Originally Posted by ennacac 
My not so local large camera shop (NATCAM) in Minneapolis has only two Pentax cameras in the shelf, a K200D and a K20D, compared to many Nikon Canon and Sony DSLR's. When I asked them about it I was told that Pentax fired the local rep that was in once a month and now no one ever comes in the shop to push Pentax at the wholesale level.
Also the price of a K20D was only $200 less than the D300 they had on special that day.
Tom
Know exactly what you mean...shopped at the same store(s) in the Twin Cities many times. Actually, I really like the folks at NatCam up there. I have never heard the typical Pentax bashing from them. As a matter of fact, they encouraged me to look at the K10D. I did not tell them at the time that I was a Pentax guy.
Most of the sales guys there just want to sell product. They understand everyone has their own favorites and it's up to them to get the customer the product they want or need, regardless of their own personal bias.
No matter what sunshine is blown at us, Pentax has a marketing/image problem, at least in the USA. As I've said before, they have allowed themselves to be defined by their competition and their competitions "sales force".