A student working in one of our labs noticed that a piece of equipment had dead batteries, and asked me to get replacements. Nothing special, just 6 regular D-cells. The next day or so, I head to Lowe’s, and use my university card to pick them up for around $9.50, tax-exempt, for 8 batteries. I bring the receipt back to the office, and mark it up so that the cost is assigned to the right account, and am asked:
“Did you check at Staples?”
Um, no. I get everyday electrical stuff at Lowe’s. Power strips; surge suppressors; extension cords; heavy cabling, plugs, and receptacles for hooking up high-power heaters or parts of server racks; etc. There’s an industrial electronics place in town that’s good for heavier-duty batteries, but these batteries will probably last for years regardless. Staples is more for when we need a cheap network switch right now.
“Staples has a state contract, and if an item is on their contract site, we have to document that we can find it cheaper elsewhere.”
Ok. So I finally went to Staples today. Not that they can actually price check the batteries without charging and then voiding my university card:
| Vendor | List Price | Discounted Price | Battery Quantity | Cost per battery |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lowe’s | ~ $9.50 | N/A | 8 | $1.19 |
| Staples | ~ $7.50 | ~ $7.47 | 4 | $1.87 |
The mind boggles. Office-supply stores don’t sell batteries for cheap, even if you have a contract with them. Why doesn’t the state board that wrote the contract know this?