Buyer Beware

Our weekly look at all things automotive. Today's review by G.Chambers Williams III of the San Antonio Express-News.

Super makeover?Last year, Ford’s best-selling F-150 light-duty pickup came to market with a complete redesign, bringing lots of new features and innovations.

As long as we are doing it this year, why not do it always?

“This year, it all comes down to value and getting the best bang for your shopping dollar,” said Tod (cq) Marks, senior editor of Consumer Reports.

He was referring to a survey by the magazine showing nearly two-thirds of
Americans plan to cut back on holiday spending. That’s on top of the last year’s cutbacks, when more than three-fourths of Americans polled by Consumer Reports said they planned to spend less.

Wait until Monday to fill up?Gasoline prices in the Kansas City area are essentially unchanged heading into the weekend compared with a week ago.

Barnes & Noble Inc. said Nook, its device for reading digital versions of books, sold out its initial production run and won’t ship new purchases until the week of Jan. 4.

The retailer said last month when it introduced the $259 device that it would ship purchases by Nov. 30. The Nook is Barnes & Noble’s entry into the market dominated by Amazon.com Inc. and Sony Corp.

“While we increased production based on the high consumer interest, we’ve sold out of our initial nook allotment available for delivery before the holidays,” said Mary Ellen Keating, a Barnes & Noble spokeswoman.

From the Orlando Sentinel
"Build quality top notch"As part of its restructuring, General Motors executives decided to save Buick, kill Pontiac and Saturn. I remain unconvinced that this was the right decision, but I have to admit that the 2010 LaCrosse makes a very strong case that there is life left in Buick.

By Joyce Smith

Quaint downtown Parkville might have quivered a bit when shiny new shopping centers began to open nearby.

And while some small business left for these “greener” paved pastures, other local entrepreneurs have settled in with offerings that are draws in themselves.

Take the new Spaghetti Western at 112 Main St.
Oklahoma native and Northland resident Melissa Robbins has long been a fan of spaghetti Westerns, those mid-1960s films financed by Italian companies. Her husband also is bass player for The Wilders, a “classic country” band.

the Associated Press
More than 314,000 taxpayers made inaccurate claims for a popular tax credit that helps pay college expenses, getting $532 million they weren’t entitled to receive, a government report said Thursday.

The Hope Credit provides up to $1,650 a year to help pay expenses for the first two years of college. The taxpayers claimed the credit for the same student for three consecutive years, instead of the two years available, said a report by the Treasury inspector general for tax administration. Auditors reviewed two three-year periods, ending in 2006 and 2007. About 58,000 claimed the credit for a fourth consecutive year in 2007.

RecallThe Procter & Gamble Co. is recalling some 120,000 bottles of Vicks Sinex nasal spray after the company found bacteria in some samples during routine testing.

Spokesman Tom Millikin describes the voluntary recall as a precaution after small amounts of the B. cepacia bacteria were found in the over-the-counter product at the German plant where it’s made.

Holiday shoppers, it's almost time to start your spending engines.

With Black Friday -- the day after Thanksgiving -- just a week away, will consumers be spending or window shopping? Buying for themselves or for someone on the gift list? Spending online or at the mall? And on what?

Consumer Reports issued its pre-holiday shopping poll this morning. Among the significant data points:

--Electronics are hot items on Black Friday weekend. Seventy percent of the shoppers surveyed plan to purchase electronics early in the shopping season -- mostly video games or accessories, MP3 players or iPods, video game systems, digital cameras and flat-panel TVs.

From Bloomberg News

Crowd control is job oneWal-Mart Stores Inc. and other retailers are being told by the government to take greater precautions with their Black Friday shopping events to avoid a repeat of last year, when a worker was trampled by customers.