Correct purchasing methods (1 Viewer)

[PYRTLE]

The rubber armouring components are most likely sourced and produced by a contractor to Leica who are waiting for the next batch of olive kits to arrive at the assembly line for final fitting and QA checks before being signed off, packed and sealed. They do look very pleasing on the eye.

As you have not yet "ordered" or paid for a pair, the price could unfortunately change as a contract is not in place, though I'm sure Ace Optics will honour the agreement. I guess a retailer's stock comes directly from Germany, rather than a one off special transfer from a Leica Store in the UK.

Leica did offer a "loan / trial" scheme many years ago with their bulky Trinovid 32mm range....... the trial models were finished in a bright matt red rubber armour ( to distinguish and advertise them ). These eventually became highly sought after by collectors alongside yellow and blue variants.

 

[Yeti Man]

My recent experience buying from B&H in the US.... When is an open box NOT an open box ??

Last week I ordered an 'open box' 8x42 Trinovid HD at a 15% savings. They were $849 vs $999, and I decided with their return policy I would risk it.

Hi Bren,

All new Leica's come in a sealed white carton box and inside that is the original box.

Jan

When my package arrived, inside was a sealed plain white box with a sticker on it with the product identification and bar code. Inside was the silver and green box that looked untouched in any way.

When I placed my order, I was kind of surprised that they still showed the open box available. I figured a few people must have tried and returned them, but I was quite happily surprised with what I received.

Their way of clearing out some stock ? Not sure.

-Charlie-

 

[dries1]

Yeti man,

Just imagine a person, we will call him Thomas Windham, he lives in Rapid City South Dakota and he very much liked the Trinovid 8X42 HD, a binocular choice he made after wading and reading through multiple threads on the Bird Forum Binocular sub forum ,.... Well he orders it and during the week one day, comes home from work and there on his front porch is a package....filled with anticipation, he grabs the package sees that it is from B&H, (the Trinovid has landed he says) and goes into his dwelling. WOW three days and it's here.
He takes time opening the package, and gets ready to open the case, and coincidentally observes that it is not a very sunny day today, sort of drab outside/overcast.
Anyhow he cannot wait, he raises the binocular to his eyes, and suddenly he says...oh c...p, the eyecups do not fit my face, massive blackouts going on.
Disappointed and PO, Thomas carefully repacks the Trinovid into the box and reseals it for shipment back to B&H the next day. He wonders how this experience was similar to the Meopta Meostar 8X32s he had ordered previously from B&H only those eyecups were two narrow, I need a glass with eyecups that fit my d...m face he says under his breath....

Those are your Trinovid HDs, just kidding congrats on the Leicas, now go enjoy them.

Andy W.

 

[sillyak]

My recent experience buying from B&H in the US.... When is an open box NOT an open box ??

Last week I ordered an 'open box' 8x42 Trinovid HD at a 15% savings. They were $849 vs $999, and I decided with their return policy I would risk it.



When my package arrived, inside was a sealed plain white box with a sticker on it with the product identification and bar code. Inside was the silver and green box that looked untouched in any way.

When I placed my order, I was kind of surprised that they still showed the open box available. I figured a few people must have tried and returned them, but I was quite happily surprised with what I received.

Their way of clearing out some stock ? Not sure.

-Charlie-

Not saying it wasn't an open box, but this is a common way to get around minimum advertised price rules.

Store wants to unload some stock. Leica says store can not advertise for less than $999. Store sells brand new sealed packages as "open box" for less to clear stock.

Happens in the guitar world all the time.

I hear manufacturers are not allowed to set a minimum advertised price in Europe, but they do all the time in the US.

 

[willisoften]

Sometimes you see ex-demo in the UK for a substantial discount, usually followed by "One Only", it was the Sony RX100M2 compact, well I bought it, my Brother-In Law bought it, a colleague in work bought it and so did our dentist I think. I think, the next iteration was just out. It was the absolute trendy must have compact camera of the previous year.

 

[Mikewander]

I recently purchased Zeiss Victory Pocket 8x25 and it was obvious the sticker had been removed and stuck down again.
They seem perfect, so should i be worried that i've maybe bought an ex-demo or a return?

 

[jring]

I recently purchased Zeiss Victory Pocket 8x25 and it was obvious the sticker had been removed and stuck down again.
They seem perfect, so should i be worried that i've maybe bought an ex-demo or a return?

Hi,

as has been pointed out, dealers are in a tough spot. Everybody wants to receive a new and sealed item and on the other hand wants to be able to order N and return N-1 bins and only keep the one that fit best. This results in the dealer having N-1 pairs which have been unsealed at best and obviously handled at worst.

