Quote:
Originally Posted by bally
The biggest gripe i have in this industry is shadow stock, its often very hard for customers to tell if a items is actually available off the shelf in the shop or if they are ordering a product that is available for a shop to buy from the distributor, which would delay the delivery by a few days and run the risk of it selling out between updates. I'm not sure why distributors that sell direct even offer this service. I get asked all the time by distributors to do this but so far have refused. We only sell what we have in stock or occasionally offer a item as a Pre-Order, but again will only sell the number we have ordered. What do customers think do you want to see us offering items we don't have any intension on stocking and do you want to be able to back order items? (This would mean paying upfront for a item that may take weeks to arrive) Maybe someone can set up a poll?
Thanks
MB
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I have no objections to shadow stock being listed, as long as it is massively obvious at every stage of the pick/pay/ordering process.
One supplier I used to use didn't actually make it clear until the payment approval stage. (No idea if they've changed it, I haven't ordered from them since).
They also used to claim delivery timings for shadow stock, which was a joke. 14 days someone's became 2 months. And in one case the manufacturer had discontinued it some months before......