Sherrill Price Increase

What I have said is based of your personal impression and my hypothetical situations. I too am indifferent in my accuracy.

I mainly dislike hearing people bash Sherrill for being a large successful company. If you're going to bash them, bash them for not having Sherrill Girls at their shows or not having an air conditioned tent at the outdoor shows.

Obviously customer care/product quality (splicing comes to mind) is fair game.
 
At least we can benefit from Wesspur's no price increase correct? Personally I don't like the shop at Sherrill, unless I have to. Not only prices, but their sales people have been rude on the phone in the past.
 
Just like your customers could benefit if you didn't charge sales tax.

I haven't looked in a while but doesn't Sherrill still have price matching?

The sales dude who was doing my order at the show was epically slow* and not all that interested in the sale, stopping and looking around after writing the first two items on the order. I went for a walk to cure the boredom, came back and he asked for the descriptions and prices on the items, having copied down the next (item 3) item number down and standing around looking bored.

As icing on the cake, after he got through filling out the order form, he handed it off to another sales guy so he could take lunch.

As a plus, I did appreciate him trusting me on the prices and the totals, but then again it would seem he was more interested in things other than sales for Sherrill, so why would he bother checking what I said for prices? I nearly got a Butterfly for $129, as my second line in the dollar sign made it almost look like $1 299. Why he decided it was $129 and not $1299 is beyond me, probably had something to do with lunch.

Back when I was first getting started, I used to call and ask for Cricket (sales girl). We had a friendly business relationship, she remembered me, and didn't mind answering my general questions. I would wait until she was available to take my order, so it wasn't like she had a choice in the matter. If I had a "special" question, I'd talk to Sean, although it isn't his job he took care of me.




* I handed him a piece of paper with the item numbers on it, no description, no prices, I had to look them (description and price) back up for him, I remembered all but a couple.
 
'Ol Monkey: They've (Sherrills) have been willfully underselling their gear since the wholesale price went up.
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I have been doing that for years, and look where it got me. Small company working from job to job with no security or safety net.

I don't mind teasing Sherrills (Tobe) personally, but then again he is in the public eye, and I intend it in fun.

As for price increases, like Tobe said, better get used to it. Prices will only go up from here on.
 
I started this about 10 posts ago and now see that discussion has changed to complaints about poor service on behalf of a (Sherrill) salesman at a show. I'm genuinely sorry for any inconvenience that was caused and will distribute the matter to those in attendance. Below is what i was preparing to post. Please read it as if delivered from a friend, not foe. I appreciate those who have attended this thread with reason toward this modest family business (okay, now with partners);

Petzl is one, if not the #1 quality product line in our industry, and yes, they have a pricing policy designed to suppress discount runaways (for the sake of retaining a dealership network). It's based on very simple economics;
When dealer X uses discounting as their primary tool to take market share away from dealer Y, it causes dealer Y to lower prices in defense, and so on and so forth until product line #1 has no margin of profit. Without attention, product line #1 will quickly become unattractive to dealers A through Z. There's always a product #2 waiting in the wings but it's rarely as good.

I can appreciate this type price monitoring by Petzl because, unbeknownst to the average speculator, this is a relatively small market with tight margins, the primary reason why corporate giants A-Z have steered clear of tree care.

Without naming names, this is often how enforcement "might" take place; Upon discovering price slippage in the market, #1 product producer might fire one across the bow of dealer Y, demanding adherence to agreed upon contract or they (SherrillTree for example) may loose the line. Dealer Y might then agree to adjust to MSRP (manufacturer suggested retail prices) but will almost always demand that others be pushed to follow... something they're often already accustomed to doing anyway. :what:

Just an FYI; as of this particular moment Forestry Supply is running the cheapest price on Petzl's Vertex helmet at only $92 dollars!! How do i know that? Because, as always, when a SherrillTree competitor pops up with a discounted price (freight matters included) SherrillTree, the pro arborist's favorite place to shop, where quality and price are only second to service, rebounds with their 110% price guarantee!!

Best to all
 
Tobe, I still made the order, normally the slowness wouldn't have bothered me but there was a rec climb at the park I was supposed to be at.

The point of posting it was A: to show I'm not a blind lover of Sherrill and B: I figured you'd be back browsing and would have benifit of critisim that you're making constructive.


lumberjack= Carl Rutherford in 39702/Columbus, MS. We re-met Saturday (I think) when I was yacking with Sean and you remarked on my "Kiss the Sky" MB's T-House shirt.
 
brendonv said:
Not only prices, but their sales people have been rude on the phone in the past.
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The gal I spoke to this morning was awesome. One of my guys needed a bolt, a bolt, to make some piece of equipment safe and she broke down the dynamics of the equipment and sold me a 20 cent bolt and an 80 cent nut. That rounded out my 500$ purchase.

