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Author Topic: The ethics of buying parts directly John Walsh Film God Posts: 2490 From: Connecticut, USA, Earth, Milky Way Registered: Oct 1999 posted 01-03-2004 10:55 AM                     The topic about manufacturers being closed during holidays made me think of another question: What do people generally think about ‘bypassing’ a projection equipment manufacturer, and buying parts directly? For example, buying a platter motor from Dayton rather than from the platter manufacturer. It’s obvious that if theaters always bought directly, projection manufacturers would go out of business. On the other hand, consider that the standard markup from projection manufacturers is 3 to 3 ½ times the original price for something easily obtained from Grainger, or an electronics distributor, etc. I think most people here would agree that parts are very expensive, specially nowadays, since the theater industry recovering from the 3-4 year old major economic downturn here in the US, although I certainly not blaming projection equipment manufacturers. Their price in necessary to keep operating. I’d be interested in what people think of this. If you’d like to share your opinion, consider the following scenarios; With all cases, remember; easily available parts are marked up 3 to 3 ½ times; -A projection equipment manufacturer who provides a product where parts rarely go bad, and provides good support (always has the part you need; provides good technical support.) -A projection equipment manufacturer who provides a product where parts often go bad, but does provides very good support. -A projection equipment manufacturer who provides a product where parts rarely go bad, but has very poor support.  |  IP: Logged Randy Stankey Film God Posts: 6539 From: Erie, Pennsylvania Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 01:06 PM                     I wouldn't hesitate to buy a part directly, like in your example, from Grainger. Like you said, it's cheaper and can be had quickly. As a matter of fact, if you're willing to pay the fee, you can have in-stock parts available 24/7. Second, buying parts directly lightens the load from the projector manufacturers having to supply easily available parts and allows their people to concentrate on helping the people who really need it.  |  IP: Logged Greg Mueller Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1687 From: Port Gamble, WA Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 01:08 PM                        I guess my opinion on such a topic would depend on the manufacturer. On my machine tools I have frequently tried to buy direct from the manufacturer. For example, the machine tool manufacturer wanted $22.50 for a carbon brush for a motor. Typically these can be bought at a motor repair store for 1/10 that and I'm pretty certain that the machine tool manufacturer can buy them for less than retail. So they are not just interested in a normal mark up, they are screwing their customers. If this is the way a manufacturer wants to play the game then can they (or anyone else) blame the consumer for trying to find them cheaper? It will also have a lot to do with any decision in the future on what brand to buy when I buy new machine tools. So I guess for me customer service extends itself to not screwing the customer on replacement parts. This type of poor customer service makes the decision for me automatic.  |  IP: Logged Oscar Neundorfer Master Film Handler Posts: 275 From: Senoia, GA Registered: May 2000 posted 01-03-2004 01:26 PM                        Parts are more costly from manufacturers. It takes money to purchase and store parts, and the cash is tied up in inventory, so the cost of money is also factored in. I have no problems with my customers buying readily available parts elsewhere than from me if they like, and especially when time is of the essence to effect a repair. On several occasions, I have told people to go to their local equivalent of Radio Shack and pick up a TL074 IC or some other part that is common. However, some parts are proprietary and can only be obtained from the manufacturer. Also, I would hope that the original equipment sale has netted the manufacturer some profit. I don't know about other manufacturers, but I am not in the parts business, I make and sell equipment. I am more than happy to fill my customers' needs, and if that need is a part, then I will certainly sell it. But don't feel bad about going somewhere else either. I see no ethical dilemna here. You bought the equipment, it belongs to you, and you have the right to do with it as you please, including buying parts where you can get the best deal.  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 01-03-2004 01:38 PM                     I suppose another question to be raised is one dealing with customer service. If you have a pretty good relationship with a dealer bypassing them might result in less customer service in troubleshooting problems, etc. My day job is working in the sign industry and we sometimes have to deal with a similar problem with items like electronic message centers or even sign cabinets. Our markup on a LED-based electronic message center is not very much, certainly not double or triple the price. Still, if someone chooses to "go direct" he should not expect us to offer any free technical support such as coming out there and getting the thing installed, connected and launched or serviced if something breaks. Our markup covers all of those things. We also sell enough LED displays that we'll get tough on a supplier if they bypass us. We used to sell lots of Time-O-Matic message centers, but when they allowed one of our cut rate competitors to give away the things at cost we shifted totally to another supplier. It has now been years since Time-O-Matic has sold any message centers into the Southwest Oklahoma and North Texas market. It can be tough to make a living in the custom sign manufacturing business. So if someone wants to bypass you then you have to take a stand on principal to make the "bypass" happen completely. A customer can burn himself going it alone. Needless to say, we absolutely refuse to install or service any clip art sign products by companies made only of fly-by-night salesmen like Signtronix. We're screwing ourselves if we do otherwise.  |  IP: Logged Ian Price Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1714 From: Denver, CO Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 01:41 PM                     I make an effort to buy from my Cinema Supplier (American Cinema Equipment). He supports me by attempting to get us the best price. I support him by buying all of my parts through him. He has a vested interest in seeing that we are a healthy business with good presentation. I have a vested interest in seeing his business healthy because he proffers advice and can be counted on responding to an emergency. I had to turn down an offer from a friend who wanted to sell me Xenons for the same price as ACE or slightly better price simply because I feel the need to support ACE as I know they will be there for me when I need them.  