Sending automotive parts internationally requires additional effort to fill out additional forms that require tariff codes to identify items. Depending on the country you send it to, what the item is, where it came from, what it's made out of, what it's value is, not to forget whether it is legal or not, makes it hard and too much effort to ship internationally for some business's. That is why there are additional fees associated with such purchases. Time is money! Some sellers are set up for this business and do it very well. When you have a country (USA) of 250 odd million people, you have to think to yourself, is it worth my while spending all the time and effort to send items to an island (Aust) of just 22 million? So for all that effort I may only increase my sales by 10%. These are commercial operations that are profit based in order to remain open.
Therefore the Aussie retailers to be competitive they have to buy and ship in bulk. That generally means paying for a container load of items you think your customers are going to buy. You then pay for the freight, the customs and duty as well as the GST. Oh, and all the fees for port charges, storage and road transport. You have to pay for all of this upfront. You either need to have a lot of money in the bank, or a really good bank manager who will lend you the money, who of course wants your house as a guarantee that you know what your doing and will be able to sell all the items you have just purchased, to pay off your debt. In the meantime your paying interest on the money you just borrowed, rent to store the items, insurance in case someone wants it all without paying for it, or the whole lot goes up in smoke.
Now, if you know a lot about VW's and can select the right parts every time you get on an international site, shop around for the best deal, can get free shipping in the USA to a mate, who can then forward it to you really cheap through US postal, that will take you about 3-4 weeks for it to be delivered from the USA.
If you Don't know your way around your hobby, Don't want to buy the wrong parts, Don't have a trustworthy mate in the USA, Don't want to wait four weeks for delivery the options are:

1. Ask somebody on the forum who knows how it all works and ask them to organise it for you, but ask if he/she is going to charge you for their time
2. Spend the time to research all you can on the best way to ship the correct parts to your door.
3. Get in your car, go and see your local VW parts seller.
4. (there is always another way)

I guess you now know why there are less and less local VW part sellers that you can go to buy your parts from. Every time you go and pick the brains of these people and don't buy something from them, don't be surprised if they don't give you much of their time. They have bills to pay!

PS Share the love...

and your point is ??

Yes, this is true...

but the title of this Post was MISLEADING....
and I changed it.. Lee EDITED

-- Brand New nos parts for Free --

Many people already know all this info....
but many don't..

it does show how the system works and the great difficulty the local vw parts sellers have keeping their heads above water..
while doing Us all a favour by just being there..

LEE

Maybe if the Aussie retailers had decent mail order web sites, they may be competitive!

lets not start bashing the sponsor again. peoples. just remember without their time and money this forum and the australian veedub scene would be a lot worse.
apart from that, im with craig. whats your point?

pointless meh wtf n all that

I guess we'll never ever never get that 3.14 minutes back again

Peace out and feel the love in the room

I always try to buy my parts for my projects from local/australian suppliers if possible. But the circumstances you put forward are across the board for all small businesses. Customer service is the sole responsibility of the owner of the business. So don't go blaming the consumer if you brush someone who had $1000 in their pocket and YOU thought they were not worth YOUR precious time. Good luck picking your worthwhile customers. My2c

Crikey, ya can't complain about Just Kampers! I am happy getting bits from them but have to accept quality is never going to be as good as original, sometimes they need tweaking!
Quality of bits from the US are no better, when the dollar goes down the local suppliers will sell more.

I manufacture my products that ive sold for well over 15 years, people dont or wont pay premium, dont want assistance and certainly dont have the money they once had
IF you cant make ends meet in business,your time is too valuable to perhaps help that prospective customer and you cant be bothered to keep the place running, well youll be like all the other closing businesses
If i get a rude reception from a new businees or get treated like an idiot, well ill tell every person i can, dont deal with them
Takes years to get a good name,and seconds to get a bad one

We all have a choice in life, whether you run a vw import/reselling business, a corner store, brothel or choose to be a employee of another business, it will always come back to the bottom line for the customer, the cheapest possible price, if you know what you want you are ahead, if you need advice you will have to consault a specialist and pay the premium, unfortunatly the internet has put a totally different perspective on buying anything, one click away and people use it as a tool to check up on any reseller in australia, people are moving away from traditional shopping, if retailers in Australia are not competitive they will disapear from the market, i know it is difficut to run a small business and have owned two successfull ones over the years but would not concider it again, i work overseas as a industrial prostitute for a multi national oil company and make far money than i ever did in bussiness, all without the worry.

