It's Offical. Briggs files Chapter 11.

[PTmowerMech]

I reckon that what I get for being an independent shop that don't buy a lot of parts that just on the shelves collecting dust and going bad over time. I still got parts for 11 yrs ago that I had to buy to get in with the first distributor. Now that distributor has free shipping on orders of 200.00 or more. I tend to just orders that are a tad over 200.00 (like 200.04) just to see how much they got to write off in shipping charges. The last order of 203.71 they had to write off over 48.00 in shipping charges and that order isn't even fully shipped; still got a Briggs item on back order. On a couple of this year's orders under 200.00 they really stuck it to me but now I am sticking it to them.

A few months ago, Stens had a $50 limit on free shipping. I was ordering like crazy. Now, I find myself getting OEM stuff from Amazon because I can't seem to get to the $150 mark. I'll have say $100 worth of parts in the Stens cart. Then need a part they don't have, but Amazon does. So, I'll put it in the Amazon cart, then check to see if there's anything in the Stens cart, I can get from Amazon for about the same price. By the time I'm done with all that, There may be very little or nothing in the stens cart. But everything I wanted bought and paid for on Amazon. Especially if it's after the cut off time (1 pm EST). So it's gonna be two days before I can get my stens parts anyways.

 

[StarTech]

PT, once you get your act together and get both your business and your resale sales tax exemption contact me or AVB over on PPETEN and we put contact with three of our distributors. Two of which has a maximum shipping charge of 11.49 per order with a few exceptions. Two of these do sale OEM parts cheaper than Amazon. Plus they also have Oregon after market parts. We also get Powerdistributors to contact you on the Briggs parts.

 

[bertsmobile1]

A few months ago, Stens had a $50 limit on free shipping. I was ordering like crazy. Now, I find myself getting OEM stuff from Amazon because I can't seem to get to the $150 mark. I'll have say $100 worth of parts in the Stens cart. Then need a part they don't have, but Amazon does. So, I'll put it in the Amazon cart, then check to see if there's anything in the Stens cart, I can get from Amazon for about the same price. By the time I'm done with all that, There may be very little or nothing in the stens cart. But everything I wanted bought and paid for on Amazon. Especially if it's after the cut off time (1 pm EST). So it's gonna be two days before I can get my stens parts anyways.

And here in lies the big difference in service times.
I walk into the shop pull the part off the shelf & fit it then when I go upstairs for a cuppa I check the price on a major on line retailer and invoice my customer slightly less, Then if I am not sure I check the scheduled hours and do the labour charge.
The parts used get written on an old Allpower/ Stens order pad ( cause I kept forgetting to reorder ) and once ordered I put a line through it .
You on the other hand have to go searching for parts, Amazon, Ebay Stens whoever and that takes a lot lot more time & if you are buying retail substantially reduces your profit margin.
When I need parts that are not available from one of the regular wholesale suppliers I buy them from a dealer where I get a small discount and when I bill the customer I charge them the same price & include the dealers invoice , thus the customer feels they are still getting a better price through me than they would going direct to the dealer. Those invoices with a lot of dealer parts have a $ 15 delivery fee added .
Oz is as big as the USA with the same population as California so next day delivery is never going to happen 3 days is the best I ever get.
When I first started I ordered 2 of everything that I needed on the assumption that if I needed one once then there is a good chance I will need another and by & large this has worked very well.
If I ended up using both before I had replaced the one I originally used then the "par" stock level gets doubled & I order 4 of them.
Thus over the 7 years there is now about $ 80,000 ( Aust ) sitting down stairs.
Stens do a preseason sale down here with additional discounts if you order large amounts with repayments staggered over 3 months so for some one like you a gift from the heavens as what you buy counts on you regular volume discount and you get the extra discount plus you get the goods 3 months before you have to pay for them so good chance you can sell most of them before hand.
More than one ebay vendor will suddenly drastically increase their ebay shop the instant that the pre-season sales get announced.

 

[Hammermechanicman]

If you guys didn't drive on the wrong side of the road you would get your parts delivered quicker. ?

 

[PTmowerMech]

@bertsmobile1 I'm trying to build up my parts. But it's tough starting from scratch. Seriously starting with nothing.
When I moved in with my dad, I helped him with a lot of the money I made at my shop in Arkansas. Then I found this shop in a town 80 miles away and gave my new live in some to help with the bills.
LOL.. That pretty much stumped me.
I've been at this new shop for about 3 months now, and have about 10 sets of blades, probably 10 different belts, no telling how many air filters, 1/2 dozen cycle carb kits, a few complete carbs (not counting the carbs I've rebuilt, ready to go on something.) and a several other things.
I took your advice on buying the sale items from stens. I check their sale stuff pretty regularly. Especially when I just need a few bucks to get the $150.

