Shops/Stock & our buying power

[kenny d]

IMHO shops reducing stock to save money is a recipe for disaster,If they don't have stock they won't have sales , I've seen this in the plumbing merchants through the resection , my preferred merchant didn't stock a grundfoss pump ( one I thought would have been mainstream) they told me they just don't sell them , I persuaded they to stock them , by the end of the month they had sold 17 , when plumbers needed one they were going to another merchant whom they knew stocked them , it became a downward spiral

As for model shops I buy from the shop that has my full order in stock , a shop that keeps 95% of spares in stock is getting 0% sales from me

[jchbarnes]

People want to buy from the uk, Most UK shops are out of stock of even the basic things, Blades for example there is nearly no 690 blades for sale in the UK atm. So if we do crash and need blades we are FORCED to buy from other sources.

I have a set of brand new SAB 690 blades that I bought from Midland a while ago and are still sat in their box. if anyone wants them at cost price then PM me.

[JoeBailey]

It starts to get even more annoying when you spend over a grand on a kit and then get poor parts support.

I don't think the exclusive importer thing works very well, one importer for a specific make means price fixing (sab, rail etc). Also manufacturers limiting importers to two per country (mikado and align) doesn't really work as you still have a third party for the other shops which means a higher price.

Unless you fly align it doesn't take much to clear £2500 on a new 700 kit and flag ship electronics for it. Add to this the fact that if your a competing pilot you need two of the damn things and it doesn't take long to rack up some serious cash. Thats not taking into account batterys and ground equipment.

The hobby is far from cheap but its getting silly expensive now. I'm lucky in the fact that I get support for my parts and kits, it's still only a discount and some of the items are only 15% discount but it's still better than most. It also means my order is at the bottom of the pile when I order parts so I have to wait for them. Full price customers come first. A few of the very big UK shops could do with this attitude, the times I've ordered parts from shops that were in stock only to receive a back order is now too many to count. I'm still owed parts by one shop and will never use them again after being put on back order 4 times in a row only to see videos of the sponsored pilots rebuilding the same models as mine over and over.

[trillian]

I suppose it has been said in various ways, the heli market is a victim of its own success. I started thinking about this due to this thread, about what exactly was different back when I started the hobby.

For a while I was on the outside looking in, reading and researching and trying to learn on a sim. This was 2008/2009, I first got interested in the hobby in 2007 but didn't really get into it for a while and then didn't really start flying regularly until 2009. At that time the big brand in larger helis (which were majorly dominated by nitro) was Thundertiger, the Raptor 30,50 and 90. You also had Compass, Minair, Hirobo, Kyosho, JR, Synergy and Century and shops in the UK catering to all those brands (obviously there were also boutique brands out there, usually not stocked in the UK). Align was only making small electric helis, then came the electric 600 and it was quite a big deal and highly anticipated when they came out with the nitro 600 in 2008 (I think). It took a little while but soon Align was the most common brand you'd see at flyins as the 600 nitros were very popular.

We had more shops with each shop usually concentrating on a few brands rather than trying to stock everything.

So the hobby was growing, more technology started coming into it, then flybarless and a shift towards electric power. So even more buying due to nitro flybarred heli flyers moving over to electric and flybarless, from 35mhz radios to 2.4ghz etc - a bit like the record industry when CDs started to take over and they enjoyed an artificial success due to people buying all the same music again on CD. So there was something of a boom due partly to changing technology. Once that settled down it was just not a level of commerce that was going to stay at such a level.

Some shops got a bit left in the dust when the technology changed and brand popularity shifted.

Then, for reasons unknown (some of it maybe due to drones), it appears that the hobby slowly became less popular, clubs that had previously always had a waiting list now had ongoing vacancies. So the goalposts kept moving and quite quickly, some shops went under and the ones that remained found it tougher and had to tighten up, and that's where we are now. We have lots of brands but an ever growing back catalogue of spares for all these models that would be just too big to keep in stock, so the shops have to prioritise.

I'm used to it now because several brands I still fly are just not popular enough for UK shops to stock them and some never really were stocked here.

[electricsceadu]

I want a shop to stock parts
and the odd kit or two
an empty shelf with no parts or kits/engines/motors/servos/batteries isn't much use to anybody

I prefer to shop only in the UK but to get parts I've had to even skip Germany and go to Japan

[milly0812]

I'd like to hear from the horses mouth why they are not stocking the parts we need. I get all the different model argument but that doesn't explain 'blades' we all need blades regardless and there are next to none about

i also get the 'weak pound' argument but if we have to buy from abroad then we have to pay the inflated prices regardless

sort it out guys the market is here, the buyers are here you are just not keeping up with demand

[electricsceadu]

the all different models argument isn't a good one
as when I started there were many more options on makes and models with some having a vast range to offer
and most parts could be obtained by a visit to a shop

[trillian]

the all different models argument isn't a good one
as when I started there were many more options on makes and models with some having a vast range to offer
and most parts could be obtained by a visit to a shop

I think is at least partly due to having more small shops that specialised to some degree. For example we had 'Real Raptors', we had Evo RC stocking all the Compass line and Beam 450, Motors and Rotors had the MA stuff etc. These shops were not trying to cater to every brand and model.

[Scotvar]

Just out of curiosity and picking up on a theme touched upon in this thread and in other threads.... are people crashing less and therefore not needing the spares as much as they used to?

I know I would go through patches of putting my helis in regularly but since I've been using FBL systems with rescue / bail outs I'm nowhere near as regular a visitor to the spares aisle as I used to be. In fact I dare say probably up to 90% less than what I used to be. What I was spending on spares I've found going on upgrades.

Anyway, just a minor point I wanted to raise, the advent of rescue / bail out may well have also had an impact.

Paul

[Shane T]

Just out of curiosity and picking up on a theme touched upon in this thread and in other threads.... are people crashing less and therefore not needing the spares as much as they used to?

I know I would go through patches of putting my helis in regularly but since I've been using FBL systems with rescue / bail outs I'm nowhere near as regular a visitor to the spares aisle as I used to be. In fact I dare say probably up to 90% less than what I used to be. What I was spending on spares I've found going on upgrades.

Anyway, just a minor point I wanted to raise, the advent of rescue / bail out may well have also had an impact.

Paul

A valid point, but if the spares are not selling then they wouldn't be out of stock.

[Scotvar]

A valid point, but if the spares are not selling then they wouldn't be out of stock.

agreed 100% but if they're selling and out of stock, why aren't we seeing shops restock?

Paul

[Mike656]

Out at the field today four Mavic quads flying, plus another couple of members have them. At fifteen hundred with extra batteries, cases, chargers etc., a lot of money not spent on helicopters. Plus they don't often crash so no spares sales.
A couple of years back, you might see at least three crashes during the day. Nowadays, not so often. Probably not a lot of money to be made in stocking a huge range of spares, but we all want them tomorrow.

[Shane T]

agreed 100% but if they're selling and out of stock, why aren't we seeing shops restock?

Paul

I think we all want to know the answer to that question.