Cameras and Lenses

Used/discontinued bins

I hope I do not anger the management with this one but I would like to share a little find with some of my neighbors. I recently returned from another excursion to the local Cabelas. For those of you unfamiliar with the store it is basically a camping, hunting, fishing, etc... retailer. Probably the largest in the US and possibly the world. They have the largest selection of optics I have ever had the privelege to handle.

In one section of their retail stores is what they call a "Bargain Cave" in which discontinued and returned merchandise is placed for resale at lower than new prices. I have found some excellent deals in there on some superb bins. Today was no exception. Earlier in the year I had owned a pair of 10x50 Meopta Meostar bins. The only reason I returned them is because I perceived a noticeable level of CA in a specific high contrast situation. Other than that one issue I was thoroughly delighted with them and thought they were entirely comparable to the Swarovski SLC 10x50s at a less expensive price. Well that less expensive price just became a bit sweeter.

These bins were marked down about $250 off of the brand new price and I could find absolutely nothing wrong with them. (In fact, I believe they are the pair I returned earlier this fall.) They came complete with all accessories. After asking to handle them the store employee commented that he would be willing to "work a deal" on the price because they were marked in a particular manner for being in the display case for an extended period of time. After discussing it with his manager they knocked another $100 of the price! I asked him if this applied to all of the bins in there and he said "yes and no". Each bin is marked on their sale label with a letter and number. The longer the bin is in there the lower the letter and number and the better the chance for working a deal on the price. The letter/number combo "J6" was on the Meoptas with several other models present with that designation or a similar one "I6, K6, etc...".

The kicker is that for some reason they seem to be overloaded with returned/discontinued bins right now. I saw just about everything in the case from the old Zeiss Classic 10x40s to a Zeiss FL 10x32, Leica Ultravids and Trinovids...quite a few Docters, several Swaro ELs in 8x32 and 8.5x42, a few Nikon Monarchs, Bushnell Legends, etc... Now I didn't examine all of these bins but I did look at a few and I honestly could not find a thing wrong with many of them though there are several in there in some pretty bad shape...

...and ofcourse, many, if not all, of the high end models would be without warranty but I thought I might mention it for you folks within driving area of the Hamburg store or possibly one of the retail stores. There are some bargains to be had.

Same principle applies: the older the stock, the more willing they are to cut you a deal. When i needed a car i looked around for one that had manual transmission and a lot of dust on it. I got me a one year old car for 70% of blue book value after 6 hours of bargaining and arguing. Can't take the Balkans out of me...Yeah, they pitched in with a 6 year warranty.

Frank, do you get any warranty at all with those? And how easy and expensive are they to service if you have no warranty? At the brand service center I mean.

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