Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own

I think that Greg and I generally do a good job buying and managing product at the store, but about once every year or so, despite our best efforts and intentions, something manages to go horrendously wrong and we wind up buried under a pile of some piece or another that just got away from us, whether by our mistake or someone elses. The most recent example of this phenomenon was some guy bopping in computer orders at WMG who apparently was not watching what he was doing on his keypad and wound up shipping us 58 copies of And Then There Were Three by Genesis. Until now, that was the worst cock-up we've had to deal with this year.

You noticed the words "until now"?

First, a bit of backstory -- U2's new album How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb was made available in three different CD formats -- a regular 1 CD version, a CD-and-DVD "combo" version, and a super-duper-limited-to-175,000-copy deluxe run containing the CD (with an additional bonus track not available anywhere else), the DVD and a rather silly and overpriced "arty" hardcover book.

As is often the case with these expensive deluxe versions (and as I mentioned above), only a small amount were made available out of an initial run of 2.2 million units. Therefore, the piece was allocated to all buyers based on your store's sales volume, with the "big box" stores like Wal Mart and Best Buy and their evil brethren limited to 30 copies per store and that amount dropping depending on your store.

With our initial order on this deluxe version now chopped to pieces, we wound up getting shipped an intial allotment of four, followed by five more we were able to scrape from another supplier at the last second, and then two more from our primary supplier. So, 11 copies in total showed up, (nearly all of them reserved by regular customers) and by Monday night we had sold all the way down to 1 reserved copy and 1 "open copy" for whomever asked for it.

With that done, we knew we'd have to resort to securing additional copies from Best Buy, who had helpfully advertised the thing in their recent Sunday ad for a price 2 dollars below the dealer's cost from any of our suppliers. Typical. Anyway, we have a guy who knows someone in managment at the local Best Buy and can get around their usual "3 per customer" limit on sale items. We informed our acquaintance over the weekend that we were going to need a bunch of this thing, and it was probably me who used the words "whatever you can get" when he asked how many he should get.

When I came in to work today, Greg asked me how many copies of the deluxe version we had being held for reserved customers, and I said there was only one, plus the one we had left for whomever asked. I noticed a small pile of copies behind him as I said this, and said "ah, our man came through, I see."

Greg laughed in that high-pitched giggle fashion of his that usually means "hooo-boy" and then asked if our pal had called on the phone at all last night. The plan was, our friend would call and ask what we had left and how much we needed and I was to tell him "upwards of a dozen if possible." But our connection had not called last night, and I said so, then followed up with "why? What happened?"

Greg did that little giggle thing again and walked to the back to the store, indicating for me to follow. When we got back there, he pointed at his work desk where two massive piles of the damn thing stood next to each other. I felt a lot of color drain from my face. "Holy SHIT!"

As it turns out, our connection went WAAAAAAAY above and beyond the call of duty for us, showing up with 3 giant bags full of the deluxe edition. Wait, it gets better: not only did he manage somehow to obtain every single copy of the thing that Best Buy had in stock (and he did this by sheer force of will with the obviously-baffled clerk), but he also completely cleaned out Circuit City, K-Mart, Wal-Mart and Target of their supplies as well (and used his Best Buy receipt to get all of the other store's copies at the same price, bwaahahahahahahahahaha).

So, instead of landing a hoped-for ten copies, he brought in nearly sixty. Which, doing the math, comes out to about $1300 or so. Greg, of course, was rather freaked (not to mention amused silly), and took about 40 off of his hands, leaving the option open of either getting some more copies off of our friend at a later time if we happen to sell this thing down again, or letting him return them to their stores of origin.

So, uh, anyone in the area who wants a copy, as assistant manager of the U2 Capital Of Lake County, let me say that boy howdy are we ever ready to serve you! Step right up!

....please.