Competition for Styles?

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Just been doing some price cheaking. Started off searching for a CD-RW, got put on to Starlyte (http://www.starlyte.co.nz) have now ordered a LiteOn 40*12*48 from him for $241.88 (inclu gst and p&p). Styles price was $350 incl.

Just been looking at some of his other prices and he's under JB by about $10 on a Maxtor 80GB.

It's just a pity he stocks things like Hyeena cases, or maybe we would get a bit of competition for the ChCh 3. :D

[KingJackal]

Everyone is competition for everyone.

And NOBODY is the cheapest for everything.

It's simple - let's say there are 2 HDD brands, brandA and brandB.

Now store A sells 10 BrandA hard-drives, so buys in another 10, and drops their price a little ( cos he's selling them in bulk lots ), while store B find the BrandB drives are running out the door - so does the same with BrandB drives.

That's just one reason why prices vary. You'll see it quite often, especially within similar outfits like the Big3 in ChCh. Dragon will be cheap for X brand, Styles for Y brand, Tastech for Z brand....

It's all good :). Just gives me, the consumer hella-choice!! w00t for competition :D

[Wibber]

unless you are a repeat customer for shop A, and just go there and say "gimmie product X at shop B's price" which is also good

[RockBoy]

not to mention the huge number of different suppliers in NZ teh Drop in teh New Zealand Dollar
the stock they ahve on hand etc etc etc

as well as website prices not being updated as fast as we would all like cos these guys have to sell stuff,

its just not really appples with apples to many factors as to why one place might b cheaper for a little bit

RB

[Binky Stunt Cat]

of if you just say "what the heck, i'm gping to Shop A coz he's a good guy"

wonder who we could apply that to eh?

*looks at Fulla A*

[RockBoy]

alot of the time that is what it comes down to

why save 5 dollars and not develop a loyalty when one day you may be rewarded for that loyalty (and invaribly are ;))

RB

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Originally posted by RockBoy
alot of the time that is what it comes down to

why save 5 dollars and not develop a loyalty when one day you may be rewarded for that loyalty (and invaribly are ;))

RB

I agree totally RB. But $110 is a bit different. I also believe in supporting competition. It very much depends on the suppliers. Dealers have good suppliers for some things and terrible ones for others.

Still I expect I'll have to hand Styles wads of cash for my new case, pump, etc, etc... :D

[Fulla A]

Fair comment about the Lite on's ..I never sold many so I never updated it..plus what i did sell, i generally got back buggered...I've removed Lite on's now..I found them to be nothing but trouble...and of course that just makes me look back :rolleyes:
Competition is a good thing, as you've said, no one will be cheapest in everything, but I'm big on loyalty...I like to think I offer my regulars better pricing and service than they would find anywhere else...
blah blah you're thinking.....perhaps all retailers say this...LOL

[Wibber]

just the good, small operations

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Originally posted by Fulla A
Fair comment about the Lite on's ..I never sold many so I never updated it..plus what i did sell, i generally got back buggered...I've removed Lite on's now..I found them to be nothing but trouble...and of course that just makes me look back :rolleyes:
Competition is a good thing, as you've said, no one will be cheapest in everything, but I'm big on loyalty...I like to think I offer my regulars better pricing and service than they would find anywhere else...
blah blah you're thinking.....perhaps all retailers say this...LOL

You could mentioned that LiteOn sucked before I payed for it. :eek: :D

*gets on knees to pray "Let mine be a good one pleassse"* :o


As for loyalty I agree completely. From the perspective of a customer, it's also a benefit (besides financial) as you get a dealer who knows your name and you get that personal service.


I hope you didn't take offense to the subject header. My reason for using it was because you are the dealer that I measure all others up against . :D

[Tiggerz]

To me, sales companies are all about shipping volume. They get their profit by adding a small markup, and with a bit of luck, it will cover costs and add a bit to the bank balance. This is otherwise known as short term selling.

A marketing company, is one that builds a relationship with its customers analyses their business, and only sells products that fit in with the customers business model. A marketing company will discuss your plans with you, work with your budget and your long term needs. Here the vendor does not make a profit from shipping product, they earn their money from the additional services provided to the customer. This is known as long term selling.