JK sold a client of mine something different than what was pictured....all is not good with internet purchases....user beware.

Quote:

Originally posted by HappyDaze Quote: Originally posted by nedsbug I manufacture my products that ive sold for well over 15 years, people dont or wont pay premium, dont want assistance and certainly dont have the money they once had IF you cant make ends meet in business,your time is too valuable to perhaps help that prospective customer and you cant be bothered to keep the place running, well youll be like all the other closing businesses If i get a rude reception from a new businees or get treated like an idiot, well ill tell every person i can, dont deal with them Takes years to get a good name,and seconds to get a bad one Well said, nedsbug. I started manufacturing some 40 years ago, and although I am now [sort of] retired, the two sons are now running things. http://www.kirrapak.com/  Back then it was Japan & Taiwan, now it's China that has to be competed with, but it can be done. There are only three basic things to be concerned with:- QUALITY, SERVICE, & PRICE. Mostly, you don't need all three to keep customers happy. If you get the first two right, and the price is a LITTLE higher, often that's fine. Advice to ANYONE in business.......keep a good watch on the above three items, and DON"T blame your customers, or the Chinese for your problems! Cheers, Greg

Non the less the original post goes a long way to explaining why the difference in price from the Ausie suppliers, though not always for all things, ie:- a battery for my camera from Ausie store front $75.00, on line 3 for under $20.00 delivered to my door, neither branded with the makers name, lets face it the store could have bought them on line and sold them at an excelent mark up. Still thats not motor vehicle parts so in case you don't understand why the price difference then the original post helps to make it a little more clear. Face to face advice (phone to phone :smilegrin ) and or being able to hold/touch the item has to be worth something.

Quote:

Originally posted by matberry Quote: Originally posted by HappyDaze Quote: Originally posted by nedsbug I manufacture my products that ive sold for well over 15 years, people dont or wont pay premium, dont want assistance and certainly dont have the money they once had IF you cant make ends meet in business,your time is too valuable to perhaps help that prospective customer and you cant be bothered to keep the place running, well youll be like all the other closing businesses If i get a rude reception from a new businees or get treated like an idiot, well ill tell every person i can, dont deal with them Takes years to get a good name,and seconds to get a bad one Well said, nedsbug. I started manufacturing some 40 years ago, and although I am now [sort of] retired, the two sons are now running things. http://www.kirrapak.com/  Back then it was Japan & Taiwan, now it's China that has to be competed with, but it can be done. There are only three basic things to be concerned with:- QUALITY, SERVICE, & PRICE. Mostly, you don't need all three to keep customers happy. If you get the first two right, and the price is a LITTLE higher, often that's fine. Advice to ANYONE in business.......keep a good watch on the above three items, and DON"T blame your customers, or the Chinese for your problems! Cheers, Greg x2 on all accounts.

Quote:

Originally posted by matberry Quote: Originally posted by HappyDaze Quote: Originally posted by nedsbug I manufacture my products that ive sold for well over 15 years, people dont or wont pay premium, dont want assistance and certainly dont have the money they once had IF you cant make ends meet in business,your time is too valuable to perhaps help that prospective customer and you cant be bothered to keep the place running, well youll be like all the other closing businesses If i get a rude reception from a new businees or get treated like an idiot, well ill tell every person i can, dont deal with them Takes years to get a good name,and seconds to get a bad one Well said, nedsbug. I started manufacturing some 40 years ago, and although I am now [sort of] retired, the two sons are now running things. http://www.kirrapak.com/  Back then it was Japan & Taiwan, now it's China that has to be competed with, but it can be done. There are only three basic things to be concerned with:- QUALITY, SERVICE, & PRICE. Mostly, you don't need all three to keep customers happy. If you get the first two right, and the price is a LITTLE higher, often that's fine. Advice to ANYONE in business.......keep a good watch on the above three items, and DON"T blame your customers, or the Chinese for your problems! Cheers, Greg x2 on all accounts.

