From “Find the Fun in Everyone”
to “Find a store”

The December 1996 page is three columns on white. On the left are a gift certificate and Always the Right Choice! In the middle sit Weekly Best Buys, A sampling from our weekly circular. Check it out! and a wreath for Extended Holiday Hours. On the right, a holiday sweepstakes and a coupon book: Visit a Best Buy store near you and pick up a 101 Dalmatians Holiday Savings Coupon Book.

Every item sends you somewhere else, to a store, a circular or a phone line. The footer gives the number for Customer Relations, 1-800-369-5050, and signs off © 1996 Best Buy Concepts Inc.

Above the copyright line is a link to a non-frame version of this site; below the phone number, a small badge, Powered by Microsoft BackOffice. The page’s code labels that version in a comment: No frame, no table browser version.

The tag in the lights was not new. Best Buy had switched to the yellow price tag as its logo in 1989.^[1] And the company began with a wrecked store. On June 14, 1981, a tornado hit its Sound of Music store in Roseville, outside Minneapolis. Six days later it held a Tornado Sale in the lot where the tornado struck, and in two days it moved more merchandise than it ever had across all its locations combined.^[10]

In June 1997 the page turns purple and splits into frames: a menu on the left, links across the top, the content in the middle. A handwritten-style banner says Just the store you’ve been shopping for. Boxes promote DVD at Best Buy, The Ultimate in Picture and Sound Quality, and Ozzfest ’97, The concert event of the millennium! The bottom line reads Last Updated June 5th, 1997 1:50 PM.

By July 1998 the frames are dark blue and the header says BEST BUY online. Now you can buy music here: Buy CDs Online! and Over 100,000 Titles, with Barenaked Ladies’ Stunt at $11.99 and Janet Jackson’s Velvet Rope at $12.99, each with an Add to Cart button. A charity auction offers Get GREAT Concert Seats! for the Page/Plant Tour ’98. The right half of the still is plain navy.

Fetch either page’s HTML without frames and you get a notice instead: Our site has been optimized for viewing with browsers that support frames and tables. It still lets you in (you can still visit our site with your existing browser) and links to downloads of Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator.

In May 1999 the header still says BEST BUY online, and the middle column says Welcome to our ONLINE STORE! Its menu, Choose a department:, has two entries in the page’s code: Music and DVD Videos. The lists under it are all discs, from You’ve Got Mail and Amistad to Tom Petty’s Echo.

Everything else lives in the yellow column on the left, in a second menu headed Learn more about the products in our RETAIL STORES:. Its code lists 13 departments, from Computers to Phones/Faxes. A fourteenth, Furniture, is commented out. Under it: Find the Best Buy store nearest you: and, in bold, Reno, NV Now Open!

Further down, a feature box sells an MP3 player the store way: Internet Music in the Palm of Your Hand! Rio PMP300 Player in Stores Now! The small print at the bottom is for the online shop: Buy 3 or more items online and pay only $1 shipping. One week only. Many images in this capture are lost, and the right side of the still is black.

On June 11, 2000, the homepage is mostly white: the tag logo with .com, four black-and-white photos and two columns of text. It opens with Thanks for stopping by. and then, in red, Soon you’ll find…

What follows is a plan. Easy shopping. Online or in our stores, you can buy stuff, get it delivered or pick it up, schedule installation, and make returns and exchanges, however it’s convenient for you. The narrow column on the right has the line in the box below. Two lines later it asks Questions about your current online order? Both sit on the same page.

Best Buy’s fiscal 2001 annual report says the company launched BestBuy.com as an e-commerce site in June 2000.^[2] This capture is the waiting room. The browser tab says BESTBUY.COM, and the code still carries the template’s labels, LEFT COLUMN BODY COPY and RIGHT COLUMN BODY COPY.

By September 2001 the store is open, and pale yellow. The tag keeps the .COM and the red dot it had in 2000. Product rows carry prices: a Compaq Presario 1215US notebook at $1,599.99 after mail-in rebates, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty at $49.99 to pre-order, Memento new on DVD. A box warns Windows XP is coming. Near the bottom, one line starts a thread that runs to 2026: Buy online, pick up in store.

The same annual report describes BestBuy.com WebStations in all of its stores, and says customers could pick up and return their online orders there.^[2] The page’s code has its own small print: Page Generated by Teamsite on 08/28/2001 15:36:33. Branch: InQA.

