Another supplier selling to end users

[Typestries]

I'm not knocking harbor for doing it-I know they have a "sell to anyone mentality," and they have many products others don't, but to offer fabrication type work as well, and to feature it on the front page of their site seems like an odd choice.

How many of us produce museum and exhibit graphics, including machined shapes and decorative panels. Certainly I'm not the only one.

Now, a museum might have a graphics shop in house, but they're still the end user. Just an FYI, it's not only the supplier in Ohio that was discussed in a previous thread that's doing it. But, here's a case where a sign/display shop has been completely eliminated from the supply chain. Vigilance in one's service, marketing, and production is in order today, more than ever.

 

[Gino]

I get your drift.

I think what goes beyond that is when you point blank ask them and they deny doing this to your customers or even potential customers.

I recently lost a job to a wholesaler who now advertises online his prices and gives the end user the same price he offers me or any other sign shop.

I wasn't getting my wares from him, but another supplier.... and then I found out where my customer got such a ridiculously low price. I called there and got the same price. My potential customer went with him and later had the nerve to ask me to put them up, since that's the easy part. He's having the faces decorated still somewhere else.

Luckily we're kinda busy, but this is happening more and more with the economy going the way it is.

 

[SignManiac]

I expect it's going to get a lot worse. For some of these companies, it's survival mode. Dog eat dog these days. My goal for the next year or so is to get out of this business entirely. I just don't like it anymore.

 

[TheSnowman]

I just wish I knew who you were talking about so I didn't use them on accident.

 

[Bigdawg]

He says in the first post - Harbor

 

[Gino]

I expect it's going to get a lot worse. For some of these companies, it's survival mode. Dog eat dog these days. My goal for the next year or so is to get out of this business entirely. I just don't like it anymore.

Got that right.

I like the business, I just can't stand the people, anymore. If we didn't need customers, we'd be fine.
​

 

[Letterbox Mike]

Interesting, I see where you're going with that. I'm not sure I see it as direct competition with us though. IMO in-house shops aren't our competition, nor are they really potentially ideal customers. If one of my vendors sells to them, so be it, I don't like it but I won't hold it against them because in-house shops aren't typically going to buy that particular product directly from us anyway, it's "indirect competition" I guess.

We currently do work for a handful of in-house corporate shops. There is a lot they can't do in house, and often they also have overflow work. I don't expect them to buy raw materials or certain fabrication from us anyway, but I do expect them to buy it from someone, more than likely someone in their narrow network of suppliers.

I guess in a way I'm happy (well, not happy, but not unhappy?) to see that Harbor isn't trying to hide from the fact that they are servicing them. Being upfront and honest about it I guess is better than what happened to us with our supplier when they completely denied it's happening. But if Harbor was touting that they fulfilled this order for someone who obviously doesn't have an in-house shop, that would be a different story altogether.

 

[Letterbox Mike]

Adding this...

What is everyone else's opinion of in-house corporate shops? Do you see them as competition? Or potentially viable clients? I sort of stated my view of them above, but I've always wondered what other people think about them.

 

[CES020]

I didn't see it on Harbor's front page, am I missing something? My harbor page doesn't show anything that seems to refer to cutting anything or selling anything to the general public. Do they have multiple websites by region?

 

[Patrick46]

it's survival mode. Dog eat dog these days. My goal for the next year or so is to get out of this business entirely. I just don't like it anymore.

I'm in a sorta parallel situation myself, and altho I'm not getting entirely outta this business, I AM instating an entirely new format to my shop to go after a completely new customer base.
This economy has killed off everyone and everything I originally designed my shop to serve.

I too don't like it anymore either. It's lost it's 'fun' aspect.

We (signguys) used to be 'artists', and people came into our shops looking for OUR ideas and OUR imput on how to best serve our customer's wants & needs. Now they all seem to come in the door with pre-demands & requirements as to who, what , why, where & how to perform our jobs, and to how much it's all gonna cost them to get their finished work.

Huh?? .....and here I always thought that this was MY shop!!!



(I feel for ya SM!!)

 

[Patrick46]

here's some additional thoughts for my post above.........^^^


the materials (namingly 1-shot) has gone to crap!!!!!

I've had so many signs & trucks lettering & graphics failures over the past few years because they've become all washed out looking.

I had one 'old boy in showing me his towtruck (the striping [red] was only 2 years old and looked horrible!), and while we're there talking about it, another older customer pulled in with a car I had striped about 8 years ago...and it looked great!! (hmmmmmm....this makes ME look good in my customer's eyes.......NOT!!)

Now, I know it's not the manufacturer's fault that they had to take the lead outta our paint...but just the same...I'm tired of paint failiures!!! (Oh sure, they'll gimmie a new can of paint...but they ain't gonna recompensate me for all my time invested on my re-do jobs.
(there's no money to be made in warranty work)

so it's time to move on I guess.

maybe for the better, huh?


