Purchase From A Brick & Mortar Dealer - Your Thoughts?

Consider this purchase: $90 total: one stamp @ $85, the balance for a handful of low-cost stamps. The total amount was 61% of SCV.

Sure, I probably could have done better on ebay. But this was a true over-the-counter brick & mortar dealer. A couple of questions:

How "good" is the 61% discount from SCV for this retail channel?

I suspect there's something to be said for a face-to-face customer-dealer relationship over time. Your thoughts?

You got the discount, you got the stamps. what do YOU think?

Peter

61% of SCV, is not the same as a 61% discount.

First off, Scott value is a garbage number. It is fiction, bogus, and obsolete a day after printing. It's better to not even know it. It only jades you. I see auctions at major venues with best of breed material selling for 50% Scott. You also see items for going over.

So the real value is what 2 people are willing to pay. You and the next in line.

Everything else is irrelevant. If you find a seller willing to pay 2x then boom!

61% is excellent, especially when you consider traditional "brickfn'mortar" overhead.

Nobody ever mentions quality in these threads. You cannot compare examining an item in person to buying from ebay. Apples and orangutans. You closely examined the stamp and felt good about the price? Excellent.

Petert4522: My opinion was given in the original post :-)

Rismoney: Interesting insight, especially in the context of one-time transactions.

Hal: you grasped the spirit of my question - thanks

Per part two of my question, I was looking for thoughts about the value of an ongoing relationship with a dealer (as opposed to anonymous online purchases).

The ability of any philatelist, whether beginning or advanced, to share and gain knowledge through face-to-face encounters is priceless.

Many dealers realize this and are willing to sit and talk stamps with customers, answering their questions, helping them understand for lengths of time which far exceed the monetary value received.

They do this because they understand that continued interest and excitement in the hobby and in their store, in particular, will be generated by this approach.

If you have the opportunity to develop such a relationship today, go for it. In the long run, you'll be glad you did.

You may have a bargain, you may have been ripped off, without illustrations, the thread has very little value.

Gents, beg your pardon if I did not pose the question with requisite precision.

Different stamps, different grades, different prices - I get it. Rather than appraising the outcome of a specific purchase, I anticipate a central tendency for all purchases. All purchases have one ratio in common: price relative to SCV.

After recording multiple purchases, a bell curve of these ratios becomes evident. For example, an analysis of multiple purchases shows average discounts as follows:

- online purchases: X% from SCV.
- Brick-and-mortar purchases: X-Y% from SCV

I'm trying to get a sense for X and Y. So far, it was suggested that 61% was not bad.

So noted that reliance on SCV as a benchmark has its problems.

As John said, completely depends upon the one $85 stamp you purchased. Please post an image of that stamp and then we can offer meaningful opinions.
Don

I am quite happy to sell you mint US wine stamps (all different) at 50% of catalog.

We can both go away happy with the transaction?!?!?!?

Stampman2002: great answer, thank you.
StateRevs: not what I was looking for, but good insight nevertheless. Serendipity never rests.

>So noted that reliance on SCV as a benchmark has its problems<

As stated above, the problem is in the original question. If I go to the store and buy a gallon of milk for half price, that is good. When I use it the next day and it smells bad - then it was a good deal for the store.
A picture of the stamp(s) in question would have been very relevant. Again, without knowing what you have YOU are the only one that can answer your question

Peter

Would you not just return the milk? What about the stores reputation? No, it would not benefit the store to sell bad milk.

Is there some reason for not just posting an image of the stamp?
Don