I personally don't look for a seal even with items advertised as new. I'll carefully inspect the item anyways and when I see fingerprints or other signs of handling, I'll think whether the price I paid does reflect that.
So if I paid MSRP for a new item (which I rarely do), I might have a chat with the dealer about that and try to get a little discount. If it was a screaming deal, I will get a bottle of optics cleaner and soft cloth and spend some very well paid 10 minutes to remove the fingerprints.

Joachim

 

[Mikewander]

Hi,

as has been pointed out, dealers are in a tough spot. Everybody wants to receive a new and sealed item and on the other hand wants to be able to order N and return N-1 bins and only keep the one that fit best. This results in the dealer having N-1 pairs which have been unsealed at best and obviously handled at worst.

I personally don't look for a seal even with items advertised as new. I'll carefully inspect the item anyways and when I see fingerprints or other signs of handling, I'll think whether the price I paid does reflect that.
So if I paid MSRP for a new item (which I rarely do), I might have a chat with the dealer about that and try to get a little discount. If it was a screaming deal, I will get a bottle of optics cleaner and soft cloth and spend some very well paid 10 minutes to remove the fingerprints.

Joachim

I'm happy with the price i paid (the lowest i could find), and don't really care if the box had been opened. There was no marks on them, and i'm happy with my purchase.
The debate about whether they can be described as 'new' is an interesting one though.

 

[Yeti Man]

Not saying it wasn't an open box, but this is a common way to get around minimum advertised price rules.

Store wants to unload some stock. Leica says store can not advertise for less than $999. Store sells brand new sealed packages as "open box" for less to clear stock.

This sure seems to be the case and I was quite pleasantly surprised when I opened the package.

 

[jring]

I'm happy with the price i paid (the lowest i could find), and don't really care if the box had been opened. There was no marks on them, and i'm happy with my purchase.
The debate about whether they can be described as 'new' is an interesting one though.

In my book, I'm fine with somebody having inspected a new item and yes, with a pair of bins, that includes looking through them.
Actually when buying optics in a brick and mortar store, I'll insist on getting the example I tried - bonus points for getting a discount for buying the demo unit.
Or if the dealer refuses, I'll unpack the sealed item I bought on the spot and inspect it.

Joachim

 

[gcole]

In my book, I'm fine with somebody having inspected a new item and yes, with a pair of bins, that includes looking through them.
Actually when buying optics in a brick and mortar store, I'll insist on getting the example I tried - bonus points for getting a discount for buying the demo unit.
Or if the dealer refuses, I'll unpack the sealed item I bought on the spot and inspect it.

Joachim

Those of us who are habitual buyers(that topic left for another day)can spot a used or touched pair of binoculars pretty easily. Whether it’s the obvious such as those finger smudges or the slightly wrinkled plastic bag they came in to the sneaky try to resealing trick I have seen them all. Does it bother me yes, that’s one of the reasons I do not return binoculars unless it’s an obvious manufacturing issue. Yes it is a very big pain in the Assssss...... to get those oily finger smudges off the lens but in the end if they look like new, perform like they should and I like what I see when I bring them to my eyes it’s a done deal til I decide to resell them.

 

[Yeti Man]

Yeti man,

Just imagine a person, we will call him Thomas Windham, he lives in Rapid City South Dakota and he very much liked the Trinovid 8X42 HD, a binocular choice he made after wading and reading through multiple threads on the Bird Forum Binocular sub forum ,.... Well he orders it and during the week one day, comes home from work and there on his front porch is a package....filled with anticipation, he grabs the package sees that it is from B&H, (the Trinovid has landed he says) and goes into his dwelling. WOW three days and it's here.
He takes time opening the package, and gets ready to open the case, and coincidentally observes that it is not a very sunny day today, sort of drab outside/overcast.
Anyhow he cannot wait, he raises the binocular to his eyes, and suddenly he says...oh c...p, the eyecups do not fit my face, massive blackouts going on.
Disappointed and PO, Thomas carefully repacks the Trinovid into the box and reseals it for shipment back to B&H the next day. He wonders how this experience was similar to the Meopta Meostar 8X32s he had ordered previously from B&H only those eyecups were two narrow, I need a glass with eyecups that fit my d...m face he says under his breath....

Those are your Trinovid HDs, just kidding congrats on the Leicas, now go enjoy them.

Andy W.

This is what I fully expected when I selected the 'open box' option. What I received was a pleasant surprise ! I had also ordered a Zeiss Conquest 8x42 for comparison to pick one of the two.
I sent the Conquest back yesterday, preferring the Trinovids.

I did handle these with rubber gloves so as to have minimum impact before deciding to keep one for sure.

