On Amazon I look for "Prime". Free two day shipping with membership.
Even if you don't have the membership items marked prime must be able to
ship immediately, so they're usually safe to assume they'll get right
over to you.
Some items I'm shocked have free shipping. Like Exide MC-31 marine
batteries at 70lbs /each. Primn with Free two-day shipping. Not sure
how they made money shipping that, but I got it in two days.
There are some places I shop exclusively using their online stores,
like McMaster, Allied and Tessco. With Tessco you need to click
“Confirm Price” at checkout which also checks availability. I have
never had any of these companies screw up an order. Mouser, Newark,
DigiKey as well, they are all very reliable and have good online
ordering. McMaster takes the cake though, I think they have the
world’s best online store.
Baltic I usually order online but if I need it next day I have found
to check if it shows “pick up at will call” as a shipping option, if
not, then “in stock” probably means drop ship from somewhere else like
Streakwave or Primus.
I have never had Jon at Streakwave (Ohio) or Mark at WAV mess up an
order or tell me something was in stock that wasn’t. But I email or
call them. It’s quick and easy. I think we all face the issue that
you spend an entire week of days in the field and can’t order parts
until bedtime when places are closed and an online store with accurate
stock status is a great thing. But I can also shoot an email to Jon
or Mark, go to bed, and check my email the next morning or they will
call me.
What I really hate are the places that want you to sign the quote and
FAX it back with a credit card authorization. Actually they don’t
bother me anymore because if there are any left like that, I just
don’t buy stuff from them. It used to be common practice.
Two places I shop less than I used to are Newegg and Amazon. I don’t
know what happened to Newegg, I think they have really gone downhill.
One place I do buy from that I used to steer clear of is Tiger Direct,
they used to be an outlet store, but they are pretty mainstream now.
At Amazon, I don’t buy a lot of stuff from third party sellers unless
it says fulfilled by Amazon. Even then, a lot of stock is comingled,
and there is a risk of getting grey market goods or outright
knockoffs. I’ve had Amazon do stupid stuff. Like one time I ordered
10 surge strips, and it turned they had quantity=1 at each of their
warehouses, so the UPS guy literally delivered 10 Amazon boxes each
with one surge strip in it. Now I order surge strips from Tiger
Direct. Also one time I was having trouble finding Bishop/Plymouth
butyl mastic tape and Amazon had some, when it came it was not Bishop
at all, it was a Chinese knockoff. Returning it was easy, but it
shouldn’t have happened.
*From:* Tyler Treat <mailto:tyler.tr...@cornbelttech.com>
*Sent:* Thursday, September 03, 2015 9:05 PM
*To:* af@afmug.com <mailto:af@afmug.com>
*Subject:* Re: [AFMUG] OT eCommerce
I always had great luck with Matt Kahle. But I was always the type
who'd pick up the phone and call.
Hey Matt I need this
Ok, how bad?
Really bad,
Ok you'll have it tomorrow.
He actually met me in Bloomington one time after same day back to back
lightning wiped out my backhaul stock.
Then again, it's important to ask if everything is in stock or where
it's in stock. Chicago was overnight UPS for us, so if something
wasn't coming from there it was pretty obvious.
___________________________
Mangled by my iPhone.
___________________________
Tyler Treat
Corn Belt Technologies, Inc.
tyler.tr...@cornbelttech.com <mailto:tyler.tr...@cornbelttech.com>
___________________________
On Sep 3, 2015, at 8:27 PM, Adam Moffett <dmmoff...@gmail.com
<mailto:dmmoff...@gmail.com>> wrote:
Dan Ortega at CTI was a badass. I would send one email and
everything I wanted would show up two days later. I don't know how
he managed it, but that guy got stuff done. Our post Dan Ortega
experiences were never as good. The only thing as reliable as Dan
Ortega is Amazon. Maybe Dan Ortega was an android.
I'm fairly happy with CTI (our rep: James until last year I think,
and now Jonte) for cases where high-touch is OK.
Ordering everything for a tower being built 3-4 months out with a
licensed backhaul is a good example.
In those cases a few clarifying phone calls and a email thread isn't
the end of the world. They're pretty good to us and I have reasons
to want to send them business.
It's ordering the one-off/small project items that can be irritating.
My usual order cycle is: email what I want (include exact part
numbers), get a quote back, make sure the price is sane and part
number is correct (if it's even listed), then email back saying yes,
and it hopefully(1) shows up next day.
1) That's the part where things break down. I'm never sure if they
have stock, are sending from a 3rd party (maybe a warehouse further
away, maybe stock levels aren't in sync). Cambium is never a
problem. Ubiquiti is hit and miss, other things, vary wildly. The
uncertainty is frustrating.
Although lately Jonte has gotten really good about letting me know
when items have long lead times or are out of stock and finding
alternate items. I do appreciate that.
Aside from stock uncertainties, it feels wasteful of my time and
theirs to have to go through a "traditional" sales rep interaction
cycle for small/uncomplicated orders.
At this point if we're replenishing stock by ordering a case of UBNT
gear and we haven't run out yet, we'll order it from CTI.
If it's for a small project (e.g. AF5x link+spare or some UniFi APs)
I'll order from Baltic because the stock levels on their website are
accurate--if they show it in stock and I order before 3 PM I know
that it will be in my office by noon the following day.
Inaccurate stock levels on Streakwave's web store have bitten me on
nearly every order I've placed with them...
On Wed, Sep 2, 2015 at 3:28 PM, Mike Hammett <af...@ics-il.net> wrote:
If it wasn't for Jeff Broadwick, i wouldn't do business with
CTI... too complicated.
-----
Mike Hammett
Intelligent Computing Solutions
http://www.ics-il.com
<https://www.facebook.com/ICSIL><https://plus.google.com/+IntelligentComputingSolutionsDeKalb><https://www.linkedin.com/company/intelligent-computing-solutions><https://twitter.com/ICSIL>
Midwest Internet Exchange
http://www.midwest-ix.com
<https://www.facebook.com/mdwestix><https://www.linkedin.com/company/midwest-internet-exchange><https://twitter.com/mdwestix>
------------------------------------------------------------------------
*From: *"Jon Auer" <j...@tapodi.net <mailto:j...@tapodi.net>>
*To: *"Animal Farm" <af@afmug.com>
*Sent: *Wednesday, September 2, 2015 2:32:38 PM
*Subject: *Re: [AFMUG] OT eCommerce
On Tue, Sep 1, 2015 at 1:58 PM, Forrest Christian (List Account)
<li...@packetflux.com> wrote:
Don't discount just adding your products to amazon and the like.
I love it when manufacturers do this (and use Amazon's
warehouses). I've been seriously tempted to just do it with
/someone's/ very awesome APC-compatible surge cards...
I was very happy when Telect was doing that with fuse panels and
fiber trays. There's so much less cognitive load and time spent
in going to Amazon, searching part number, and clicking buy now
instead of emailing Power&Tel or CTI, getting a quote, approving
the quote, placing the order, etc.