Often people ask me, what price can you do me for product x.. I usually reply that I wont sell them product x. Not because I can't, its because I dont want them as a customer. Why would I do this you might ask. Its because I know that I cannot build a vendor customer relationship with you. When I can't make sure that I am selling your the right product, that you get the ultimate user experience, and that your future needs are met, I dont want you as a customer. If I cant build a relationship - it hurts my business - because I then have to start handling volume, returns and possible lost sales because another vendor is cheaper. All this adds to my costs, which means I have to charge more etc.

What I would say to you the customer, is please do not shop based purely on price. Select one or to vendors so that you have a broad product base to choose from. Develop a relationship with them. They know which products work and which have high returns, they will know what products are selling in volume and what is not. For example, the folks at Styles have a great product range and a competitive pricing structure. If you make an effort to develop a relationship with them, they'll probably help you stay clear of the bum products it helps them as well, when they get customer feedback from people they trust, they can work their product range to reduce old inventory and costs, this means they can become even more competitive - which ultimately helps you, the customer.

I would also expect the vendors to work with their customers. Talk with them, educate them (yes even if the customer is the ultimate dufus), show them whats selling and whats not - tell them whats got high returns. Also, don't be afraid to network with the other vendors in your area. If you cant get hold of a product or another vendor is able to supply it cheaper and you know the customer is tight for cash - send them to the other supplier, or even better, network with the other supplier - they might be able to get you the product at a discount so you can make the sale. Both ways, the customer is happy and a happy customer comes back.

[Deviant]

I've never delt with Styles, but pretty much all I have heard through the guys in this forum is positive.

I fine this forum is great to find out the quality components over the nasty ones, and the good resellers over the bad ones.

If you get a good name in this forum, your business must be very good, cause bad words spread very fast in here.

I don't think we overclockers are a typical bunch. We want best bang for our buck, with good service, and people usually go out of their way to get our business. I find that's pretty good seing Overclockers are a pretty small minority in the big computer business.

Sometimes I wonder why so many motherboard manufacturers go the extra distance to spend the extra on a motherboard with good overclocking features, when so few people actually use them. I'm not complaining, cos I love it, but I guess it must be worth it financially, maybe not direct money from us, but maybe we have a large influence on many of their customers purchases.
eg I must get asked by heaps of regular folk, what should they get. They don't want an overclocking board, but I always point them in the best value/price/performance direction, and than includes shops like Styles.

$0.02c

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Well put Tiggerz.

I personally am one of those strange breed of customers, who are somewhere in the middle. By choice I prefer to go to a slect few retailers, but due to financial ristrictions (a missus and two babies) it is often necessary to shop on price alone. This is where knowledge is essential, which is why I for example sort recommendations on drives by posting the "CD-RW Preferences" thread.


Deviant - I think the other factor your forgetting about OCers is that although we are small in number, we go through about 5-10 times as many upgrades as the average user. Also we are alot more willing to spend copious amounts of money if the hardware in question is worth it. To continue your mobo example, we are likely to buy a new mobo maybe every 6 months (compared to joe bloggs who'll just buy a new comp in 2 or 3 years) therefore our buying power is dramatically increased. Have you noticed how many hardware sites exist? I garantee that mobo manufacturers have. We are also more likely as a community to spead the word when we find a good product. This fact makes us - to use political terms - a preasure group. As we can exert a lot more influence than average joe bloggs.

[DiscoStu]

Without adding another rant to this growing thread ;) They aim at us as we are innovators/early adopters in the life cycle and are often influencers, ie- people come to us and ask our opinions on a product.
Manufacturers know that if they keep us happy, we spread positive word of mouth (which is more powerful than advertising) about their products. Sure - Ma & Pa don't really need that XP2100 but...............

[HomerNZ]

well styles has always done well for us whaka boyz:)

hehe and deviant i think in terms of speak in here thats was possibly the worst comment int he history of this forum 'more BANG for your BUCK'
hehe j/ks still pretty scary given some experiences


PS hey jb ill upgrading again soon:) all goin well bill wise:) its benn 5 whole months without and upgrade i think im goin thru withdrawals:(

[KingJackal]

Targetting Overclockers

I pretty much agree with the above posts. And yeah, the reason they aim for overclockers is good economics.

I may be a phreak even here, but I literally do a major upgrade ( ie, not CD-R's, case mod gear, or the like - but coolers, CPUs, RAM, mobo's, HDD's, drives etc ) every 2-3 weeks. During holiday periods ( when I'm earning ), the fact that I look after my PC and the family rig means it's more like 1-2 a week. And most of those purchases will be in the $100-$300 range, so that's a lot of business to push through one person.