In normal times I would have gone to a Cabela's 45 miles away where I could handle and compare them, but that wasn't in the cards right now. That's probably a good thing, because I would have likely bought an Ultravid HD plus if I compared them all together.

In 2004 I went to a Sportsman's Warehouse to compare binoculars with a $600 budget in mind. $1700 later I came home with a 10x42 Leica Ultravids which I still have and LOVE.

Reports to follow on how the Trinovid HD stacks up to my older Ultravids.

 

[Renze de Vries]

Bren,

Don't forget that when buying a Leica binocular new, there's the Leica warranty in case you would have doubts about its performance. It's impossible to pick out the cherry (and yes, there are cherries, almost cherries and just plain good samples) in a shop, not even by guys with 50 years of cherry picking experience. Because you'll never know if another one in another shop would be the cherrie's cherry.
When I bought my Noctivid I thought it was perfect, I I really loved it, but after a couple of months some doubt slowly overtook me. I asked an experienced friend for his opinion and when we both agreed it could do just a bit better, ideally, I sent it to Leica with a note asking to check collimation. When it came back it was superb, not just good but really good.
My explanation is that my sample was good enough to pass quality control. Being good enough for the majority of users. But with years of experience with all kinds of binoculars, in all kinds of condition and all stages of collimation, I'm not the average customer. I'm the highly critical user. Well, Leica doesn't have the slightest problem with customers like me. They check the binocular and if collimation can be just a bit better, they do the job.

Note: I have the same experience with Zeiss.

Renze

 

[b-lilja]

I think Renze's comment is spot on. I find it appalling that essentially the optics companies have offloaded QC to their customers and vendors, assuming enough people just won't care/know the difference between sample variation. I now order multiple copies from mail order vendors to pick the best one - indeed recently picked between copies of the Kowa 884, one clearly better than the other. Also, recently sent in my 8x32SEs for cleaning/service, and it was returned clearly better than before (now I get what the raves are about). I am very suspect about old NOS samples that have kicked around shops for a while - I think they are often copies noone wants. It means to a degree that our conversations here are somewhat meaningless, as there is no uniformity in our samples. And overlay that on top of our variable bio/human subjective experience - !!

 

[b-lilja]

Oh - so my correct purchasing method is:
Look through multiple copies and pick the best
Hang onto the cherries in your collection

 

[Maljunulo]

It means to a degree that our conversations here are somewhat meaningless, as there is no uniformity in our samples. And overlay that on top of our variable bio/human subjective experience - !!

I think that depends on the price range we are discussing.

I have a very strong suspicion that sample uniformity increases steeply as one pays more money.

(No proof, of course)

 

[Binastro]

I agree that as one pays more money sample variation improves.
With a proviso that lemons can appear in high priced optics.

The cheaper the binocular the more samples one needs to try to get a good one.
With say a pile of Lidl cheapies at £15 one needs to try a dozen. One or two are worth buying.

With U.K. imports of Russian binoculars six should provide a very good one and two fairly good.

However, I tried about eight 20x60s after the fall of the Soviet Union and none are really good. What is more is that they lack serial numbers, only having a date disc on the axle.
It was impossible to compete at that time with the open market, but things may have improved since then.

With the Japanese Celestron 20x80 c.1975 I chose the best of three.
With the Japanese 30x80 I chose the best of three.

With the c.1970 Japanese Ultraview 12x50, I tried about a dozen in the shop and bought the best one.

With other cheap to middling price I try three or six.

With expensive binoculars I have had to make do with just one, fully aware that it might not be the best sample.

It is likely that lead as with thorium improved performance.
But non lead glasses can be very good, although the glass may be expensive.
Also if exotic, as the glass may need to be, it must be coated immediately it is made as it tarnishes straight away.

Single coated elements need to be replaced with single coated elements.
Multicoating varies a lot and I suppose one matches pairs as much as possible.

Measuring the front curves with a spherometer often shows any changes.
Although any aspherising is usually on a back surface, although I suppose there are exceptions.

Something like an Aculon has aspherising I think in the eyepieces.

Regards,
B.

 

[Plingplang]

I checked what dealers (in Germany) do think about the issue. I contacted several by email, asking if it would be OK for them if I ordered several models with the intention to keep only the one that I like most and send back the others. I know that according to European law I have the right to cancel online orders within 14 days of receiving the product, but I think that it is fair only doing it if the dealer is OK with it.

The result: three immediate responses (maybe more will come): one said no problem at all; one said no problem but to leave a comment when doing the order saying that I will keep only one; and one thanking me for being honest and asking me not to order under these circumstances because their loss for the sent back items would be greater than their gain from the sale.