Hello,
Guys, I haven't read through the whole thread and I won't bother. But I'm just shaking my head simply from reading the comments some individuals have been making.
Telling off a distributor that his comments on market trends and client expectations is BS sounds to me that this is more like a personal issue than anything. Different people are entitled to have different estimates.
Market participants have the right to set prices at whatever they want. If consumers don't like the price, they can do two things: 1) Buy another product and eventually demand will fall to the point that the price needs to be adjusted, or 2) Buy it direct yourself.
Now, three experiences I do want to add:
1) There can be duties with aquarium goods. I used to import products and had to pay duty. It depends on the material and country of fabrication or assembly.
2) There are breakages with shipments. Just because an end user didn't experience this due to luck on a one time purchase doesn't mean a distributor doesn't see this with consistent purchases. Filing claims on damages do take time and sometimes the process involved just ain't worth it.
3) Businesses do need to make a profit, and this profit comes after all the rent, salaries, bills, taxes are all paid for.
Just to provide a comparison, does anyone know how much does an average Coach bag costs in Asia compared to North America? It works out to about 30% more expensive in Asia.
So what? People are going to file a petition demanding explanations from the Asian distribution chain? I'm sure that will hit the press as the joke of the day.
Just because an Asian consumer can order direct from Coach.com and get it shipped across without having to pay taxes and duties doesn't mean the local retailers don't have to pay for rent, insurance on the storefront and employees, advertising, warehousing, bills, salaries, corporate taxes, shareholder dividends, interests, etc. After all these you still need to have profit left over or the equity owners doesn't have an incentive to invest and run the business.
If someone really have the time, go take a look at some companies' corporate filings rather than trying to argue to death about something like this, which really isn't constructive in adding to knowledge on how to run an aquarium. A huge portion of the annual revenue goes to stuff that doesn't apply to the average individual.
Titus
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