September 2002 keeps the yellow and adds a flag-striped banner, Free Shipping on everything. One box asks Have you seen our infomercial yet? You can order the featured products right here. Another sends returns back to the building: It’s fast and simple! Bring your product return or exchange to a Best Buy store near you. Best Buy and Geek Squad joined forces that year.^[1]

The 2003 captures we checked all show the same page at the homepage address, and it isn’t a store. It’s a notice: To shop and check out on BestBuy.com, an Internet browser setting that enables cookies is required. It explains that a cookie lets the site move you around without reintroducing yourself. If you’d rather not, it offers a phone number, 1-888-BEST BUY (237-8289), or a last resort: Or, shop at a Best Buy store near you.

By our June 2004 capture the page is blue and white, and the tag is bigger, without the .COM, with a tilted wordmark, on the right of the header. Next to it, a slogan in the header: Thousands of Possibilities, GET YOURS. The tab title now names the stock, Best Buy ~ Computers, Electronics & Accessories. The middle is a pile of offers: Grand Slam TVs, ALL ON SALE, a row with a DVD, a camcorder and a tablet PC, and a GPS receiver in the row below.

In the right column a small banner shows a Best Buy storefront and asks Why pay shipping? The answer is written on the picture: buy online, pick up in store.

June 2005 says it louder. The hero reads getting a great gift in time for dad’s day is possible, and under it, in yellow, GET IT BEFORE JUNE 19 WITH IN-STORE PICKUP. June 19 was Father’s Day that year. The strip above it is about the weather: Beat the Heat with a new Air Conditioner. Because most of our captures are from mid-June, Father’s Day comes back almost every year from here on, up to Super tech for super dads in 2025.

In June 2006 the hero area is blank in our capture, with a Gift Ideas For Everyone strip under it, and the shipping banner is still on the right: Why pay shipping? Lower down, two boxes advertise what is inside the stores now. NEW at Best Buy: Magnolia™ Home Theater promises demo rooms Inside select Best Buy stores. The other says Computer Problems? Call in Geek Squad®! and offers to fix your PC at a Geek Squad precinct in a Best Buy store.

The June 17, 2007 capture was taken on Father’s Day itself, and the page knows: a blue bar says Dad’s Day GIFT IDEAS. Across the top runs ONLY AT BEST BUY, ROLLING STONES and NEW 4-DVD SET. A blue box on the right says IN STORE ONLY and SAVE UP TO $500 ON HDTV.

The footer keeps a menu from 2006 called MORE BEST BUY SITES.... Its code lists Best Buy Canada, Best Buy for Business, Government and Education, Magnolia, Geek Squad and Best Buy en Español.

From June 2008 to June 2011 the top of the homepage is a blank band in our captures. In 2009, at least, the banner was Flash: the code loads a file called productdisplay.swf, and the replay shows nothing there. What survives is the frame around the hole.

That frame is busy. The 2008 header lists Weekly Ad, Store Locator, Outlet Center and Gift Center, and the rows under the band offer Great Deals on Discounted Items in the Best Buy Outlet Center, a box labeled WALK OUT WORKING™ and a FixYa panel, TECH QUESTION? GET HELP. In 2009 the Computers menu in the code reads Laptops, then Netbooks.

In 2010 the header turns into four drop-down tabs, Products, Services, Shops & Deals and Gifts. In June 2011 the band finally has words, MAKE YOUR SUMMER SHINE with great prices on the latest devices. Below them is an empty box with a spinner and the word Loading.

In June 2012 the header goes dark navy and the tag sits on it, smaller. The hero is a DAD’S DAY SALE, FRIDAY–SATURDAY, and under it a full-width strip with a store icon: FREE STORE PICKUP EVERY DAY WHEN YOU ORDER ONLINE. A red box, DEAL OF THE DAY, appears on the right and stays for years.

June 2013 is a 5 DAYS OF DAD sale next to FINAL HOURS FINAL SAVINGS. A blue line announces THE WINDOWS STORE ONLY AT BEST BUY, and a badge promises LOW PRICE GUARANTEE, We’ll match prices on qualifying products. The tab title has become a slogan, Best Buy: Making Technology Work for You. Image labels in the code add three more lines: We Promise, Knowledgeable, Impartial Advice and Support for the Life of Your Products.

June 2014 keeps the navy header over a white page, now with a MacBook Air, Save $100. Plus free shipping, and a strip with two icons, FREE STORE PICKUP and FREE SHIPPING. The browser tab says it outright: Best Buy: Experience the Ultimate Showroom. A store is a place to look at things; the tab tells you to look here.

