[USA] Wal-Mart Clearance

[gmpirate]

Most HP and PotC sets 30% off here in the Inland Empire, though some oddities (most 'marts have either Fountain of Youth or Isla de Muerta discounted, but not both). Lots of stock on the HP stuff so perhaps hope of future reductions. Check boxes carefully - 3 of the 5 QAR sets I found were clearly opened, as were about half of the straggling Turbo Tanks.

Which stores specifically had good stock? There are so many in the area I could drive for hours :P

[bigdaddy]

Made the drive yesterday to a Walmart that I knew had both the ships for potc. Get there and luckily enough I find both of them for $69 and $79. Picked them both up unfortunately none of the Star Wars sets were marked down and the other HP markdowns weren't as great as others are reporting.

[jal4u2c]

Right after i posted last night, i was looking at the walmart website and was checking availability of the QAR. Made a few calls and was shortly on my way to another walmart in the middle of nowhere. But they held me the only two QARs they had. I also forgot to mention that during my race across the state, i did manage to find the Star Wars Death Star Mini Set with the TIE Interceptor and Pilot figure for $1.25 at a Kmart.

[BB.206]

I checked four WalMarts, but only one had the additional 50%. I asked the Department Manager at the other stores, but they said they didn't hear anything about it. They had to manually adjust the price at the store that did have the additional 50% off.

[jal4u2c]

Well, after some calling around this morning, i found 3 more QARs and 2 Turbo Tanks. I think i am done for a while. No more money to spend. LOL

[willb2064]

I managed to get POTC The London Escape for $25 (50% off). It was marked as $35 but went through the till at $25. It was the only Lego set marked down, which was a shame as they had good stock of Star Wars and other POTC sets.

[brickarmor]

This might be semi-off-topic, but does anyone expect Target to give up the goods like the other big box stores have been doing? I really really deeply and truly hate going to WM... Yesterday, after embarrassing begging and pleading, the wife finally consented to going to WM for the first time in over a decade. So I'm looking to Target for a comparable deal. Is this wise, or unsubstantiated?

[vynsane]

Target is usually more clockwork than Wallyworld. They start with 30% off towards the end of June or beginning of July. They then go to 50%, with 75% off if they haven't sold by then. It's generally two weeks between markdowns, and the Toys dept. usually does so on Wednesdays or Thursdays.

[markerpk]

Target is usually more clockwork than Wallyworld. They start with 30% off towards the end of June or beginning of July. They then go to 50%, with 75% off if they haven't sold by then. It's generally two weeks between markdowns, and the Toys dept. usually does so on Wednesdays or Thursdays.

Man! I wish I could count on that around here. I've got 4 of them around town and they are totally hit and miss. Two of them don't even seem to participate in any of the clearance sales!

[anakinisvader]

This might be semi-off-topic, but does anyone expect Target to give up the goods like the other big box stores have been doing? I really really deeply and truly hate going to WM... Yesterday, after embarrassing begging and pleading, the wife finally consented to going to WM for the first time in over a decade. So I'm looking to Target for a comparable deal. Is this wise, or unsubstantiated?

Save money, live better... or so the commercial says

[ninjagoyo]

