What They Don't Want You to Know! Insider Secrets and Tips to Shopping at Harbor Freight

[1madmouse]

We find the same story for so many companies, employees want more pay And benefits, employer has to get that money from somewhere. Share holders want more profit per share, preferred stock has to get more, money has to come from somewhere. Business has to sell off to make ends meet, or a hostile takeover, it's always something. Wages or product everything makes a circle and ends up here. Really no way to make it stop. Best we can hope for is to retire without starving to death.

 

[StarTech]

So a D10 WAT kit goes from $ 8 to $ 26 ( Aust ) and this is wholesale price + 10 % GST
The same Kit from CTS is $ 2.20 via Ali-Baba or $ 1.00 from DC ( when he was trading ) or 24 ¢ direct from CTS ( min order 100 kits , min sale $ 500 )
Why are they so cheap, well it is not because they pay the workers 1/2 bowl of rice / day
It is because they have bought machines that can stamp out 10,000 gaskets hr from rolls of paper or mylar and the diaphragm machine can do 5,000 /hr

And here what a couple of my distributors wants for the Walbro K10-WAT.

Distributor One


Distributor Two


Now you know why I am also use CTS kits. I was also using DC Spares until the main land China cracked down on Hong Kong.

It is also why I have two distributors as I play them against each other. Both sell some the same OEM parts but one better prices than other on one OEM while that other has better on another OEM.

 

[bertsmobile1]

I am looking at shutting the workshop down
The past 4 years have not been kind to me health wise and chopping up a couple of fingers is probably the last straw
Looking at retailing CTS down here shortly and just selling parts as they have no local distributor
$ 16 US will be close to $ 26 ( Aus ) by the time freight & oppertunity costs are taken into account as RGS have to buy in very large quantities .
Why one of the locals has not done a deal with CTS for local distribution is beyond me .
All Mowers Spares was distributing the Prime Line products that RGS decided not to carry and for some silly reason they are dropping most aftermarket lines in favour of genuine or house brand ( Chains saw & Line trimers mainly ) .
Some B & S magnetos are now over $ 100 or $ 25 from Farmer Tech and I know B & S did not make them so probably the same factory .

 

[StarTech]

I am getting the same way Bert about shutting down. It seems every company is screwing the customers now.

I when place telephone order yesterday for parts. When I look online this morning at the order, over half is not there. One item that online system they had 14 of but the shipping order only has one even though I ordered 8. I am needing 4 for the current project. Calling this morning to raise some question that needing answering. Like why in the heck Microsoft needs full access to my complete internal data systems. And I also want as why such ridiculous shipping on an order that they split up and charge $20 shipping on a $4 item.

As for CTS kits I been getting them thru Amazon.

Edit: Well just got the phone with Gardner over half my order didn't even get placed and the most needed item was one of the items left off. They cancel the whole order because I complained and was trying to get it straighten out. What a bunch of F ups they have become.

 

[1madmouse]

What happened to caring about the customer and making sure he is happy? No one seems to give a rat's arse. I always had it pounded in me to do the best job and keep the guy who pays your salary in good mood. Did we not instill that in our next generation? I remember squeaky wheel gets the grease, now if you complain they hang up and you get screwed. Dealing with orders and shipping has to be a nightmare, I deal with it, but on a small base. I can't imagine going through what you get StarTech. Trying to depend on the computer inventory system is a bad thing.

 

[StarTech]

Asa last resort I emailed my salesperson and she finally called. I explained what was going on and when she looked the order it had not even been cancelled. We got that ordered cancel because she could not edit it to correct the incorrect amount of items and to add the missing items. It took her about an hour to get things straighten out with the order so at least I think we got the order placed but neither of us are sure until it gets shipped.

You think why I did just order parts from someone else. That would been at least a two fold problem. One was the order was from four different oems which would order from OEM supplier separately. And second would all the extra shipping charges. Just one part would had been an extra $30. So if I not wrong the $70 order would have been closer to $145 by the time extra part costs and shipping costs were all added up if not more.

OEMs were MTD, Husqvarna, Gates, and Tuff Torq.

 

[1madmouse]

Glad you got results, sometimes you will and sometimes you don't. I can see the amount of hassle with all of it, hope it turns out good.