How to right retailing wrongs.(Have You Heard?)

When I was a kid, my parents bought our manual push mower from Mutual Hardware in my hometown of Amherst, Mass., in part because Mutual stood behind the products it sold. (Not literally-mowing the lawn was my job.)

Shopping for one of the mowers in our report that begins on page 36 isn't quite as easy. Granted, consumers now have the benefit of the Internet for price comparisons, and we're spoiled for choice with the number of retailers just down the cyberroad. But such convenience isn't always so, well ... convenient. I won't wax nostalgic about the good old days when shopkeepers treated customers better, but we consumers need to be on high alert about the pitfalls in today's frenzied marketplace.

Brick-and-mortar retailers used to be the reliable contact point between customer and manufacturer. They took your money, and if problems arose with the products they sold, they took care of them. Now, while retailers still eagerly take your money, many are less willing to take responsibility if a product goes kaput. They tell you to go to the manufacturer. That's unfair, and in some cases, it's illegal.

In fact, in most cases, you shouldn't have to navigate your way back to the manufacturer. By selling you an item, a store gives an unwritten assurance known as an implied warranty of merchantability. That means if the product you bought doesn't do what it's supposed to, or if it malfunctions or fails within an unreasonably short time for that type of product and the price, the retailer is obligated to correct the problem, no matter what its return policy says. That doesn't mean a product should ...