Got a catalog from DX engineering via USPS today

[kc7jty]

and it had my fully correct address on it (my a-d with the FCC has a secret omission in the details).
They carry Icom's line only, and the V-8000 is $30 more than HRO.

[N8YX]

...but DX is cheaper on some things than other amateur equipment retailers, my friend/protege Brian works for them and the outfit is right down the road from me.

Inside the Summit Racing store.

Either way, when I visit that place I'm probably gonna end up $pending.

[W3WN]

and it had my fully correct address on it (my a-d with the FCC has a secret omission in the details).
They carry Icom's line only, and the V-8000 is $30 more than HRO.There are ways of finding out your address information. Google is not always your friend. To say nothing of the subscription departments of newspapers and magazines, utility companies, vendors you've dealt with... more than a few feel few if any compunctions about selling your address information (along with those of thousands of other subscribers) to anyone willing to pay the coin.

And considering that the HRO chain... heck, any given store in the chain... outsells DXE on ICOM equipment by a large portion, it's not at all surprising that HRO has a better price on a given item than DXE. They may be buying in large enough quantity to get a bigger wholesale price.

Or, they may cut the price on the radio itself to a bare minimum, and keep the prices on the rest of the accessories and other add-ons at or near MSRP. For example, how often does someone buy a (name brand) HF rig without a power supply (be it a matching or a generic, like an Astron)? Compare the cost of the total package, not just the rig itself.

And then there's the little trick of charging for shipping & handling above and beyond the actual freight costs. "Handling" to most of us means the cost of the shipping box (if any) and packing material (if any). Some include a small labor cost in there to cover the time of the person who does the packing. And some figure in all those costs as part of "handling" and then and a surcharge that is pure profit (for example, on a generic widget, $10 to cover the shipping delivery charge, $4 for the box & packing stuff & $1 worth of time from the poor minimum wage schmuck who put it in the box, filled the box with bubble wrap or packing peanuts or whatever, and applied the mailing label... but the firm's billed S&H is $30 or more)