Direct sales

[mloudy]

I am always a bit uneasy when buying from a new source. If the rep has been trying to get my business for a few years and still stays in contact even though I don't buy I feel a litlle more at ease pulling the trigger on my first order.

We buy used and rebuilt Sharps to keep in stock. No more than a few machines at a time. It can be anywhere from a week to 3 weeks to get a machine in. Many times we are delivering one of these the same day or next were are contacted by a new customer. I can't be waiting around for weeks when someone calls and asks "How fast can you have a machine here?"

As of right now Sharp has taken away our abilty to see what they have in stock but they did give us a forecast of which models would be in/out of stock for the next quarter. Currently most of our equipment orders are to us within a few days unless it is coming from the west coast.

[SalesServiceGuy]

Product in your local inventory is king these days.

Most dealers are use to ordering product only as they need it and receiving the same maybe a week later.

Those days are likely not coming back for quite a few months for all players in the copier/printer industry.

Rising prices are also likely as the costs to ship a container from China has risen from approx $4k to $28k. The cost to ship one Doc Feeder via air from China use to be around $200.00, now around $800.00.

Even via Air freight quick delivery is not assured as you must compete for available cargo space as many industries compete for that space.

[deputydogg]

For several machines? What's the rise you're seeing lately?
The only manufacturer I can imagine here is Brother.

We've had several customers wanting "full size" machines lately(40-50 color 11x17). We sell a ton of "throw away" machines but typically only 2-4 full size machines a year and buy them from acm so I prices are typically higher than most. All that being said I found out Friday that our owner is selling out so I don't know if I will even have a job after August...
Dave