I just want everyone to know about my experience at the Brooklyn Microcenter

CarlG · December 2020

This is a repost after my initial post was removed for obscenity. I have removed the offensive language that the salespeople at the Brooklyn microcenter used when I was trying to make a purchase.

I waited outside the Brooklyn microcenter for 7 hours (2 am) in the cold on Friday for a chance at a 5950 cpu and a 3080 gpu. I was first in line and when I got to the Build-A-PC section the sales people I spoke with were actively hostile. They yelled at me when i touched the boxes for the GPUs and CPUs and wouldn't let me inspect them. When I told them I had purchased a gpu at another Microcenter and wanted to exchange it for the Gigabyte 3080 they inspected my receipt and my unopened box for 3-4 minutes then refused to do the exchange because they said that I had too many card purchases (3) in my history. By Microcenter policy this should not prevent me from doing an exchange but they ignored my assertion. They then also ignored my requests to purchase a 5950 cpu and tried to sell the 3 of them to the group behind me, only giving me one when I began complaining.

After the tall gentleman in the glasses finally gave me the card he then went back to a work computer with other employees, looked up my history on his own and among other things said, "How the <expletive> did this fat <expletive><expletive> get 3 cards in 3 days?" and began loudly yelling, swearing, and complaining about me with a few of his other coworkers who also joined in. I know this because they were so loud I heard them from the checkout line. This was the most unprofessional retail transaction I have experienced to date.

I want to be clear that I am not a scalper and was nothing but nice to your staff. I had a 5800x stolen off my welcome mat last week and decided to wait in line over and over again at microcenter until I got the final parts to my computer because it had been 2 months and I was tired of the bots taking everything online. Tuesday I waited 8 hours at Yonkers and got nothing. Wednesday I waited 10 hours in the cold at Yonkers again with my friend and got a 3060ti fe and purchased a 3080 for my buddy who was ahead of me and unexpectedly got the last card 2 and a half hours of waiting later. Thursday I again waited 10 hours in the cold and got a 3080 ftw3 ultra for myself but no processor. And finally Friday I stayed 7 hours in the cold at Brooklyn, wasn't allowed to make a by policy trade for the gigabyte gpu I'd been looking a week for and only got a 5950x after I was harassed and maligned by the staff.

By the way, I gave one of those extra cards to my roommate and the other one to my brother. None of the cards I received were sold.

I will never be back to the Brooklyn microcenter. My family won't be back. My friends won't be back and I will tell everyone I work with, for and through to not to come to your location. I don't know what happened to your staff and I'm sorry they have become so angry, and stressed and anxious and bitter but I did not deserve to be treated the way that I did. I did not deserve to be called the names I was called. This was my first time at the Brooklyn microcenter, and I had been informed of your service by my experience at the Yonkers location, which was exceptional. I have never met friendlier, more helpful, or more knowledgeable staff that actively cared about the products and the people who were buying them. This was not the case with you.

Just so you know, none of your staff came out to tell us if anything was available, offered to help with the line, helped organize, did vouchers, or did anything other than ignore my friendly good mornings or give those of us standing in line rude glares or looks. No other microcenter completely ignores the people that brave the cold for a chance to finish building their rigs. I made a list, kept everyone organized, got donuts, prevented stragglers from sneaking in and helped keep people in a good mood while we waited. Nobody even came out until 9 am, and when the doors did open, the staff seemed genuinely upset that we were there. I'm sorry but I'm in the hospitality business, and this was just about the worst retail experience of my life and I can't imagine treating anyone the way I have been treated by the salespeople at Brooklyn.