Tobe, why don't you advertise on this site? We are a nice bunch of folks that enjoy trading with your company.
 
Carl, I try to spend equally with Wesspur, Sherrills and Baileys. I am happy they are all in the business and want keep them around.


Tobe, thanks for responding. I see where you are coming from. Perhaps I had heard incorrectly that Sherrils and not Petzl were the ones who had first taken issue with Wesspur not changing prices mid catalogue. I find myself with split sympathies on this one. Its as if one of the major airlines stopped having in flight meals and then insisted that a smaller carrier do the same or risk having its suppliers pulled out from under them. On the other hand I can see why companies like Stihl insist on fixed pricing.
 
Good on ya for sharing the wealth Darin. Best I can remember I've never orderd anything from Wesspur. I've ordered a couple bars from Baileys (41" 72"), a jug, and a tach from Bailey's. Otherwise, most all of my kit comes from Sherrill, excluding the random wicked deals from Ebay.

Gigi, I thought we decided long ago we wanted the ONLY non commercial site around, supported by the members thus leaving us to the Blaster's whims but no "suits" telling us what to do? I have a several other commitments to deal with first, but hopefully Paypal will be recieving another hit soon enough.
 
lumberjack said:
Gigi, I thought we decided long ago we wanted the ONLY non commercial site around, supported by the members thus leaving us to the Blaster's whims but no "suits" telling us what to do? I have a several other commitments to deal with first, but hopefully Paypal will be recieving another hit soon enough.
Click to expand...

Carl, great idea. Toby could hit the donate button, just like the rest of us!
 
"We decided?" I musta missed that meeting. And why would someone donate to a site they don't participate in? I know I wouldn't.

Gaining sponsors for the TreeHouse hasn't been ruled out. Who knows what tomorrow will bring?
 
I hope Tobe can get out of here without getting panhandled.

Two, three, or four TH generations ago (2-3 years I guess) we had a big thread discussing if we wanted to go "public" or not. I thought the general idea was we wanted to be different, but I've been wrong before.
 
I don't buy a couple of thou worth of stuff per but it still is over 2-300 bucks when I round up those that need parts etc . Lot's of good folks out there to deal with . Toby at Amicks is a good one also .
 
The other side of the story.

Hello folks, this post was brought to my attention by one of my employees and after reading it over I feel the need to clarify a few things.

The first thing is about price increases in general. WesSpur is not implementing a general price increase mid-year. There are a few products that we have been forced to raise prices on due to increases in costs. Tobe posted the only two price increases that are significant (Petzl and Samson.) I have not heard of any other price increases so far. As far as Samson Rope goes, we did of course like everyone else, get the letter that Tobe published announcing approx 10% price increase. We made a business decision, given two months to prepare, to hedge our costs on rope. We basically purchased enough Samson rope to last until the new catalog comes out in 2009. That way we are able to keep our prices as low as possible. The warehouse is a little full though.

As far as Petzl pricing goes there are two separate issues - the price increase and the dealer agreement. The price increase that Petzl announced was only on a few arborist products. Again we hedged our costs by purchasing enough of these products for the year, I think there were 9 sku's that we loaded up on. The second issue is with the dealer agreement. Petzl does state in their dealer agreement that dealers must adhere to MSRP but in the past it has neither been adhered to by any dealer that I know of, nor has Petzl cared to enforce it. Recently, and all of a sudden, they decided to start enforcing it, and of course we complied with their request. Petzl does make some of the best products around and we want to continue our great relationship. We do not know why they started enforcing it all of a sudden, but have a very good guess. Just to clarify, none of the major arborist dealers were adhering to the pricing at that time. There have been many other recent pressures from vendors, just out of the blue, that we have had to stave off this year as well.

I also want to take a second to say I think there is room for a few arborist suppliers in this market, like Tobe said it is a fairly small market, but competition is good for everyone, especially the end user. My philosophy on business is obviously much different than that of Tobe Sherrill's, but in saying that I have great respect for the things that he has done in the industry and the company he runs. We have a completely different business model from them that allows us to sell for lower prices, and focus on service and delivery. I truly think that free and fair competition is best for all involved.

Hopefully this clarifies the matter, and brings to light the other side.
Thanks for your time
Ryan Aarstol
WesSpur Tree Equipment
 
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