comparison shopping. "As long as someone is not disruptive, we have no policy" against it, said Morgan Stewart, a spokesman for Richmond-based Circuit City.

It isn't the only one. "Customers can come in and take down any price they want," said Brian Dowling, a spokesman for Safeway Stores Inc. "In fact, it's something our customers and our competitors do all the time."

"Someone wants to price, we tell them to enjoy themselves," said Barry Scher, a spokesman for Giant Food Inc.

After his arrest, Kahlow said he priced TVs at several other electronics retailers, including Circuit City. In each instance, he said, he was asked what he was doing but was allowed to continue when he explained he was comparing prices before deciding where to buy a TV.

A month after his misadventure at Best Buy, Kahlow stood before McDonough in Fairfax County General District Court.

Best Buy argued that Kahlow was interrupting other sales.

The judge, in full rhetorical flower, disagreed.

"I come from a period in which civil disobedience was a method of life," McDonough said to Kahlow. "I view this period with immense pride. . . . It was extraordinarily helpful in [the] overall growth of our nationbecause people did things like you did."

Kahlow recorded the hearing in General District Court, and McDonough confirmed the accuracy of his own remarks.

Kahlow, not to be outdone by McDonough's flourish, recited "Ripple of Hope," which was written by Robert F. Kennedy in 1966:

"Each time a man stands up for an ideal Or acts to improve the lot of others Or strikes out against injustice He sends forth a tiny ripple of hope."

The judge, moved, said, "Never has the cause of comparative shopping been so eloquently advanced."

McDonough then turned to Best Buy's representative and said, "I know of no law that says you cannot take down priceswhether you are taking down on a computer or you are taking them down on a pad of paper, which I do. . . . Now if Best Buy wishes to do so, they certainly may post a banner saying that comparative shopping is not permissible."

Bauer, of Best Buy, declined to comment on the judge's remarks.

After Kahlow was found not guilty, he filed a civil suit in Fairfax County against Best Buy seeking $90,000 in damages. He said that he offered to settle for $3,000 in legal costs, an apology from Best Buy and a declaration that it is all right to record prices but that he never heard back from the company.

Kahlow and the company are due back in court Tuesday for a meeting about the suit.

Meanwhile, the space in Kahlow's Reston home where he planned to put his new TV still stands empty.

"I got so ticked off, I never bought one," he said.

Copyright 1997 The Washington Post Company