Secondly, I often buy for mates. Either I'll physically be at the store picking up the parts and paying, or I'll be telling them where to go. ATM I'm only directly purchasing for 2-3 mates, but.....

Thirdly, what I say probably get's noticed by a few other people. If I hate something, chances are dozens of people will know within 24hours. That's an awefully quick impact.

And lastly, it's cool. You don't sell cars by saying they're designed for families - you sell cars by selling XXX racing car driver uses one. There's a similar thing with overclocking - many people who don't overclock still buy ( rightly or wrongly ) based on online reviews that base their conclusions largely on overclocking resutls.

And because of all this, stores are more likely to stock what I want, or what I should want ( products I don't know, but are good, and I'm likely to be convinced to buy sooner or later ). And of course manufacturers are only going to make what stores want to sell, so.....

Store Loyalty

Just thought I'd say I pretty much agree here too. There are really only 3 stores I buy stuff from to do with computers. The only stuff I don't buy from them ( hose, paint, headphones, network cables, CD's, games, OS's ) is stuff that they don't sell. For example, network cabling. I just can't get it off them - so I'm more than happy to buy them from Uni ( which being non-profit, is VERY cheap for some things, RJ-45 cabling being one... ).

Now they DO sell OS's - but they DON'T sell academic version OS's ( which are about 1/2 the price ;) ), so that's an example of somewhere where I always buy elsewhere because of cost only. But that's a strange example - you'll be hard-pressed to find many 1/2 price examples. ( The other being radiators, I bought mine off a car wreckers - more like 1/5 the price there..... ;) )

[Antallica]

quite correct on all counts KJ, since I have been introduced to OCNZ and hearing about styles and what a great service it is etc. I would basically *ONLY* buy from there these days.

It's all about what other people think of or past dealings with the person or whatever..... styles is my choice (have yet to purchase anything off him yet though... hehe :D)

I would never buy something unless I can find at least 2 reviews of it (all being good reviews then I will look into where I can get it cheap)

[Tiggerz]

A few folks have mentioned that over-clockers only make up a small part of the market.

I don't believe this is so. The specific market segment that you are all part of is the consumer market. Or more specifically, the gaming segment.

If you draw a pyramid - the top will be value in dollars - higer up the pyramid being more dollars, and the width of the bottom is size of the market.

Take a slice off the bottom of the pyramid about 1/4 the height of the pyramid, this is the consumer segment. Within that, draw two virtical bars so that the gap between them is about 1/4 the width of the slice. This is called a virtical segmentl. Mark it gaming.

In order for a product to reach consumer status, it has to achieve 60% market penetration. NZ reached this mid 90s with 1st PC sales. This is the 1st virtical segment (Home PCs) in the consumer market. We then start to get new segments forming. The next was the second PC purchases (called Internet Segment) and the third was the Gaming segment (both these are not at 60% yet but are growing). The gaming market specifically is growing rapidly, because of this, it is attracting the attention of the consumer product makers (sony, microsoft and the like).

Remember that above the consumer market slice, you have the vendor market slice. Each segment in that slice is narrower than the one below, but the dollar size is higher (more profitablity). In order to grow the consumer market, one has to grow the vendor market. The slice above grows the slice below.

Overclocking was seen somewhat in a neutral manner as being a small part of the gaming market. When a certain CPU manufacturer released a certain CPU, they noticed a huge sales spike in the gaming market. The fact that this spike was noticed, indicates that the market is large enough for the impact to be felt. Enough so, that the vendors in the slice above (software developers and hardware manufacturers) seem to have set up a specific product range allowing for overclocking (or high performance game platforms as they call them).

From my research, this trend seems to be global. Ie. US, EMEA, and APAC are all trending the same way.. NZ which is part of APAC seems to be lagging by about 2 to 5 years. eg. vendors like styles appeared in EMEA about 10 years ago, 5 years in APAC and 2 years or so in NZ.. TFT monitors started trending 5 years ago in APAC and about 2 years ago in NZ.

So anyway - what I was trying to say in all that wordy mess.. There is a grand scheme, and I believe that the gamers and overclockers are starting to play a more significant and visible part of it as the years progress.. I would be keen to take a look at this post in 5 years time :)

[Deviant]

Originally posted by Gh0s7 L3mUr
Deviant - I think the other factor your forgetting about OCers is that although we are small in number, we go through about 5-10 times as many upgrades as the average user. Also we are alot more willing to spend copious amounts of money if the hardware in question is worth it. To continue your mobo example, we are likely to buy a new mobo maybe every 6 months (compared to joe bloggs who'll just buy a new comp in 2 or 3 years) therefore our buying power is dramatically increased. Have you noticed how many hardware sites exist? I garantee that mobo manufacturers have. We are also more likely as a community to spead the word when we find a good product. This fact makes us - to use political terms - a preasure group. As we can exert a lot more influence than average joe bloggs.

