Martin,
You are not representing all the facts!
A local distributor has additional costs that have to be recovered through
the incremental price:
1. The carrier (Fedex or UPS) charges a fee on every shipment for handling
the Customs process. Believe me it's well worth the extra money to avoid
the battles you can get into with those people.
2. The distributor has to pay in advance and stock all sorts of items, many
of which will never get sold, but he has to do it, just in case someone
needs the parts. Shelf space costs a lot of money on an ongoing basis.
3. The distributor has to pay for advertisement. If he doesn't, the
manufacturer dumps him and chooses someone else.
4. The distributor has to do guarantee work in his region and performs lots
of free consulting on the products.
5. The distributor has to make a "fair profit". It's not just his hobby. I
don't know what your idea of a "fair profit" is, but I believe 10% before
tax is fair.
6. Believe me, the manufacturers' discount for distributors is much lower
than you think. It usually isn't possible to negotiate a better price.
If you add all of this up, you quickly come to a number close to +50%.
I have run an exclusive distributorship here in OK (as in Oklahoma) for a
European company for two years. I have people accuse me all the time of
price gouging compared to the price in Europe.
At the same time, my wife asks me why I continue to run the business; I
would make more money per hour selling hamburgers for McDonalds or Burger
King!
I can't say whether +56% is a fair price or not because I don't have all of
the information, but I am sure the distributor in NOT making a killing.
73
Rick, NJ0IP
-----Original Message-----
From: tentec-bounces@contesting.com [mailto:tentec-bounces@contesting.com]
On Behalf Of Martin
Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 9:18 AM
To: tentec@contesting.com
Subject: [TenTec] Ten-Tec dealer in OK
A friend of mine runs here in OK a popular and frequently visited web
site in czech language. Now he writes that he planned to buy something
from Ten-Tec. The price was $267. He tried to order directly at T-T and
payvia PayPal but he received a reply:
"I am sorry, we must honor our dealer in the Czech Republic. I am not
able to sell factory direct to your country without going through our
dealer."
No problem, he said and asked the T-T OK dealer. Surprisingly, the
dealer asked $417 ... which means 56% increase! My friend's final
comment: "Never mind, the T-T company ended for me. I hate companies
engaging similar exclusive dealers!"
---
Actually I don't know who is the OK exclusive dealer, I don't care. But
T-T should know that the VAT here is 20% and also the shipping costs
should be added. The ham radio dealers here are gluttonous and greedy,
mostly incompetent and buying for list prices like any end-user across
the pond. Presumed that the manufacturers offer their stuff for dealer
prices, they should check their price strategies unless they want to
fall into disreputation.
73
Martin, OK1RR
_______________________________________________
TenTec mailing list
TenTec@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
_______________________________________________
TenTec mailing list
TenTec@contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/tentec
|