Nicro's outrageous ripoff
 

As boaters, sail or power, we are accustomed to paying ridiculous prices
for just about anything that has the word "Marine" in its name and for
which the identical item can be found at, say, Home Depot for much much
less.

But this has to take the cake: Nicro's price for a replacement battery
for the 24-hour Powervent 3000. $29.99 at West Marine.

Might be an improvement, actually. Earlier models required you to send
the unit back to the factory to replace the battery at a cost very close
to that of a new Powervent.

This battery is no more than a standard rechargeable NiCad. About $2 at
Radio Shack. The old units had the battery soldered in. I was able to
modify a Radio Shack battery holder so that now all I need to do when the
battery dies (they do, you know) was pluck out the dead one and plug in a
new one, about five minutes and $2.00. Not only that, but I was able to
replace a smaller capacity battery with a larger one.

"Gogarty" wrote in message
...
As boaters, sail or power, we are accustomed to paying ridiculous prices
for just about anything that has the word "Marine" in its name and for
which the identical item can be found at, say, Home Depot for much much
less.

But this has to take the cake: Nicro's price for a replacement battery
for the 24-hour Powervent 3000. $29.99 at West Marine.

Might be an improvement, actually. Earlier models required you to send
the unit back to the factory to replace the battery at a cost very close
to that of a new Powervent.

This battery is no more than a standard rechargeable NiCad. About $2 at
Radio Shack. The old units had the battery soldered in. I was able to
modify a Radio Shack battery holder so that now all I need to do when the
battery dies (they do, you know) was pluck out the dead one and plug in a
new one, about five minutes and $2.00. Not only that, but I was able to
replace a smaller capacity battery with a larger one.


Otoh, several years back when the cover on my plastic Nicro solar vent went
adrift after about close to ten years, Nicro shipped me a new one gratis.

John Cairns

Gogarty wrote:

As boaters, sail or power, we are accustomed to paying ridiculous prices
for just about anything that has the word "Marine" in its name and for
which the identical item can be found at, say, Home Depot for much much
less.

But this has to take the cake: Nicro's price for a replacement battery
for the 24-hour Powervent 3000. $29.99 at West Marine.

That's not Nicro's ripoff...that's West Marine's ripoff.

I don't know what Nicro's list price is...but I do know that WM charges
a whopping $17.95 for a 22-oz bottle of Raritan K.O. that has a factory
list price of $11.90. And I've heard of even worse price gouging by WM
than that.

The moral: despite WM's efforts to eradicate 'em there are lot of marine
retailers out there, so shop price! Even your local marine dock store is
likely to be cheaper than WM these days.
--
Peggie
----------
Peggie Hall
Specializing in marine sanitation since 1987
Author "Get Rid of Boat Odors - A Guide To Marine Sanitation Systems and
Other Sources of Aggravation and Odor"
http://www.seaworthy.com/store/custo...0&cat=6&page=1

In article ,
says...

That's not Nicro's ripoff...that's West Marine's ripoff.

I don't know what Nicro's list price is...but I do know that WM charges
a whopping $17.95 for a 22-oz bottle of Raritan K.O. that has a factory
list price of $11.90. And I've heard of even worse price gouging by WM
than that.

The moral: despite WM's efforts to eradicate 'em there are lot of marine
retailers out there, so shop price! Even your local marine dock store is
likely to be cheaper than WM these days.


Hmmm. Interesting. Of course, when Boat US sold out to West Marine it put WM in
a near monopoly position in many markets. I do in fact shop many other vendors.
This one just happened to catch my eye but I will certainly be on the lookout
for others. If it's big bucks I am spending, I research pretty thoroughly.

Glad to see you back, Peggy. You were missed there for awhile.

Peggie Hall wrote in
:

that's West Marine's ripoff

I'll second that. The SAME EXACT fuses Waste Marine sells for $7.30 a
bubblepack are $1.79 at a local RETAIL hardware store down the street.
That's over 4 times the price!

--
Larry

This jerk called my cellphone and was nasty.
Continental Warranty -- MCG Enterprises -- Mepco-
24955 Pacific Coast HWY Suite C303
Malibu California 90265
888-244-0925
Fax: 310-456-8844
Email:
Read about them he
http://www.ripoffreport.com/view.asp...3&view=printer

Peggie Hall wrote:

The moral: despite WM's efforts to eradicate 'em there are lot of marine
retailers out there, so shop price! Even your local marine dock store is
likely to be cheaper than WM these days.

Or, the opposite: In my locale where there is also a WM, the big &
small competition within a large radius has used the WM pricing
standard as a winch to ratchet themselves up to the same levels, and
the prices are so identical it is easy to forget which store you drove
to, once inside with the item in hand. A far cry from 8 yrs ago when
we had a wide spread among them with WM at the top & all the others at
60% or much more below those levels. Sort of the inverse of the
WalMart syndrome.

Here's another, and I am sure there arev plenty more.

Aqua Signal Series 25 stern light at West Marine: $23. At SailNet: under
$10. At Defender: about $15. But SailNet charges more than $10 for shipping
and Defender charges nearly $5 for shipping to my ZIP.

So what's the price of instant gratification -- walking into the store and
walking out with the item? Plus tax.