Exactly my thought. Why pay $135 for a Genesis SD70M at the LHS when I can can spend $100 on two and have them here in a week?
Depends on whether or not your local hobby shop is what the computer industry likes to call a "value added reseller". i.e. Does he add anything to the transaction to make it worth the extra time and effort you spend shopping at his store?
I shop both online and at my local hobby shop. Like many of you, I can't resist saving $150 or so on a BLI loco by shopping online. On the other hand, I buy just about everything else at my local hobby shop. For me, the ability to look at the product before buying is worth something extra. So is having a place to stop by and pick up some track or rail joiners, or a magazine. So I buy almost all of my cars, buildings and accessories from a couple of local shops.
Luckily, here in Seattle we have probably about 10 shops within 50 miles or so. Some have great prices, others not so good. Some have friendly staff, others seem like they'd just as soon you leave them alone. I choose where to shop accordingly. I tend to visit about 5 or 6 shops over the course of a year, but end up buying most of my stuff from 2 of them, based on a good selection, customer service and reasonable prices.
I actually had a fellow ask me to leave his hobby shop once, since I had the nerve to suggest another customer look at something other than what the salesman was trying to push. The fellow wanted a narrow gauge line to go with his O gauge trains. The salesman suggesting buying an N scale train and modifying it. (To represent what? A live steam park train?) I suggested he check out the On30 that I'd seen on a nearby shelf, since it was ready to run, and a better match to his scale. What I had suggested was not only a better option, but that set was also more expensive. Still, since it wasn't his idea, the salesman took offense and asked me to leave.
The same sales jerk.. err clerk, had also refused to let me look at a catalog a few minutes before, saying he knew I wasn't going to buy anything. I was considering buying an LGB set that they had on hand for a Christmas tree layout, but wanted to check on the price of an LGB Forney, since I really like that engine. Had he simply let me see the catalog, I could have confirmed what I thought I recalled, that the Forney I wanted was about $800 at the time and I would then have purchased the smaller $300 set he had on sale. I simply wanted to be sure I couldn't get the Forney for roughly the same price as that set before making the purchase.
After he asked me to leave, the other customer left too, based on the way he treated me, leaving a nice stack of O scale stuff he'd intended to buy on the counter. All told, his attitude cost him at least $600 in sales, if not more. I've also never set foot in the place again.
The sad thing is, when I told somebody that story, at least two people said "was the store 'xxxxxxxxx' Trains?". It wasn't the same place, but both of them went on to relate how that store pretty much catered only to collectors, and the "Christmas Tree Train Crowd" was made to feel less that welcome there. It caught up with them in the end, they're no longer around.