indiansprings
Firewood Purveyor
What Husky is not saying in the press release is that selling to the big box stores is killing their bottom line. Yes, having the sales on the front side is very appealing, but they never look at the backside of the vendor agreements.
Having worked at a high level for the world's #1 retailer for 18 years I can tell you that every saw that is returned for whatever reason is credited to the seller plus freight and handling fees back to the mfg. At W-M a lot of times we would put a defective allowance in that represented the average return % for that type product industry wide. Say it was 3% we would deduct that off every check until it hit a set number both the buyer and seller agreed on, say 5 million. If it exceeded 5 million we would just deduct 100% of the selling cost of the product x #of defective units right off their check plus handling and shipping guaranteeing W-M would get every penny of their money. I've seen alot of good companies go blind over the initial sales number and never consider what can happen on the backside, many go broke. Lowes, Depot and TSC everyone in the retail business operates the same way when they are big enough to leverage their volume.
Husky absolutely screwed the pooch when they made the decision to go "big box". I've seen people buy saws after storms use the hell out of them for a week and bring them back saying they are defective. Little Suzy at the service desk doesn't have a clue, she just sends it back to claims to be returned to the vendor. If they try that on ole Thall he sends their azz packing out the door. If they don't fix their marketing and their distrobution philosophy unfortunately they will continue to flounder, it's not a issue with the quality today, but saddles with less profits they will eventually start cutting corners and it will become an issue down the road, R&D will suffer, new models will be slower to introduction, Stihl has to be licking their chops.
Having worked at a high level for the world's #1 retailer for 18 years I can tell you that every saw that is returned for whatever reason is credited to the seller plus freight and handling fees back to the mfg. At W-M a lot of times we would put a defective allowance in that represented the average return % for that type product industry wide. Say it was 3% we would deduct that off every check until it hit a set number both the buyer and seller agreed on, say 5 million. If it exceeded 5 million we would just deduct 100% of the selling cost of the product x #of defective units right off their check plus handling and shipping guaranteeing W-M would get every penny of their money. I've seen alot of good companies go blind over the initial sales number and never consider what can happen on the backside, many go broke. Lowes, Depot and TSC everyone in the retail business operates the same way when they are big enough to leverage their volume.
Husky absolutely screwed the pooch when they made the decision to go "big box". I've seen people buy saws after storms use the hell out of them for a week and bring them back saying they are defective. Little Suzy at the service desk doesn't have a clue, she just sends it back to claims to be returned to the vendor. If they try that on ole Thall he sends their azz packing out the door. If they don't fix their marketing and their distrobution philosophy unfortunately they will continue to flounder, it's not a issue with the quality today, but saddles with less profits they will eventually start cutting corners and it will become an issue down the road, R&D will suffer, new models will be slower to introduction, Stihl has to be licking their chops.