Be careful with those $30 QARs if you see them. This was just posted to the Bricklink forums:
***
"Well this is one of those things that happen all the time. For example this week this happened to me. Let me explain. I visit the walmart here regularly same with target and with Kmart and I have been stopped several times and asked about my reason for spending so much time in the Lego Isle. In fact I have had the stores check my bags in walmart after doing a price match just to be sure I was not scamming them. However I digress. In the last few weeks I noticed a few sales so I would go hit them up, something else I noticed was the same 2 guys there often. They were writing down items (something I had done in the past) to track pricing, so I thought nothing of it. So this week I seen the same thing yall did with the QAR and a few others and decided to get some sets. As I was checking out I got the QAR and one range up as $30 and the other as $79. I figured I had hit the jackpot but was a bit curious as to why they were so different. I asked about the sale price and the girl at the counter called the manager. My wife and I were taken the security room in walmart and asked about where we got the boxes from. I told the guy I had picked on from the front and one from the very back of the shelf when asked why I responded with " I am a collector so I try to find the boxes in the best condition" He said ok makes sense. He said they know that I am a legit buyer and that they had to stop anyone that had rang up suspicious. He took the box out and pulled off a barcode that was double sided taped onto the box. He said that the Walmart company, target and Kmart have been notified of a Massively widespread Barcode swapping of items in the store, not just Lego. He said what people are doing now is waiting for things to go on sale and then swapping barcodes. This makes the swap less obvious to the people at the register, and also to the cameras at the self checkout. Then another group of “random” people would come in and price checks the items to be sure they had the ones with the changed barcodes. They would check out with just a few items or so each as not to raise any eyes to them. He let us go with no problems and thanked us for the cooperation.

Unfortunately I was not able to get the $30 box however they did give me the other one for $50 for the inconvenience. Also I made sure that the managers knew who I was and that I was a frequent person at walmart. Most of the floor managers already knew me and let me in on some sale items before they were put on the shelves. Guess the point of the story is that the person in the news was just the first one to get caught, others are coming."
***
On the other hand, I had a WalMart toy manager personally tell me she sold off a bunch of BPs at $15, so legit mega-bargains are not impossible.
WATCH OUT FOR FAKE BARCODES!

[Luciant]

There was an Article on the front page of Yahoo News about a Vice President of some company out in Silicon Valley who was printing his own Bar Codes and swapping them. He would do it on multiple items, and only buy one or two to throw off the investigators (so he's not the only one constantly getting discounts). He would then go and sell them on Ebay... ended up making like 30k. Then they busted him. Sounds like some copy cats.

[dilbert12]

Be careful with those $30 QARs if you see them. This was just posted to the Bricklink forums:
***
"Well this is one of those things that happen all the time. For example this week this happened to me. Let me explain. I visit the walmart here regularly same with target and with Kmart and I have been stopped several times and asked about my reason for spending so much time in the Lego Isle. In fact I have had the stores check my bags in walmart after doing a price match just to be sure I was not scamming them. However I digress. In the last few weeks I noticed a few sales so I would go hit them up, something else I noticed was the same 2 guys there often. They were writing down items (something I had done in the past) to track pricing, so I thought nothing of it. So this week I seen the same thing yall did with the QAR and a few others and decided to get some sets. As I was checking out I got the QAR and one range up as $30 and the other as $79. I figured I had hit the jackpot but was a bit curious as to why they were so different. I asked about the sale price and the girl at the counter called the manager. My wife and I were taken the security room in walmart and asked about where we got the boxes from. I told the guy I had picked on from the front and one from the very back of the shelf when asked why I responded with " I am a collector so I try to find the boxes in the best condition" He said ok makes sense. He said they know that I am a legit buyer and that they had to stop anyone that had rang up suspicious. He took the box out and pulled off a barcode that was double sided taped onto the box. He said that the Walmart company, target and Kmart have been notified of a Massively widespread Barcode swapping of items in the store, not just Lego. He said what people are doing now is waiting for things to go on sale and then swapping barcodes. This makes the swap less obvious to the people at the register, and also to the cameras at the self checkout. Then another group of “random” people would come in and price checks the items to be sure they had the ones with the changed barcodes. They would check out with just a few items or so each as not to raise any eyes to them. He let us go with no problems and thanked us for the cooperation.

Unfortunately I was not able to get the $30 box however they did give me the other one for $50 for the inconvenience. Also I made sure that the managers knew who I was and that I was a frequent person at walmart. Most of the floor managers already knew me and let me in on some sale items before they were put on the shelves. Guess the point of the story is that the person in the news was just the first one to get caught, others are coming."
***
On the other hand, I had a WalMart toy manager personally tell me she sold off a bunch of BPs at $15, so legit mega-bargains are not impossible.
WATCH OUT FOR FAKE BARCODES!

