When Mike Anderson of Plymouth needed 25 feet of Cat-5e network cable to connect a router to a Blu-ray player last week, he shopped around.
BestBuy.com wanted $26.99 for its Dynex private label, but Anderson found the equivalent cable for $3.03 at MyCableMart.com, an Eden Prairie-based company. "That's about an 800 percent difference," he said.
For audio-videophiles like Anderson, My Cable Mart has been a low-cost source for HDMI cables, TV mounts and wall plates since 2009.
Now Twin Cities customers can also peruse hundreds of items in the company's inventory in a retail store that owner Neil Marriott opened this month.
Unlike most companies that start with a bricks-and-mortar store and add a website later, My Cable Mart did the reverse.
Part of the reason for the retail expansion is the large number of Twin Cities customers who were already picking up orders at the warehouse to save on shipping costs. About 10 percent of the company's $4.5 million in 2012 revenue came from the Twin Cities, Marriott said. "Now we hope it will be even more," he said.
The former software developer started the business as a hobby from his spare bedroom in 2007 when he started helping friends with their own connectivity needs. "After you buy all the components, we're here to help you hook everything up. We're selling the gravy."
The company sells 1,800 different items, although 70 percent of the sales are HDMI cables. More than one-third of the inventory will be on display in the store, but all 1,800 items are available for pickup at the store.