How long should stuff last?

That was the question I asked Catherine after a successful return of a 3 year old Christmas gift. For Christmas 2005, Catherine received an iHome iPod alarm clock. An iPod alarm clock is a lot like a regular alarm clock, except it can wake you up to whatever is on your iPod. This particular version costs $100, which seems expensive, but if people are buying it, why not?

Catherine's alarm clock began to malfunction after about 1.5 years of service. In a nod to the device that gave the iHome clock life, it has two wheels that let you control things like volume, tuning, and setting the time for your alarms. One of the wheels started to work improperly to the point that the device was no longer usable. It sat on Catherine's dresser for some time (1.5 years), not doing anything.

This year during the Christmas season, we decided to try to return it to Bed, Bath & Beyond. It had now been about 3 years since the time the device was purchased. We saw two issues with this attempted return:
1) There have been possibly 2, but at least 1 new version of the alarm clock released since hers was purchased.
b) She wasn't sure it came from Bed, Bath & Beyond in the first place.

We did know that BBB sells the new version of the alarm clock, so we decided to try it out. We took the box and all of the original pieces back to the store and handed it to the cashier. She scanned the item and it came up on their system. Value: $99.99. She handed us a receipt for store credit, and that was that. She didn't even look in the box, which was fairly amazing. Doubly amazing was that the current iHome clock was selling for $89.99 as a part of a sale, AND we had a 20% off coupon, so it ended up costing much less than the 3 year old version we just traded in.

Places not named Radio Shack are usually very eager to please their customers, so it never hurts to try to return something that you believe has failed you. As I learned from Catherine's mom, places like Costco will take back any item you purchased their no questions asked for 2 years. They simply ship it back to the manufacturer and get a refund from them, claiming that the product did not live up to the customer's standards. Since Costco sells so much stuff, the manufacturer wouldn't dream of pulling out of there, so they comply. This benefits you greatly, and keeps the manufacturer from producing a crappy product which will be returned en masse.

Last point: how long should stuff last? I asked Catherine if she was disappointed in the length of time her clock lasted, and she said very. 1.5 years does seem like a short life span. But what about 3 years? 5 years? Many electronic products are upgraded on a yearly basis, and some even more frequently than that. This leaves us with a lot of outdated gadgets laying around, some of which no longer work correctly. Just because your device broke down after a year or so, and there's a new version out doesn't mean you should feel OK that your crappy product is broken. Talk to the retailer and see if you can return your item for credit towards the new one. If that doesn't work, talk to the manufacturer and see if they will help you.

And of course, if all of that fails, stage an 8 year boycott and send follow up letters to the CEO whenever you have a chance.