Note: the below story is an unedited email from an anonymous Best Buy employee. Accuracy has not been checked, but read it anyway -- it's good stuff.

The foundation of Best Buy is "The Numbers". Basically "The Numbers" are what determines the rank of the store. That is, there are over 500 Best Buy's and they are all ranked against each other. What determines a store's rank, i.e. what determines how well a store performs in relation to other stores, is "The Numbers". "The Numbers" consist of several things. However, they consist primarily of percentages of PSP's aka the service plans, aka extended warranties) and accessories. As you read on, this will begin to make more and more sense.

Say, for instance, that you purchase a television for $1,000. If the service plan is, say, $100, then "The Numbers", as far as service plans are concerned, are 10% (given that 100 is 10% of 1,000). There are also a number of accessories which Best Buy wants you to purchase along with the television, such as: high-price surge protectors, monster cable hook-ups etc. When purchasing a computer (as you did) accessories would include items like surge protectors, USB cables, ink cartridges, paper, Norton anti-virus and more. Like the PSP numbers, if you purchased a television for $1,000 and purchased $100 in accessories, then the accessory numbers, for this particular sale, are 10%.

Each department has it's own set of numbers it is expected to maintain. The video department for example (TV's, DVD's, VCR's) at my store is expected to maintain around 10% in PSP's and 10% in accessories (these numbers are considered very good). Basically what this means is that if the total sales for video, over the course of a day, amount to $30,000, then the department should also have $3,000 in PSP's, and $3,000 in accessories to give them 10% in each category (since 3,000 is 10% of 30,000). Other departments vary as far as what is considered good. For example, in Computers, good would be around 12% in PSP's and 20% in accessories. Good for the cameras/camcorders department is 13% in PSP'S and 30% in accessories. All these numbers combined make up the store's overall numbers which ultimately make up the store's "power rank", which is basically a particular store's ranking within the whole company (somewhere between 1 and 500). The better your store's "numbers" are, the higher the store ranks.

This may already have become clear to you, but the reason they didn't want to sell you the computer was because you were going to screw up "The Numbers". You were going to put a couple of thousand dollars into their revenue without putting any money into the accessory or PSP numbers. Revenue does matter somewhat as far as store-ranking is concerned, but not as much as PSP and accessory number's. The store you dealt with wasn't willing to take the amount of revenue you were going to give them because of the negative impact it would have on "The Numbers". It should be noted that the value is not in "The Numbers" themselves, the value (and hence the concern) is that managers and supervisors get bonuses based on how well the store does-and how well the store does is, as I've mentioned, dependent on "The Numbers".

You may be wondering why some non-commissioned, non-bonused part-timer will screw you over just as readily as a manager or supervisor. There are a few reasons. One, they don't want to get chewed out by a manager or supervisor for a customer that "didn't get the service". Two, a person doesn't want to feel like it was their fault that the numbers suck-no one wants to feel like it's because of them that the store is doing poorly. Three, there is a lot of praise and back-patting when the numbers are good, and you need only have a very basic understanding of psychology to know that this serves to perpetuate the behavior (regardless of how unperpetuated it should be). Lastly, people who generate "good numbers" are more likely to be favored for any number of things such as more hours, day-shifts and promotions.

I know the whole "Numbers" thing sounds stupid and, to an extent, it is. It's resulted in a countless number of people leaving Best Buy having not been able to purchase what they wanted. Not only is this stupid because it results in people not wanting to frequent the store (since they can never seem to get what they want), but it is also money which is lost-out on by the store. People are walking into the store literally wanting to shell out hundreds or even thousands of dollars but employees won't allow them to do so because these would-be customers aren't buying the right things.

But what you should realize is that there is also something smart about "The Numbers" (as much as I hate to admit it). Since the employees are not commissioned, there is no incentive for them, on their own, to sell PSP's and accessories. Imagine a store with no structure (the polar opposite of what I've listed above). The employees would simply offer these things when they felt like it (which would be rarely, if ever). And accordingly, these things would rarely, if ever, get sold. And, needless to say, this is precisely what the store doesn't want since accessories and PSP's have a very high mark-up and thus generate a great deal of profit. But, despite a lack of commission, these things do get sold since managers are coming around showing you what "The Numbers" are for the day, and since every morning begins by detailing "The Numbers" from the day before, and since once a month there's a two-hour meeting discussing "The Numbers" of the previous month. The notion of "The Numbers" and their importance slowly but surely works it's way into the minds of all employees. And to make sure you're continuously concerned with them, there are bonused managers and supervisors walking around and watching you to make sure you're consistently offering/selling all the crap they want you to offer/sell which, in the end, makes the store, and them, more money. So when some young-punk screws you over, don't blame him/her too much because he/she is simply a victim (or mindless follower) of Best Buy's design. The problem lies within the company's scructure much more than it lies within the actual employees.