Sorry for the highjack
Hey happy days (Greg).
Just had a look at your website,looks like you have some good machinery there.
Up untill 12 months ago i was the production manager of a manufacturing plant in Melbourne that employed around 80 people.
We made office furniture,(Guess what Brand) we had all NC machinery (Salaghnini panel folders,Turrets,Promecams,huge powder coating facility and the list went on).
We were taken over and guess where it is all made now.80 people including myself gone.Ive seen where they are made now,and they should be ashamed.
Thats what can happen when a small place becomes corporate and the suites at the top don't understand manufacturing.
Well done on being an Australian manufacturer.
It is important that if we can we support the local scene we do.
But some people really need to get there act together...

Quote:

Originally posted by donn Non the less the original post goes a long way to explaining why the difference in price from the Ausie suppliers, though not always for all things, ie:- a battery for my camera from Ausie store front $75.00, on line 3 for under $20.00 delivered to my door, neither branded with the makers name, lets face it the store could have bought them on line and sold them at an excelent mark up. Still thats not motor vehicle parts so in case you don't understand why the price difference then the original post helps to make it a little more clear. Face to face advice (phone to phone :smilegrin ) and or being able to hold/touch the item has to be worth something.

Not just car parts. It everything. In the building game we compete with dickheads that import substandard materials from over seas or alternatively tender projects based on substitutions of quality products for cheap shit.

As far as online sellers go, had great success with Just Kampers. Yeah, some of the stuff is cheap repo crap - but it is better than spending years searching for that elusive NOS part. There would be a lot less VW's on the road without repo crap available.

The busstop I find to be very good but I always callas the website is not always up to date.
I chose to use Roy for my safari's as a seller for Creative. When the disengager fell off he replaced it free of charge no questions asked.

Unfortunately I have to rely on online sellers. Roy is the closest on the Gold coast. Otherwise the only other option is Brisbane is Micks. So far I have been in a handful of times and the lady in there not only lies on the phone about having stock , but is then rude about it when I have gone in to collect and found out it was not there when she "looked" that morning.
They are not cheap but do not deserve to charge a premium.

I am still pissed off about my fuel cap that she told me was the cheapest around. The same one at Busstop was $50 less and I still have to modify it to fit properly so it was not leaking.

But very good post at the top. Good reasoning behind it.

Quote:

Originally posted by vlad01 Quote: Originally posted by bugmaniaar Sorry for the highjack Hey happy days (Greg). Just had a look at your website,looks like you have some good machinery there. Up untill 12 months ago i was the production manager of a manufacturing plant in Melbourne that employed around 80 people. We made office furniture,(Guess what Brand) we had all NC machinery (Salaghnini panel folders,Turrets,Promecams,huge powder coating facility and the list went on). We were taken over and guess where it is all made now.80 people including myself gone.Ive seen where they are made now,and they should be ashamed. Thats what can happen when a small place becomes corporate and the suites at the top don't understand manufacturing. Well done on being an Australian manufacturer. It is important that if we can we support the local scene we do. But some people really need to get there act together... thats sad If fat cats didn't start moving manufacturing off shore in the first place back int he 90s or when ever it started then we would still be manufacturing today and remain competitive and good quality. once the ball got rolling with moving off shore then we had the snow ball effect on every other company doing the same. And consumers wouldn't be buying over seas so much as we would still have good stuff thats inexpensive made here imho.

Hope your shed doesn't fall down......when those 'cheap' purlin bolts let go, nedsbug.

Quote:

Originally posted by HappyDaze Hope your shed doesn't fall down......when those 'cheap' purlin bolts let go, nedsbug.

I agree on the last comment.

I know quite a few Asian and some Indian personally and they are bloody hard working people with good ethic and trying to make a difference.

I can't say the same about every white aussie i meet. There are some shockers out there dragging everyone else down around them seems a common trend these days.