One thing that impresses me most about you pro's, is how well you're organized and have things in order. Especially with all the business stuff and having several suppliers. That's impressive to me. Just about the time I think I'm getting organized, I have a busy day, and everything gets out of sorts. So I spend 1/2 the next day getting things back in order. lol.

 

[StarTech]

I am small operation out a two car garage but I have POs in the process of either being filled or nearly ready to order. This don't even count the received orders for the same two month period of time.


And my current inventory is as follows.


If it wasn't my auto manager program and the bin system I would never find anything.

 

[Hammermechanicman]

You might want to stock up on the generic stuff and seasonal maint stuff if you haven't already. Different sizes of fuel line, different sizes of starter rope, spark plugs, oil filters, air filters, fuel filters. Most of this is relatively inexpensive and you will move fairly quick. Most of the cube carbs don't need full rebuild kits and you can get multi packs of diaphragms and gaskets. Many times all you need for 4 stroke carbs is a bowl gasket and intake manifold gasket(s). You can find a lot of these in multipacks. Get some different thickness sheets of gasket material a hollow punch set from HF so you can make that odd gasket you need to finish a job.

 

[bertsmobile1]

If you guys didn't drive on the wrong side of the road you would get your parts delivered quicker. ?

Stens have their warehouse in Melbourne , 550 miles away so it is supposedly overnight to a Sydney 3PL then another day to me
In reality it is 1 day to Sydney then 2 days to me
RGS have main warehouse in Brisbane 570 miles away so the same story. Speed limit is 80 mph & max 4 hrs behind the wheel then a 1 hr break.
Briggs warehouse is in Melbourne as well in their case it is pick ( day shift only ) then ship to Sydney then sort into delivery runs for the next day so 3 days mnimum , if you get todays pick & it is in stock.

No one in warehousing & logistics in Australia has the faintest idea how to run an efficient warehouse, it is all about labour hire, flexiable staffing on a daily hourly basis & pretend cost cutting.
I got the warehouse I was running working properly , all picking done overnight & day shift refilling the pick face & doing bulk orders.
Pickers got paid a full shift regardless of how long they work & they could go home the instant the pick was finished & checked ( O picking errors ) .
I went one step further & got the pickers to stack the stock in reverse delivery order if the drivers got their run order done in time so even the loading time was slashed.
The end result was we picked in 1/3 the time of the warehouses in Melbourne & Brisbane with zero errors and the supervisor , who could not go home shifted pallets & swept the floors .
But management would not tollerate paying pickers when they were not there so they put a stop to it and we became just as inefficient as the other 2 warehouses.

 

[Its Me]

I have not considered pickup and delivery but might be I can get the prices I read here, I finished one today John Deere D140, I charged the fellow 700.00 l parts and labor transmission belt and Idlers, Idlers on the deck and that belt, sharpen the blades and changed the bearing in one spindle he was glad to pay that he said it had just come out of the John Deere shop and they said they changed the transmission belt but the transmission was going out, I told the fellow let's see took a light and checked the belt it was worn out, the two idlers (Plastic) were wore to the bolt, he was some hot at them, he called late this afternoon and said how pleased he was, then took one into today Kubota a G1900, fellow said that the PTO only had one belt never could keep the one closer to engine on, they were Kubota belts, they told him he put the belts on wrong, that would be hard to screw up, two V pulleys and a flat back idler and saw that two motor supports were broken, I called him and told him that after what I have seen the labor alone was going to be 1,000 dollars, his reply that is less than Kubota wanted and the same old story, no one else had a problem with the rear belt cutting. that is the one that has the 3 cylinder diesel engine sure he paid a good price for it, not looking forward to that job but will start AM

 

[PTmowerMech]

I am small operation out a two car garage but I have POs in the process of either being filled or nearly ready to order. This don't even count the received orders for the same two month period of time.

View attachment 53452
And my current inventory is as follows.

View attachment 53454
If it wasn't my auto manager program and the bin system I would never find anything.

LoL. When I get an order in, I'm still writing price on it as I check off the order count.

PO's, (purchase orders) isn't something I can see a point in. Having only a few places I get.my parts from, I let them keep all that info. As in stens, I can go back to the first of the year and see what I've bought and how much I've spent on it.
When I get 1/4 of Berts inventory, I might need a system.

My inventory is on like 8 shelves, 10' long. Although, the blades are starting to weigh the one shelf down. So I'm in the process of building a blade tree.

But even that is getting put off. I'm having to tell customers that I'm 2 weeks out now. And I'm honest about it. Both bays are full at night and the back lot is about 1/4 full.
I'm gonna need a system, soon.