Academy Sports + Outdoors

Today I visited Academy Sport's+Outdoors (9557 South Boulevard Charlotte, NC 28273) location to purchase a meat grinder. An employee helped show me various meat grinders. I found the item I wanted but it wasn't on the shelf, so I asked the rep to see if there was any stock. The rep advised there was stock upfront and I asked her to scan the barcode to see. Once the barcode was scanned, the rep confirmed material was in store, but the price was $149.99 compared to the advertised price in the camping area of $139.99. I requested the lower price to be granted and the rep stated that it wasn't possible because they were switching prices due to the holidays. I requested to speak to a manager, and the store rep took the shelf price tag off and I headed upfront to the promotional area. Once upfront, the holiday advertised price listed $149.99 but there were barcodes on packages listing the item at $139.99. Another price discrepancy, that clearly shows two different prices in one area for stock. Once at the register, the customer service rep/manager Ty said that although it shows $139.99 on the box, it will be $149.99 and that she had already spoken with the initial rep who informed her of the issue. It seemed as if Ty had already made the decision after speaking with the rep via headset that I wouldn't be granted the price adjustment although there were multiple price discrepancies for this item throughout the store. I wasn't given the opportunity to fully be heard. I was told nicely by Ty that the price would be $149.99 or she couldn't sell the item to me. I advised that I would purchase the item but would call to speak with the store manager. Ty declined to give the name of the store manager due to the potential of different managers being on staff once I called. There's a big difference between a store manager and department managers. Both store reps lacked to show interest and empathy towards my concerns even if they couldn't grant the price as the decision was made before I could even speak my case to the manager and the store didn't take any responsibility or ownership for the mistake of listing two different prices for the product in multiple areas in the store. I don't think the store was blatantly advertising a lower price to mislead consumers to increase sales but believe it is due to broken systems/processes for managing price changes throughout the store during various advertisement campaigns and seasons. It's not the consumer responsibility to check around the store for different advertised pricing to see if there’s higher or lower price for them to be charged. I do not want the price difference of $10 bucks. I felt embarrassed today as customers and other employees watched as myself and Ty went back and forth about a mistake that the company made. Better training is needed for employees at this location managing the customer in-store experience along with managing price changes. Customers deserved to be treated fairly and at least given the opportunity to be heard. I will continue to escalate this until I hear from an appropriate level of management at Academy. I would like to discuss my encounter with the store manager and district manager. Please see picture below.

I really enjoyed going into this particular Academy Sports + Outdoor store. I needed some gloves to do commercial driving. I explained the type of gloves I needed and Tonmy walked me right to it. He stayed while I made a decision on which ones I wanted. Chris checked me out. He was very polite and pleasant. You do not find this type of customer service anymore. I appreciate these men bring nothing but gentleman. Whoever raised them, raised them right.