Ritz Camera will be closing 300 of its 700 of stores soon and offering liquidation sales.
If you love photos like I do, it sounds like a good opportunity to get a great bargain. Right? Wrong.
The firm handling the Ritz liquidations is the same firm that recently closed down Circuit City stores.
The Great American Group, SB Capital Group, Tiger Capital Group, and Hudson Capital Partners did a poor job selling Circuit City stock, according to the article “No Deals: Notorious Cabal to Oversee Ritz Camera Liquidations” on The Consumerist.com.
Scott Carpenter, executive vice president for Great American of Woodland Hills, said the discounts would begin at 10 percent to 20 percent off, depending on the category of merchandise.
“Then we will progress to 20 percent off, 30 percent off all the way to 90 percent off. We think it will take about seven to nine weeks," Carpenter said. The group said that about $50 million in merchandise would be liquidated.
But The Consumerist advises shoppers to be wary.
The liquidators reset all prices to manufacturer suggested retail price, which is considerably higher than most sale prices, and then apply discounts to the higher price point, The Consumerist reports. Even with 30 percent discounts, you can still find better prices online or at other local retailers, ones who issue refunds and are subject to state consumer protection laws.
Ritz Camera, based in Beltsville, Md., filed for bankruptcy protection in February after growing to a chain of more than 800 stores since its start as a single store in Atlantic City, N.J., in 1918.