I was thinking the same thing about swapped barcodes when I first saw the price. When I price scanned QAR, the scanner read "Queen Anne" with the clearance price so I'm sure that was legit. Thanks for the warning. It would be a pain to have to be detained and questioned. I think it would be fairly obvious if a sticker is over the barcode once you know to look for it.

[vladsimi]

To be clear, KMart WAS selling the PotC QAR for $30. This was their clearance price, that's what shows up on the receipt as well. There is no UPC scam as you suggest. Walmart's price on the other hand is $79. If it rang up as $30 then there is a problem...

[wilykat]

It happens a lot but usually the thief gets busted. Snipped from NBC news about the current scam by VP of Palo Alto:

This is not the first case of a LEGO bar code scam. In 2005, William Swanberg of Reno, Nev., was arrested in connection with stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of LEGOs from Target after switching the bar code labels on the toy boxes. The company at the time estimated Swanberg stole up to $200,000 of LEGOs taken from their stores in Oregon, Utah, Arizona, Nevada and California. The LEGOs were then resold on the Web. In that case, too, Target investigators uncovered the scheme.

As I understand, Target has placed an automatic alert for when someone is buying a large number of low priced sets, they take a close look at security cam to check for scam.

The self service check out is the worst place try this kind of scam. I used to work at Meijer and I'm sure it's the same at Walmart, Kmart, and other places that offers the self service check out. Everything you put in bag is weighted and checked, if you put a bar code for a $30 set on a $120 set, the $30 set would be a lot lighter than $120 set and the system would complain of unexpected item in bagging area.

[vynsane]

That's what sucks about scams like that - it makes the rest of us seem untrustworthy.

[Luciant]

http://abcnews.go.com/US/silicon-valley ... 8PewMXuCSo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

There is the link to the article i was talking about.

[vynsane]

http://abcnews.go.com/US/silicon-valley ... 8PewMXuCSo

There is the link to the article i was talking about.

Also already being discussed over here.

I checked out the Fishkill, NY Walmart. It's odd, looks like they've already done a reset on the LEGO aisle, even though Monster Fighters are just around the corner.

They had "Captain's Cabin" for $7.00 and QAR for $69.99. I picked up "Captain's Cabin" because I feel it won't last until the next reduction, but they had a LOT of QAR left, so I'm hoping to grab it on the next round (should be ~$50, I think?)

[echobanzai]

man that sucks. that idiot computer dude just made running to clearance sales a hassle now!

i have snagged so many cool sales thanks to bricklink! as soon as bricklink says go buy, i run.

and now i might have to deal with some computer telling the checkout girl to look at me shopping?

but one amazing thing i am reading here is how many jacks are stealing parts and minifigs then returning the set as brand new. the least they could have done is told the store parts were missing or something, then they would have not put the box back on the shelf.

i got some legos at walmart this week, now i gotta go open them up to verify if they were opened or not.

[brickster90]

http://abcnews.go.com/US/silicon-valley ... 8PewMXuCSo

There is the link to the article i was talking about.

Also already being discussed over here.

I checked out the Fishkill, NY Walmart. It's odd, looks like they've already done a reset on the LEGO aisle, even though Monster Fighters are just around the corner.

They had "Captain's Cabin" for $7.00 and QAR for $69.99. I picked up "Captain's Cabin" because I feel it won't last until the next reduction, but they had a LOT of QAR left, so I'm hoping to grab it on the next round (should be ~$50i, I think?)

Sounds like my Wal*Mart - Captain's Cabin was $7 (I got 3), Cannibal Escape was $21, The Mill was full price (??), Black Pearl was $69, and QAR was $79. They still had plenty of ships left and I just found out that a friend works at that Wal*Mart, so hopefully I can snag some when they go lower in price.