Ok. I got the identical one of these in a different city, and I combed through a ton of pages trying to figure it out. In the end, I just went. Here is the deal...
You call the number and they will ask you to attend a 90 minute presentation and invite you to join Direct Buy.
You will set up an appointment with the person on the phone, and show up to the event.
NOTE: If you are married they WILL NOT LET YOU COME ALONE. You will have to bring your other half. (They will use your relationship against you in the sales pitch later.) I told them I was married and they were about to hang up on me after I gave them every reason that my wife could not make it. Then I finally lied to them and told them I was recently separated but too embaressed to say so earlier. They then told me that was a different story and let me come alone.
You show upon the day you had the appointment, and they lump you in with a group and they will give you a sales pitch for 90 minutes. They are good, BUT your ace in the hole will be bringing your phone and doing a Google search for one of the items they claim that you will not find a better price. The very first item they pitched to all of us was a Mitsubishi TV model WD737-40. "Retail Price" was like $4900, but they would not be beat at $1299. I Google'd when they were not looking. found it on Amazon for $1179 with free shipping. Google the first item that they show you their catalog number for.
From time to time the store manager would swing by and proclaim that "he rarely interrupts the groups, but he thought we were a good bunch".
During the presentation they finally gave us the cost. $5k to join roughly, and then $200 per year after the introductory 3 years. They claim that you will save that much in the first year, and they will throw their fabricated numbers at you to make it work, but remember, they showed you an item in the beginning, and you googled it, so their numbers are crap. Direct Buy is a big room full of Manufacturers catalogs. Direct from the manufacturer. They are the catalogs that all of the big box stores use to order their stuff. Furniture, home decor, fabrics, flooring, electronics.... they do have a lot of stuff, BUT WITH patience you can find it cheaper somewhere else.
After a 120 minute presentation... not 90 minutes, they took all of us to sit at different ends of the store. They visited us each one at a time. The couples they had a higher chance at signing went first. I was the very last person they came to talk to, as I'm sure they saw it in my face that I was on the fence at best.
They let me sit there for 45 minutes. No one looked at me. No one talked to me. They wanted me to leave before getting my gifts. Then, I just started to pick up catalogs off the shelves and google every item I could find. Found it cheaper EVERY time. 90% of the items on Amazon.com. Shortly after they noticed that I was doing this, the salesman came over. I promptly told him that I was interested, but that I had found the items he said I would never find cheaper, cheaper. Immediately he went to talk to another guy and they came back and said, "wait, that catalog is not up to date". They showed me another one with the verbiage "Tier Two" that just happened to be $2 less than the one on Amazon. Still, I told him I could not justify $5K for savings $2 at a time.
He said thank you for coming by ad walked away. Another man came up to give me some paperwork to fill out and said "I heard you just wanted your free gifts, so lets get you on your way". Rude, but he was right.
NOW.... almost 3 hours later. They gave me 2 vouchers for Restaurant.com. $100 was part of the original deal, $100 for coming in within 3 days of calling the number. The way these work. You have to go to Restaurant.com and redeem them. You punch in the zip code you are interested in, and they will give you a list of places. Pick a place, and print the voucher you an take to the restaurant. YOU GET $10 off $20 meal, $25 off $37.50 meal, $50 off $75 meal, $100 off $150 meal etc. etc. You haveto spend out of pocket, but still free money if you are going to spend it anyway. We used it on Vacation in the OBX for Pamlico Jacks, Kellys, Adriannas (EXCELLET), and even Sweet Frog.
Now, the Tablet. They give you a voucher to mail in for your tablet. You have to send a MONEY ORDER, self addressed stamped envelope, and a $39.99 activation and shipping fee. They will then mail you a tablet. I am still waiting on mine (4-7 weeks on the voucher), but from reading the specs, and looking at the pictures on the voucher, they are sending me the Pandigital 7" Novel Tablet. 1 GB internal memory, with Wi-Fi. These retail new for about $65-80 on Ebay and such. Once again, not a great deal, but 1/2 price for a few hours of my time.
So... the verdict. It is not a scam. You will get exactly what they are presenting if you are willing to sacrifice your time, print out your food vouchers, and mail off a money order. It all comes down to what is your time worth. Obviously I have spent a ton of time typing this all up, so I do not consider my time that valuable... So in the end it was a great deal for me to get $300 worth of dining that I would have done anyway for $100, and a $65-80 tablet for $39.
Hope this answers it for everyone.
