PROFIT FROM PARTS DIARY OF A SEASON - LONGHAM MOWERS FACE TO FACE - KUBOTA'S DAVE ROBERTS TRAINING & EDUCATION LAUNCH OF BUSINESS MONITOR INDUSTRY AWARDS INFO BTME & LAMMA REVIEWS PRODUCT NEWS JIM GREEN
LET THE BUYER BEWARE Internet a force for good - and evil
UNSURPRISINGLY the item about a scam mower website has been widely read in recent issues of our weekly newsletter. Such sites have the capacity to do huge damage. Not only do they fleece money from unsuspecting consumers, but they offer products at unrealistic levels for those customers who are looking to price benchmark.
From the information I have, around a dozen customers have parted with money through the RideMow site, and not received their goods - although some of these may have been test purchases made by suppliers.
The internet has changed the way we live our lives today. We take banking on-line as the norm, we pay on-line, buy goods on-line, we e-mail rather than write letters, there is hardly any part of our everyday life that has not been changed forever. And all that has only happened in the last 25 years.
Whilst the internet and electronic communications are a force for good, they are also a force for evil. Scam websites, rogue e-mails, people pretending to be someone else.
We all have to be on our guard constantly lest we fall foul of some very clever and unscrupulous operators. Indeed, the team working on behalf of Rochfords (see item in this newsletter) to try and track down the people behind the RideMow site have described the operation as one of the most sophisticated they have come across.
In the end, in comes down to trust. We feel comfortable visiting websites that we trust. Even then, the rogues often try and mimic the trusted sites.
Last week I spent a fascinating couple of hours with Duncan Martin down in Plymouth. Inevitably much of the talk was about internet trading. In recent years, GGP have been working to harness the growing trend of buying on-line with the role of the traditional dealer (you can read the full interview in the next issue of Service Dealer out on 1 May).
The internet has created a level playing field for specialist dealers, who were unable to compete with advertising spend of the DIY sheds in the 1980s and 1990s.
Not only that, those leading retailers who have recently reported good results such as John Lewis and Next, are succeeding because they create a direct link between on-line shopping and the branch network. Neither are talking about reducing the store network - indeed quite the reverse.
Dealers should urge their suppliers to establish a fair, coherent and workable policy for internet sales which both parties ‘sign up’ to. This policy should then be enforced by either party in the case of a breach of its conditions.
That could bring an end to some of the 'Wild West' pricing that is going on at the moment. It's not rocket science, but does need discipline and application to make it work.
