Ritz camera

[Ruffian29]

Their prices are only average, but if you have any worries about your camera their warranty beats any i've ever heard of a company offering (for about 60ish dollars a year, to be renewed as you like, no need to pay for more than one year up front)
Their warranty covers everything except for fire damage.
They'll fix it even if you go into the store and say i droped my camera and I want it fixed. Any user damage, unless you set your camera on fire, will be covered.

I think its worth paying their average prices just to get that warranty, especially because I just bought a cannon sd300 and was worried about the stories i had heard about their lcds breaking.

:-)
good luck

[purplesocklady]

I wanted to buy my Canon PS S2 there, but they didn't have it in yet. So I went to Best Buy. I was sorry within minutes. They won't open the box so you can see the unit you are purchasing. They seal it with yellow self-destructing tape. They have a 15% restocking fee once you unseal the box. So how are you supposed to really test it and know it's what you want?

Ritz gives a month to test drive, no questions. And they have the warranty, and free lessons if you want them. Not to mention, very knowledgeable sales people. They are willing to take the time to show you and help you learn. No pushiness. (Ask for the manager for superb service.)

[Ruffian29]

I totally agree. The person I talked to about the cameras was so smart about them. She really knew what she was talking about. I've had recent problems with Best Buy and they are quickly falling off of my liked stores list ;)

Go to ritz, maybe they can order the camera for you?

[Rhys]

The last two times I was in Ritz (different branches), the guy in the first branch didn't seem to know what an MH-53 charger was and wasn't inclined toward looking it up in his catalogue. The guy in Ritz was only interested in flogging some multi-charger or other by some noname Chinese company. The guy in the second branch thumbed through his catalogue without finding the Pentax *ist Ds that I wanted to try in the shop and seemed pretty clueless as to what an SLR was. I'm convinced that Ritz is staffed by pushers and morons.

[Ruffian29]

that stinks about your experience with them. I guess its going to be different at each chain. The Ritz near me has incredibly knowledgeable people. It was amazed at what this woman that I was talking to knew about the cameras, without needing to look them up at all.
She also knew exactly what they had in stock. I was looking for a camera for my dad, and explaining to her all the specifications that i needed for it, which were hard to match, and she thought for a bit, showed me some cameras that would be ok given the restrictions that I had, and then got excited, told me to hold on a min, and went into the back room and came out with a camera that was about perfect, considering the circumstances.

I also went to another Ritz camera, in a different state, and the guy that I talked to was pretty good, but not like this woman was.

But by far they were more knowledgebale than people I've found at Best Buy, Sears, Circut City, Staples, Office Max, and the hundreds of other places that I checked (the guy from sears told me that any camera with a lithium battery you can plug the camera directly into the wall to recharge, without needing to remove the battery... which we all know is BS, he had NO idea what he was talking about)