How hard can it be to price a SINGLE window, standard in every way?
In need of three casement windows, all at a nominal 36 wide by 42 high, clad wood, white exterior, standard everything, I phoned two of our local lumberyard suppliers early this morning, gave them specs, and asked for pricing and a delivery lead. Both promised callbacks.
Not hearing anything by noon, I phoned the millwork desk at our “local” (one hour drive) Lowe’s, and also the Pella store in the same town. In both cases I was given price and lead right then and there. The guy at the Lowe’s took my name and phone number, and said the quote was stored under my phone number in their records, and I could talk with anybody about it, if he was unavailable. He gave me his name and extension number.
The woman who answered the phone at the Pella store, when I asked her to direct my call to someone who could quote a window price, said she could, and promptly did. Took my name, and said I would get the order a couple days earlier by having the distributor drop the order at my door, rather than me picking up myself.
By the end of the day, neither yard had called back. Why do biz with the lumberyards?
Replies
Unless you actually need their lumber,
. . . I should have said.
I would say just bad luck with your lumberyards.
Of the two that I most often deal with- the larger one basically anyone at the counter can work me up a price- some quicker then others- but always while I wait.
The smaller yard has only one guy that can price it out - but usually he can get one back to me within 10 minutes- but never more then an hour.
I am a dyed in the wool lumberyard patron. Although on occasion I use them, I dislike the service of the big boxes.
Terry
They can all pull it right up, using software.
Virtually every window manufacturer known, has provided their distribution and dealership chain with the software tools, most of them web-based, some not, that enable fast price lookups and quoting. Really fast. I've sat there and watched.
I talked to those two lumberyard types this morning, and I know them, and know that they have computers at their desks. They were simply playing it sloppy and lazy.
They probably forgot all about me as they spent the rest of the day waiting on folks at the counter. ;-)
The other folks, the guy and Lowe's and the gal at the Pella store, had their keyboards clicking in the background as we spoke. They just simply had a more wired approach to customer service, and a better attitude.
Pella will get the biz. I'll phone them in the morning.
I still am shocked by companies that want to do business with me by FAX.
There is a lot of room for improvement with building suppliers. It's seems odd to them that I would want to have something cheaper delivered to my door from another state than to drive 30 minutes to show up at their door in an industrial slum to place an order for something that I'll still have to drive to again to pick up in a week... oh, and no they can't change the ship to address, it has to come to them first. Dorks.
I totally agree. So I'll continue the rant.
Of the four lumberyards within 30 miles of me, only one has barely moved into doing biz per what I would call 21st century standards. The rest are dinosaurs.
Things like this silly simple no-brainer window price request.
Things like, "I have your quote for (insert item or package here), why don't you stop on by so we can go over it?" Why? So I can burn a bunch of $3 gas, park in your grubby lot, come inside and wait until you get off the phone? How about just emailing it to me?
I think the whole thing boils down to who, exactly, in the whole cultural, socioeconomic, educational, or whatever, scheme of things, chooses to go to work in or find a career at a lumberyard. Versus, say, a Best Buy store, or a Subaru dealer, a plumbing supply house, or a lot of other kinds of places that sell things.
Things like, "I have your
Things like, "I have your quote for (insert item or package here), why don't you stop on by so we can go over it?" Why? So I can burn a bunch of $3 gas, park in your grubby lot, come inside and wait until you get off the phone? How about just emailing it to me?
Another way to look at it -
Would you just e-mail a job quote to a potential customer?
Terry
I know that when I have been in sales, there have been some folks that I learned not to bother responding to. For a variety of reasons.
We are on two different subjects, you and I.
I am talking about inquiring for, and vendors replying to those inquiries with, material pricing.
Materials. Not a contracting job.
Even if my inquiry had been for something as complex as a lumberyard can quote, like, say, a big roof truss order, or a window package with a lot of special stuff in it, why should I waste my time doing highway miles and in-store waiting to get and then discuss the quote, with a lumberyard salesman who may know far less about the package than me?
If it is a big multi-page package of detail, I am going to have to go over it all with care and attention, so as to ensure what is being quoted is what was requested, and I sure don't want to do that across the desk from some salesman. I want to do that at my own desk, no distractions, with all my tools and information available.
Face to face selling and buying, negotiating, flesh-pressing, the reading of reactions and body language, etc., is for contractors doing business with property owners, and maybe for GCs doing business for the first time with a subcontractor. But for all the rest of the transaction drudgery, let's get efficient and use modern tools.