Only some of us who can afford too, how many overclockers in here are still using celerons, or durons that are 1-2 years old, how often do they upgrade? Some overclockers just can't afford to.

[Geek4Life]

Originally posted by Deviant


Only some of us who can afford too, how many overclockers in here are still using celerons, or durons that are 1-2 years old, how often do they upgrade? Some overclockers just can't afford to.
And where do you get that stuff. From overclockers with more money that are upgrading their stuff.

[Binky Stunt Cat]

Originally posted by Geek4Life

And where do you get that stuff. From overclockers with more money that are upgrading their stuff.
you see, its very handy knowing all these guys who HAVE to have the latest and greaest hardware...means you get yours cheeper :D

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Originally posted by Binky Stunt Cat

you see, its very handy knowing all these guys who HAVE to have the latest and greaest hardware...means you get yours cheeper :D

Yeah waiting 3 months after something has come out can greatly save the old bank account some stress. :D

[Agent 86]

Originally posted by Tiggerz
To me, sales companies are all about shipping volume.

Small mark-up high volume, big mark-up small volume. Most PC retailers fall into the former. You have to draw a line on customer service when you’re only making small market. For example someone who sends you 10 emails about which $20 fan to use on their Duron. You quite often he these guys complaining "they keep ignoring my emails" which means the retailer is politely telling them to piss off.

[Antimatter]

Originally posted by Deviant
Only some of us who can afford too, how many overclockers in here are still using celerons, or durons that are 1-2 years old, how often do they upgrade? Some overclockers just can't afford to.

IMHO, the primary reason for O/Cing is to make a machine capable of playing a game better. I can't see any real point in O/Cing a GeForce 4 until it's out of warranty and can't play the latest and greatest games with a decent framerate. Of course, I'd say most regulars on this forum would O/C anything and everything...because it can be done... ;)
but the newbies to O/Cing would be more likely be trying to get a Celeron 300a running at 450MHz or eke a few more MHz out of the TNT2 RAM so they can at least play the games everyone is talking about.

[Ripping]

Just a quick plug for staryte.co.nz

I ordered a few bits on Tuesday afternoon... they arrived Wed morning (!), straight from the distributor. In any circumstances this is good, but the fact I live rurally, this is excellent service

[Gh0s7 L3mUr]

Originally posted by Ripping
Just a quick plug for staryte.co.nz

I ordered a few bits on Tuesday afternoon... they arrived Wed morning (!), straight from the distributor. In any circumstances this is good, but the fact I live rurally, this is excellent service

Yeah I can agree with that also. Not to mention the speed he replys to emails. I think the longest it took was an hour and the quickest was under 2 minutes. :D

[swiftynz]

a most informative thread, cant say i've disagreed with anything that's been said above. i used to be a price shopper only and just bought from the cheapest place, and regretted it somewhat. lets just say the components in my last PC were not very well chosen....

i've referred two people to styles now, even though i haven't spent very much there yet myself. i will be when i next upgrade tho!

actually the second guy's going to ring you tomorrow JB. he doesn't know much about computers at all, but he knows approximately what he wants, and that's a new system which can play all the latest games well. he's on the canterbury LAN aswell so a vast quantity of storage space for divx movies is another priority. :D

[Binky Stunt Cat]

Originally posted by swiftynz
he's on the canterbury LAN aswell so a vast quantity of storage space for divx movies is another priority. :D
A case of you take care of the supply, I take care of the demand JB :D:p

[farns]

Cool there is a Styles supplier in Taupo now wohoo, I really wanna use HotChips which is local in Taupo too but his prices are generally a fair bit higher, ill try Andre from Styles for service but I like Paul from Hotchips cos he will often take trade-ins and is generally a good bloke.
Its so much easier having a local dealer all things considered IMO

[swiftynz]

Originally posted by Binky Stunt Cat

A case of you take care of the supply, I take care of the demand JB :D:p
lol nah binky i think it's a "you give us cheap stuff and we'll send u more customers JB" :D:D