Five months after that capture, on Black Friday 2014, bestbuy.com went down.^[4] Fortune quoted the message visitors got: We’re sorry. BestBuy.com is currently unavailable. Check back soon.^[5] None of our June captures shows it.

June 2015 and 2016 put full-width photos on top, TOP DEALS FOR DAD and then HOTTEST DEALS FOR DAD, with the new slogan centered under them: EXPERT SERVICE. UNBEATABLE PRICE. In June 2017 a gray strip appears below the hero, Shopping History, and talks to a visitor with no shopping history shown: Your shopping history is empty. Let’s fix that.

Best Buy changed its logo in 2018: the name left the yellow tag and stands alone in white block letters. In our June 2018 capture the words BEST BUY stand on their own in white block letters, and the yellow tag is a small blank shape after them. Best Buy announced the logo on May 9, 2018, as its first logo update in almost three decades, made easier to read, especially in today’s digital world. The same announcement said it already appears on BestBuy.com, ahead of the stores.^[6]

The page around it is the June hero for a game fair: E3, Bring home the hype., and a stack of covers including Kingdom Hearts III, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and Fallout 76. The menu bar keeps the 2017 labels, Products, Brands, Deals and Services. Under the hero the strip from 2017 is back, word for word: Your shopping history is empty. Let’s fix that. The tab title has dropped the slogan for something closer to a search result: Best Buy | Official Online Store | Shop Now & Save. It is still the title in our 2026 capture.

From 2019 to 2024 our captures show a store icon in the header with a store’s name next to it. In June 2019 it says San Francisco (13th…, in June 2020 Bangor, in June 2021 San Francisco (13th and Harrison…, and from 2022 to 2024 Milpitas. Nobody signed in to take these captures, so these are the stores the page showed the archive.

June 2020 adds a notice under the header: See the latest on our stores, services and safety plans. and We’re operating a little differently, but we’re still here to get you what you need. In the code, an image label spells it out: Contactless curbside pickup ready in one hour at a store. Best Buy had moved to contactless curbside service at all its locations on March 22, 2020, where state or local laws allowed.^[7] The hero below is ordinary: Top Deals, Great deals happening right now.

June 2021 is a yellow The Bigger Deal. with a grid of round category icons. June 2022 is red and blue: Top Deals, Deal Mode Activated, and a box for Clearance, open-box and more.

In June 2023 the hero is a white ROG Ally on purple, Play all your games with the new ROG Ally gaming handheld. A pop-up covers part of the page: Hi there! For the best experience, be sure to sign in. It is back in 2024, with Milpitas still in the header.

June 2024 is a 3-Day Sale, Ends Sunday., Shop gifts for Father’s Day and more. and, in the small print, Limited quantities. No rainchecks. The link bar has grown odd neighbors. A link in the menu row says Yes, Best Buy Sells That, and the strip above it lists Yardbird, Best Buy Outlet, Best Buy Business and Shop with an Expert. About five weeks later Best Buy announced a new tagline, imagine that, and added magenta, teal and red to its blue and yellow.^[8]

June 2025 is Father’s Day, Super tech for super dads, over a row of round icons. The store slot in the header shows only the icon.

On August 19, 2025, two months after that capture, Best Buy opened a marketplace for outside sellers. It said the marketplace more than doubled the products online and brought movies back on Blu-Ray, DVD and 4K SteelBook. Something bought from those sellers could still be returned at a local Best Buy store.^[9]

Our last capture is from September 1, 2026, the week before Labor Day. The hero is a LABOR DAY APPLIANCES SALE, Save up to 45% on select major appliances. Under it, on yellow: We won’t be beat on appliance pricing, BACKED BY OUR PRICE MATCH GUARANTEE, and in the small print Excludes Marketplace Products.

The next row is for the returns. A banner reads BEST BUY Outlet and Open-box, and its heading says Top quality. Even better prices. We inspect and verify every returned item. In 2002 the page asked you to bring your return to a store. In 2026 it sells the return back.

At the top right, where earlier captures showed San Francisco or Milpitas, the header says Your store and, under it, Find a store.

1996 · lights2026 · Find a store

◀ ▶

The 1996 page had nothing to sell on the screen. It sent you to a store for a coupon book. Thirty years later the page sells appliances, MacBooks and open-box returns, and still keeps a slot in its header for the building down the road.

The tag made the same trip in the other direction. In 1996 it was the whole logo, lit up for the holidays. In 2026 it is a small yellow shape at the end of a name, the size of a sticker.