Re: [AV Media Matters] Refurbished Equipment

[rohre@ARLUT.UTEXAS.EDU]

I have seen electronics sold as refurbished
by chain stores who specialize in electronics.  Those apparently have
either internal processes by the chain, or by the distributor/manufacturer of
the brand to handle merchandise that might have been an infant mortality, or
returned by a customer for other reasons.  Some labels may say
remanufactured, when the brand owner has done the work.  Refurbished might
mean a more local repair.

There also exists now a quite organized
reverse distribution network, which are companies who specialize in buying
discontinued models, overstocks, stock from retailers going out of
business, etc. and then reselling them to Dollar stores, discount stores, or
even retail chains not primarily in the business of selling that type of
merchandise.  Examples of the latter are the cheap tool displays you see at
drug stores, they are marketed by the reverse merchandisers.  Some of this
is done by catalog resales, and I am sure there are web resellers who do bulk
sales.  I am now even seeing computer accessories in Walgreen's drug stores
locally!

Some refurbished merchandise are items that have had excessive repair
estimates when sent in for service, and the owner has chosen to abandon the
item.  Later inspection has found something that was not so costly to
repair and the item is repaired to basic functionality and resold as
refurbished.  Others were infant mortalities that have been combined with
others with differing problems to be repaired into a functioning unit.

Other paths for merchandise to resale could be bulk import shipments that
suffered water or shipping damage to packaging, but which could be
repackaged  and  refurbished.  The interior product may not have
had any damage at all, and might be unused.

The quality of refurbished is probably indicated by whether there is any
warranty on the item resold.  Power tools from chains such as Sears are
sometimes sold as refurbished, and are generally backed by a warranty, thus can
be a reliable choice.  Other resale's, and especially those on e-commerce
are often "where is, as is", and may or may not have any warranty.

Some electronics chains sell small quantities of remaining stock at various
times in their stores as a where is, as is item.  For some reason, even
with computerized inventory, such chains cannot track all sales and can end up
with a few models left over when the new model comes out.  They have opted
to minimize the old stock return problem by local sales disposal.  Radio
Shack has done this for years in their chain stores.

Stuart Rohre
Applied Research Labs, Univ. of Tx.