Spin Off

[Mojo]

This is a spin off of another thread that was about dealers and suppliers. That discussion got me to thinking - have any of you seen increased competition from China within our trade ?

You can now go online ( E-Bay or whatever ) and buy boat covers, car covers, rag tops for jeeps, tire covers, bimini tops, etc. And in all and in most all cases these sellers offer these products at ultra cheap prices. Yes I do know the quality sucks. The material is sub par and typically falls apart in a couple years. But as I was saying in the other thread there are people who will shop on price alone and will not consider quality of materials and workmanship.

Have any of you seen this or experienced a small hit in your business because of these offerings ? Do you think these products are actually good for business ? The consumer buys this junk, it falls apart a year or so later and then decides to buy quality ?

Chris

[Mike8560]

VeI've had that happen chriss there tired od crap that falls  apart.
But I also see theese cheap cover and it get me the cheap &&@#%£

latly I've got a couple call from thenmakers of ez2cy about after he sold he got some new canvas now.  Anyone else?

[SHHR]

I was speaking with friend the other day who owns the local NAPA store. He was asking me how my business was doing and somehow we got on the China import topic. A lot of it was about what we speak of on here many times like customers finding their own supplies and parts off of e-bay or other internet suppliers.
I brought up an example of a guy who asked if I could make a new soft top for his Jeep. I let him know I couldn't compete with companies like Best Top who seems like any auto parts store or 4WD suppliers sell.
Anyway, the owner of Napa told me of another guy in town was going to start selling Jeep and off road stuff. He went on to say that the guy had a program that could attach itself to these other guys' websites to see what they sold the most of. Then he had contacts overseas that he could buy the same items produced in China's factories greatly reduced and in turn sell cheaper than the popular sellers here in the U.S.

I don't think off shore companies will ever be able to compete with a true custom stitched piece that we provide, But this goes to show you in today's global market we need to stay on top of things and be ready to make any changes for our benefit.
Kyle