(disgruntled in Oregon)

 

[FatCat]

Adding this...

What is everyone else's opinion of in-house corporate shops? Do you see them as competition? Or potentially viable clients? I sort of stated my view of them above, but I've always wondered what other people think about them.

Very similar situation we faced often with in-plant printing shops. Seems they would go in cycles based on who was holding the reigns at the time. In my 15 years in the offset printing field I saw a large local insurance company go from selling their in-plant shop in the early 90's to putting one back in in the late 90's and then finally selling it all off again in 2004-05. Not really much you can do if they have enough volume and can afford the equipment, right? It all boils down to the current chief holding the reigns and what the bean counters say will save the company money at the time.

I don't view any company with an in-plant print, sign or whatever shop as competition as long as they are only doing work for themselves. Sure they no longer buy from their current vendor, but hey - that's business. However, once they cross the line and start selling to the general public that is a whole 'nother issue.

 

[Letterbox Mike]

Very similar situation we faced often with in-plant printing shops. Seems they would go in cycles based on who was holding the reigns at the time. In my 15 years in the offset printing field I saw a large local insurance company go from selling their in-plant shop in the early 90's to putting one back in in the late 90's and then finally selling it all off again in 2004-05. Not really much you can do if they have enough volume and can afford the equipment, right? It all boils down to the current chief holding the reigns and what the bean counters say will save the company money at the time.

I don't view any company with an in-plant print, sign or whatever shop as competition as long as they are only doing work for themselves. Sure they no longer buy from their current vendor, but hey - that's business. However, once they cross the line and start selling to the general public that is a whole 'nother issue.

I pretty much see it the same way. You're right, business is business, if a company is buying so many signs per year or they feel like they need to have tighter control of their signage/graphics and it's financially viable for them to do it in house, I guess I don't really blame them. Part of me wonders how it's justifiable for some places to do it in house, others make perfect sense to me. I don't like that they're taking that business away from other sign professionals, but in most cases I've seen they tend to try to hire people that know what they're doing and are "sign people", so that's good I suppose. I've never seen one of these companies start selling their signs to the general public though, and I agree, that would probably piss me off too.

 

[FatCat]

I pretty much see it the same way. You're right, business is business, if a company is buying so many signs per year or they feel like they need to have tighter control of their signage/graphics and it's financially viable for them to do it in house, I guess I don't really blame them. Part of me wonders how it's justifiable for some places to do it in house, others make perfect sense to me. I don't like that they're taking that business away from other sign professionals, but in most cases I've seen they tend to try to hire people that know what they're doing and are "sign people", so that's good I suppose. I've never seen one of these companies start selling their signs to the general public though, and I agree, that would probably piss me off too.

Yeah, a good example would be a big company like FedEx or UPS who likely have their own in-house graphics shop to produce decals for all their trucks. This way quality control and production/installation times are completely in their hands and I'm sure at significant savings compared to buying direct. I agree, it's not benefitting any of us - but in their situation it makes sense.

However, another example that still frosts me to this day was one where many of the big copier companies out there (IKON, etc.) started selling big production copiers to all the schools, churches and other organizations who used to rely on print shops for those needs. Realistically, very few actually needed the high-end machines for what they were doing, and most soon realized they needed to hire a full time employee to baby-sit the machine and keep it loaded and printing. NOT something the sales person was forthcoming about in their cost analysis I'm certain.

Oh well...

 

[CheapVehicleWrap]

here's some additional thoughts for my post above.........^^^


the materials (namingly 1-shot) has gone to crap!!!!!

I've had so many signs & trucks lettering & graphics failures over the past few years because they've become all washed out looking.

I had one 'old boy in showing me his towtruck (the striping [red] was only 2 years old and looked horrible!), and while we're there talking about it, another older customer pulled in with a car I had striped about 8 years ago...and it looked great!! (hmmmmmm....this makes ME look good in my customer's eyes.......NOT!!)

Now, I know it's not the manufacturer's fault that they had to take the lead outta our paint...but just the same...I'm tired of paint failiures!!! (Oh sure, they'll gimmie a new can of paint...but they ain't gonna recompensate me for all my time invested on my re-do jobs.
(there's no money to be made in warranty work)

so it's time to move on I guess.

maybe for the better, huh?


(disgruntled in Oregon)

1shot lays down looking like that, no need to wait 2 years. Sorry for your loss of business. It doesn't sound like just the economy, but the fact you feel you can't put out a quality product anymore because of available materials. And THAT is respected. Best!

 

[Pat Whatley]

My goal for the next year or so is to get out of this business entirely. I just don't like it anymore.

Me too, slightly longer time frame, maybe three years, but it's time to find something else to do. Money is still good but it's in stuff I hate doing.

 

[TheSnowman]

He says in the first post - Harbor

Doh! I never have used them anyway.