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Hey Fellers and Montroy.
- Thread starter HulkSmash
- Start date
Sorry but I just need to point this out. While I am not picking a side and I still have faith in Fellers to fix their mistake... Grimco doesn't appear to be directly bashing Fellers. They are simply pointing out a fact at the perfect time. I don't see how any other business besides ones like us and Fellers will get hurt from a situation like this.... especially with someone like Brian Fellers speaking for the company. A move like this will permanently tarnish the reputation of a company.
CanuckSigns
Active Member
Lol @ brian_fellers, I think Monday is going to be a bad day for you.
MagnificentBastid
New Member
'Brian' is Frank's middle name.
I received a courteous PM about the issue. Any supplier can choose any business model that they like as far as I'm concerned, I have not control over that; I do however have a choice about where to spend my money. They assure that they are not promoting or selling to the public and that the website will be down or in another state by end of business Monday. I just checked it 4am TX time and it looks like pricing is already removed. My limited exposure with Fellers has been positive and my recent interaction with Ted my sales rep was great. I won't punish a company for a mistake or mistake in judgement that they correct. I would have gone out of business 20 times already.
HulkSmash
New Member
Gee, so if you made a mistake or bad judgment and then you saw the light and corrected it would you want to be put out of business? Maybe you should take a different approach to life you might get further.
MtnView
New Member
As a small distributor of another product I was a member of a forum set up for fellow distributors to discuss the industry and help each other out. One day a thread was started about a huge supplier making a decision to sell direct to our customers. Just like this thread took off that one did too. Many voices on the subject trying to figure out what it meant to the industry and what was to be done. Someone asked what could be done even if they made the decision to sell direct. I addressed this person's question by saying "If" this was happening (as with this particular case it hadn't been verified direct sales were happening) we could all start buying other suppliers' products. I did not call for everyone to boycott this supplier but simply mentioned what could be done if this supplier was or started selling direct in response to someone's question.
I remember reading on that thread shortly thereafter another distributor saying they were being sued by this large supplier. A week later I received my certified mail from their law firm naming my company in this lawsuit of distributors. Four of us were named in this lawsuit while larger distributors received C&D letters. One distributor was forced out of business. Another paid a small settlement. A third and myself joined together and fought to a stalemate. While we did nothing wrong we still had to spend a lot of money on legal bills in the process to prove we did nothing wrong. While the intentions were clear our four companies were to be made examples of under the guise of violating federal anti-trust laws. The backlash of negative publicity toward the supplier amongst distributors over the lawsuit was felt by the supplier.
It's one thing to say you won't be using a particular supplier but be careful about using the word boycott or making a call to action such as a boycott unless you have the financial resources to defend yourself in the legal system. Just speaking from experience.
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