What's up with the Scottish Lion Import Shop?

[RockyR]

SOME vendors jack up the prices at events b/c the people are a 'captive audience' and more likely to buy what's in front of them. Not all vendors, but an unscrupulous few.

Quality of product comes down to the individual product. Some vendors at highland games have all Scottish made products and are very high quality. MANY MORE vendors have Pakistan / China -made accessories which are generally a lower quality and have a much lower price.

Bottom line... you get what you pay for. If the price is low on something, there's probably a reason. While there are certainly exceptions to this rule, as a general guideline, it's a pretty good starting point.

[ggibby]

As my day job is with a company that does quite a bit of business online, I must echo Rocky's advice, but simplified:
If the site doesn't prominently feature a toll-free number, or have a well-developed feedback system (like eBay and Amazon), caveat emptor.

In defense of 'drop-ship' arrangements, we do a fair amount of that and it allows us to offer niche and specialty products, expanding our value to the customer. However, we also have an elaborate and expensive inventory system that synchronizes with vendor inventories on a daily basis. It's the only way it works, and even then we trip up occasionally, usually when the humans get involved. ;-)

As much as I hope for continued growth in the kilt industry, I doubt if any kilt site (or vendor) has yet adopted this ability, so unless somebody at the other end can lay hands-on your stock product, you're risking an unhappy ending, as it were.

[Kornkob]

SOME vendors jack up the prices at events b/c the people are a 'captive audience' and more likely to buy what's in front of them. Not all vendors, but an unscrupulous few.

I wouldn't automatically consider it 'unscrupulous' to raise prices when at a road event over the price found on the vendor's web site. There are costs associated with taking one's business 'on the road' and the convenience and immediate gratification of buying it off the table can come with a premium without taking advantage of the consumer.

[jeremy j starche]

As another vendor (but not kilt related) I too have to stand in defense of having some things drop shipped instead of keeping the entire product line in stock.

In our case, we try to keep all of the repair parts in stock, things that are small enough to fit in a bin (or in a few cases a large box).

I simply cannot afford to keep every single body panel in every single color in stock. I only sell a few a year and they would chew up a large amount of warehouse space for very little return -- some colors might sit on a shelf for years before there is a call for them.

That said, I won't charge a customer until I've contacted the importer and made sure the item was in stock and available to ship right now.

(I'd love to be able to sync up to the distributors and get their inventory levels so that I could reflect them -- but they are almost in the electronic dark ages.)

My feeling is this:
If it is your 'bread and butter' then yes, you should have the items in stock and be ready to ship them immediately. If it is an extra item that you wouldn't be able to carry otherwise, drop-shipping is fine -- but let the customer know.

[RockyR]

I wouldn't automatically consider it 'unscrupulous' to raise prices when at a road event over the price found on the vendor's web site. There are costs associated with taking one's business 'on the road' and the convenience and immediate gratification of buying it off the table can come with a premium without taking advantage of the consumer.

Maybe "unscrupulous" was too strong of a word. Perhaps I should have said "Questionable".

Yes, there are costs associated with taking your business on the road (as we do 3 or 4 times a year), BUT the idea is that you have 10 X the normal amt of customers in front of you to offset those costs.

As a vendor, if I raised the prices at an event, I would be afraid of having to explain to people that look up our website and say "But it's THIS price on your website... why is it more in person when you don't have to pick it, pack it and ship it?" Luckily, I only know of 1 kilt company that does that and they only sell 'low end' kilts.

It's something that I'm not comfortable doing b/c I'd be ticked if someone did it to me and I found out. That's all I was trying to say.