In 2004 when I knew nothing about lawn mowers I stopped by the local JD store. There I was turned off by a smug attitude and never returned. So instead I bought a big box Intek which has been an adventure. I do find the good review and readily available manual cited a contrast to my initial impression of JD. Maybe I had it wrong. Frankly after that first impression I would have expected something like the high end automobile "support" for diy'ers (none). e.g., "you want to fix your BMW or Mercedes, or Porsche?" OK subscribe to our on online software support ($20/mo), buy the sw ($250) , and don't contact us." So if I ever buy another rider I might look again at JD.
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Lawn Royalty
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In 2004 when I knew nothing about lawn mowers I stopped by the local JD store. There I was turned off by a smug attitude and never returned. So instead I bought a big box Intek which has been an adventure. I do find the good review and readily available manual cited a contrast to my initial impression of JD. Maybe I had it wrong. Frankly after that first impression I would have expected something like the high end automobile "support" for diy'ers (none). e.g., "you want to fix your BMW or Mercedes, or Porsche?" OK subscribe to our on online software support ($20/mo), buy the sw ($250) , and don't contact us." So if I ever buy another rider I might look again at JD.
Don't confuse the attitude of a company with the attitude of its dealers.
way way back when I had hair & teeth I came off the oil platforms with bucket loads of cash ( which being young & stupid I squandered ).
I wanted a new car & I wanted it to be a good one so I walked into the RR dealers show rooms with a suitcase full of cash. ( to get a better deal)t
The snooty salesman told me " a vehicle like this will cost more per hour to run than the value of the cloths you are wearing" so I showed him what I had in the suitcase and walked out, though I then had to fight him off.
Next door was then Mecedes dealer and 1 hour latter I drove out in my 600D Pulman, drove into he RR showroom, gave the sales man a few toots from the horn then drove away.
Any way back to JD.
The company has its roots in farm machinery.
Most farmers were not particularly mechanically skilled back then so their machines had to be able to be fixed by the "average farmer" thus the excellent manuals.
Like a lot of companies this has become a tradition of the company , a long with a log tailing off of parts availability and prompt parts delivery.
You do pay for this which is why JD machinery is not the cheapest in town and this follows through to the lawn & garden products.
Oddly enough, down here JD mowers are quite cheap compared to other brands but that is because the law & garden division can piggy back on the farm equipment's excellent warehouse & distribution system & is not run through multi level complex exclusive franchising arrangements.
A while back, Torro made an agressive attack on the commercial mower market which JD dominated.
JD refused to play price wars and surrendered much of their market to Torro, but bit by bit the green & gold mowers seem to returing to council workshops.