I embark on Part 3 of the 24 Minute Holiday Shopping Saga. I found about 8 DVD’s including some HD-DVD’s to help complete out my shopping list. It was now almost 24 minutes since the web order was placed with my stealthy laptop from my car in the parking lot...Cingular 3G, you gotta love it! I headed up to the pick up counter and requested my order. The girl there was very friendly and asked me to wait a moment.

The iPod Nano was brought out and then she had a puzzled look. She asked me to wait another moment.  I already suspected the remote may not be there based on the scurrying doing about the store of the sales associate earlier. She brought out the order and said they were just about to call me and tell me the remote was not in stock. She offered to order it in for me or locate another unit at a different store. I opted to have the amount refunded back to the gift card.

So now what? As per their 24 minute guarantee qualifying purchases will be ready for customers to pick up at their designated store within 24 minutes of purchase confirmation, or the customer will receive a $24 Circuit City gift card. With out missing a beat she started processing a gift card and apologized for the out of stock item.

So there you have it; ordering was easy but the lack of in store pick up for Movies and Music is so Web 1.0 (yes, I’m lossing karma for that). It was nice to see what stores had regular items in stock and then being able to select what store to pick the item up at; very handy. Not having an item in stock after you drove out to get it would be annoying however. Was the $24 gift card worth the drive out...possibly? It is a nice perk that makes you feel that you’re getting something for the effort. If your trip to the store is your only propose out and you have to fight traffic I would call ahead to ensure your order is ready. Overall Circuit City’s online shopping and 24 minute in store pickup guarantee made for a very easy shopping experience and I did not have to fight any crowds. Also as a bonus and I get another $24 to buy myself a little something.

--Bill Landon

Let’s get back to our 24 Minute Holiday Shopping Saga. It was time to put Circuit City to the test. Armed with my thin and light laptop and my Cingular UMTS 3G data card I drove to the Lynwood Circuit City and found a nice place to park and start shopping...online.

I had my holiday gift list with me and started browsing the Circuit City website, in their parking lot while in my car...lol. I figured this would be easy, lots of DVD’s and CD’s for friends and family. After finding several of the DVD’s on my list I started to notice that all of them were available for shipping only and not for store pickup...WFT over? This was the same thing with the CD’s; kind of lame if you ask me. All I can figure is that their online store for movies and CD’s is a re-brand of Amazon or some other distributor and not tied to the stores themselves.

It was time to move on to the more expensive gifts on the list. Fist the iPod Nano that I have been getting begged to buy. There it was in all its stunning green glory on the webpage. With the zip code in place the Lynwood store showed it was in stock so I added it to cart. What was interesting was that it also showed nearby stores, so in theory I could shop at all the stores at the same time then drive to the other stores for pick up. Useful if some stores were out of stock.

I have wanted the Harmony remote for the XBOX 360 for some time now. We reviewed the Harmony 688 remote a year ago and really liked it. Lynwood showed it was in stock so I added it to the cart and proceeded to the check out. After making my payment with the gift card I printed the receipt to an image and wrote the order number down. I noted the time the order was placed and proceeded into the store for a little recon. Also I wanted to get those DVD’s I was denied.

I browsed browed around the DVD’s and kept an eye on the web order pick up area. I watched a sales person go to the XBOX area with an invoice in hand looking around at the accessories, frowned then headed off to the home theater section of the store. This had to be my order. They still had about 10 minutes before I would go up to the counter to claim my order.

Stay Tuned for Part 3 of the 24 Minute Holiday Shopping Saga. 

I was recently asked to try out Circuit Citys online shopping and 24 minute in store pickup guarantee. With the holidays rapidly approaching and my shopping not even started I gladly accepted the offer. Now I just had to wait for the card to arrive so that I could sample their online shopping venue and put them the 24 minute test.

However before I jump into that portion of this tale let me take you back to about three weeks ago when the XBOX 360 HDDVD player was released. I stopped at the Best Buy close to our office and was told that while they show one in stock it was really not there and that would probably be the same story at their other locations.  I am thinking what ever happed to live inventory status? Frustrated I went back to my office.

Back at the office I decided now would be a good time to try out the online shopping at Circuit City and proceeded to look up the new HDDVD player for the 360. Bingo! The Everett store showed it was in stock and available for in store pickup, all other locations were sold out. Being suspicious by nature I chose to make this purchase with my company card rather than wait for the gift card sent to me by Circuit City’s PR firm. Is it out of the realm of possibility that purchases made with these cards could be flagged for priority service? I’ll put my tinfoil hat on just in case.

Later that evening I drove up to the Everett Circuit City store and my shiny new HDDVD Drive was waiting for me to take home. Well that was easy but not a real test of the 24 minute guarantee; that would have to be done on a different day with a more high tech approach.

the 24 Minute Holiday Shopping Saga. Part 2.