Help Me Flag White Van Scammers on Craigslist - Page 2

Yep, you got it.

My friend got taken by a White Van scammer. Pretty funny, the goofball. Of course, this was on the street. Its a little harder to pull off on the web. I mean, "Kirsch" speakers. Unless your dyslexic, you're going to see the difference. When someone pulls you aside and shows you a fancy box in the back of a van, it's another story. My friend bought "Acoustic Response" speakers (not "Acoustic Research"). I got to laugh at him for weeks. And they were the WORST speakers. Bwahahahaha.

That was actually a pretty entertaining report. It blows my mind to think someone would actually buy speakers from some dude selling out of the back of his SUV.

 

I'd probably flag pages like that on Craig's list if I actually knew speaker brands.

It feels kind of pointless to go out of my way flagging craigslist ads because if it does get taken down, it's really really easy to just put up a new one.  So it doesn't really accomplish anything.  The only time I have ever flagged CL ads is when I have been looking for a used car, and there's those dealers who relist their car every day, and you keep clicking on the new ad thinking it's another car, over and over and over.  Drives me nuts. 

 

But more than just googling the speakers, who wouldn't listen to them first?  I guess most people can't really tell, and just want something loud and bassy, but if they sound good to them in the back of the SUV, then I guess it was a good purchase. 

Not quite.  Maybe second dumbest.
 

Well, there's an old saying: "You can't cheat an honest man." These scammers work on the theory that you're going to jump at what you see as "a steal." If someone here at Headfi advertises a Ray Samuels Predator amp for $125, how many people do you think will be throwing money their way without thinking twice because they want to jump on that amp NOW. That's how the original White Van scam worked. Youre walking down the street and some guy says, "Hey, you need some speakers? Best Buy hired me as and independent installer and they mistakenly gave me three pairs of speakers instead of two. I installed two sets at this rich guy's house and I got these left over.  I don't have any use for them. Do you need speakers? Hell, I'll take a hundred bucks for 'em. These are Klispch speakers. They cost like a thousand bucks a pair."  And you were in such a hurry to "score" on this deal you didn't even notice the box says "Kirsch" not "Klispch". Now I'm talking 15 years ago it was a new concept, these days its old hat and you're not likely to fall for it. But listing speakers as "Kirsch" on the Web? That just shows the scammers are the real dummies.

 

Edited by chadbang - 11/2/10 at 8:50am

Anytime someone tries to capitalize on stolen property which the white van speakers were touted as, they deserve a good screwin'.  This concept is older than 15 years BTW.  Back in the late 70's my roommate at the time drug home a new pair of speakers that he bought off of 2 guys who were parked in a Kroger parking lot.  They were delivering them for a store in Tulsa and had an "extra" pair that was not on the invoice.  I think he paid around 100 bucks for them.

Edited by ronnielee54 - 11/2/10 at 9:25am

The 70s? Really? Wow, I had no idea!

No, the white van speakers usually are not stolen.

Instead, they're really cheap crap not worth $20, but passed off as "high end."

That sounds awfully familiar for some reason.

The scammers usually tell people that they just finished installing some five-figure home theater, but the owner had accidentally ordered too many speakers. Further, that they managed to get the extras out and are selling megabuck speakers cheap before they go back to their shop and their boss notices that they have extra speakers.

They usually want $200-$300 for the pair and will have some bogus glossy ads for the brand.

Yeah, an obvious scam, but a lot of audio is the same way. Look at the crap passed off as good in big box retailers. And look at the crap sold around here. Most keep their mouths shut, but there are a number of products and brands I would never buy. Stuff that's obviously cheap junk priced sky-high.

I don't see much difference between that and the guys in the white van.

It would be a scam if either ad actually advertised the item as something else (e.g. Klipsch instead of Kirsch) or said something along the lines of "these speakers are worth $5000 new". They don't. They advertise exactly what they are selling. I don't see how either ad is a scam.