[TheForge] rant concerning quality of products

[GRAF]

Andy, This is simply my own observation of local businesses, but I 
believe you are in error here.
In the last two decades or so I have seen a distinct alteration in the 
way things are being run, as the next gen of bosses have arrived with 
their freshly minted business administration degrees.
Companies that used to function on the theory that their success was 
based on helping their customers make a good living and therefore remain 
viable customers in the long haul, have gone to a model that treats 
their customers as a nuisance at best. The customer is now useful only 
to make an immediate profit.
"Just in time" is an example . Items that are critical to repairs, but 
not often needed used to be stocked two or three deep so that when 
needed the customer could get back up and running, generating profit and 
coming back for other items, while not even considering going elsewhere 
for supplies.

Now those same items are usually on backorder, if they are really being 
stocked at all. When someone orders them in dire need they are told that 
maybe they should have had a spare on their own shelf.(Where any 
warranty would be expiring while waiting to be used.) Fast delivery is 
of course available for an extra charge to pay for "special shipping 
charges", otherwise it is two/three weeks out.

I have no problem stocking parts that I have a reasonable expectation of 
needing in a year or so. I am talking things that go wrong suddenly and 
only once in a piece of equipments life. That is what distributors USED 
to be for. They in theory, cover a base of hundreds ,if not thousands, 
of these same pieces of equipment.

Why is this? Could it be that some bean counter has decided, or been 
taught, that the real value lies in the nickels and dimes that do not 
turn over every quarter, and not in the customer base? Yeah, turn over 
is important, but so is the return customer. Given the choice between a 
distributer that I can walk into , do business and be about my way, and 
having to chase all over town, I will gladly pay a premium at the 
first.. Short term paper profits vs giving a reason for customer 
loyalty, is the contest and the wrong side is winning.

I still have a few old fashioned distributors each closely run by 
family. They too are starting to change as the degreed 'business 
professionals " are now being hired to help manage things as the 
businesses have grown beyond the ability of the limited supply of 
grandchildren, in one case great grandchildren, to handle.
I don't know, but it seems stupid beyond belief.
They have vibrant, expanding, generations deep businesses and they don't 
seem to have a clue as to how they got that way.

Mike Graf

Andrew Vida wrote:
>
>> People at the top are out to squeeze out every penny they can in the
>> short term with no regard for the long term. 
>>     
>
> 	In general, this is simply untrue.  Those cases where it is are the 
> ones that get all the press - and this is not to say it is not a 
> problem.  It is a very grave one, as our current teetering on the brink 
> of oblivion attests to.  Yet none of these people are being called to 
> account for their crimes in courts of law.  One should be asking why 
> that is so.  One should at least be asking why so many of them are 
> actually being vastly rewarded for their crimes.  Can you say BIZARRO?
> ______________________________________________________________
>
>