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 02:03 PM                     Actually when I'm repairing something I always try to keep the cost down for my customer as much as possible, but I won't jepordize quality in any respect in order to do that. There are many ways to keep costs lower, sometimes by going direct with the manufacturer, or even with that manufacturers vendor as I have done with DTS parts many times. Lets fact it $300.00 for a DTS ATX power supply is highway robbery as is having to do a $300.00 repair/ exchange of the D to A board in a 6D when all thats usually wrong is that the 30 buck DC convertor for the analog stage has failed. DTS will not supply that part to theor dealers but their vendor will so we stock them. I feel the same way about the Strong Platter motors and most all lamphouse blowers and such. Save your customer where you can, he will appreciate it alot in the long run. And when it comes to platter motors 98% of them are repairable at least once anyway so your customer can get double the life out of any given motor. One thing I dislike and I feel is very wrong is that manufacturers sometimes go around their dealers and make huge sales directly to the theatre owner. All of you dealers out there have experienced this at least once. Not only does this most likely cause a seperation of the dealer that could be doing the warranty work but it also can causes poor future relations as well. Dealers should always be kept in the loop if even only for warranty and after the fact service. Mark  |  IP: Logged Manny Knowles "What are these things and WHY are they BLUE???" Posts: 4247 From: Bloomington, IN, USA Registered: Feb 2002 posted 01-03-2004 02:33 PM                     Are dealers protected such that they cannot be circumvented by the equipment manufacturers?  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 03:09 PM                     Some vendors like JBL have dealer contracts that eliminate alot of this. There is nothing from preventing say a projector manufacturer that doesn't have a dealer agreement from buying everything from the other equipmnent vendors that for some reason seem to acomodate them and then re-selling it all to a theatre. This sort of thing happens alot. Mark  |  IP: Logged Greg Mueller Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1687 From: Port Gamble, WA Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 03:32 PM                        In one instance I ran into a road block when I identified a small gear motor and tried to buy it from the manufacturer rather than the machine tool builder. The machine tool builder wanted many hundreds of dollars for a gear motor which cost $150 from the manufacturer. The manufacturer declined my purchase saying that the motor was built as a proprietary product for the machine tool builder.  |  IP: Logged Sam D. Chavez Film God Posts: 2153 From: Martinez, CA USA Registered: Aug 2003 posted 01-03-2004 08:35 PM                       I'm with Mark on the need for manufacturers to keep the dealer in the loop, particularly if the dealer provides real service. This sometimes has strange consequences however. AMC was after me to sell 350 analog readers direct. I refused and eventually sold them through MTS. I got paid some, but now the lawyer for the MTS bankruptcy trustee wants all the money back from everyone who received any payments in the last 90 days of MTS's existence. I would do it the same way again but I am aware that no good deed goes unpunished.  |  IP: Logged Mark Gulbrandsen Resident Trollmaster Posts: 16657 From: Music City Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 08:47 PM                     Sam, Am really sorry to hear that you got stung by them, thats a pretty bug chunk of dough t have hanging out there. When I closed down my buisness I was told by my accountant to pay off everyone slowly so the Bankruptcy trustee did not recall any of the payments. It turned out that he was right. I paid off all the small companies first and then what ever was left went to the big guys, then several months elapsed before my attorney filed. It worked out better or everyone involved to say the least. Greg, Christie does this with their Bodine Motor parts. The odd thing is if you can find out the OEM Bodine part number somehow they will gladly sell it to you. Mark  |  IP: Logged Scott Norwood Film God Posts: 8146 From: Boston, MA. USA (1774.21 miles northeast of Dallas) Registered: Jun 99 posted 01-03-2004 09:07 PM                        Personally, I don't see an ethical problem with buying standard off-the-shelf parts from other vendors. As was mentioned earlier, the customer owns the equipment and should feel free to do whatever he wants with it. One minor snag might be liability concerns, however. If one buys a platter motor from the platter manufacturer and the motor is somehow defective and causes the rest of the platter to disintegrate into a puddle of molten metal, then the platter manufacturer is ethically (and probably legally) required to replace both the defective motor and the platter, since the motor was sold specifically as being suitable for use with that platter. If the motor had been purchased from another source, then that vendor would only need to replace the motor and the customer would assume the risk for the loss of the platter. Of course this situation is extremely unlikely to actually occur, however the customer does assume a small risk when purchasing parts from third-party vendors, and the manufacturer has every right to deny warranty service on the product if the need for a repair is caused by the use of third-party parts. The relationship of the customer and his equipment dealer is a different issue. If the customer values the relationship, then it probably does make sense to pay a bit more for parts in exchange for convenience and good customer service.  |  IP: Logged Michael Schaffer "Where is the Boardwalk Hotel?" Posts: 4143 From: Boston, MA Registered: Apr 2002 posted 01-04-2004 03:48 AM                        How can they want that money back? Wasn`t that sale completed before the dealer filed for bancruptcy?  |  IP: Logged Tim Reed Better Projection Pays Posts: 5246 From: Northampton, PA Registered: Sep 1999 posted 01-04-2004 09:01 AM                       Sam, how can they go after completed transactions retroactively? To heck with that lawyer, it was a done deal. Tell him you already spent the money.  |  IP: Logged

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