Vendor response
 

I am trying to be a good patron and use the site vendors but they don't seem to answer the phone or reply to emails. Has anyone else had this problem? I assume that these guys may do it as a side job so it may not be priority number one. But it's going on a week and I haven't heard from three vendors!

The longest I ever waited was 24 hours for a e-mail reply. Doesn't sound normal.

I'm with Roland, about the longest turnaround I've had is 24 hours. There's one particular vendor, Rich Patton, I've bugged the crap out of a bunch and received 4, 5 emails in a day. Most of them I do believe this is a side business.

I'm not going to mention the vendor, but I've been waiting for 3 days to hear a response from one. I called another cub graveyard and he didn't answer either. The first is a sponsor. The last isn't.

AJ

As a new member, I had a similar problem.

Mr. Patton was easy to contact and very helpful when I called about some items. I left phone messages and a private message through the forum to another sponsor over a month ago, and still have had no reply. I've since found good deals on what I needed, with kind help from many knowledgable forum members.

Josh P

I had a great experience with Mark at IH Cub Cadet Parts - He does it as a sideline so his day-job has to take precedence but he kept in timely communication and when he knew that he was going to be out of touch he let me know ahead of time - real quick turn around on parts also.

I've done inquiries with Patton Acres and always got a quick and information rich response.

I contacted one of the vendors.

Left a message.

Left another message.

3 days later I gave up.:bash2:

Went to NAPA auto parts, ordered my rebuild kit & had it the next morning.

Nik,

I recently bought a couple things from Cub Classics, and IH Cub Cadet Parts with no problems from either and would use both again if need be. Chris from Cub classics returned a phone call within 24 hours, answered my concerns and called me back in the evening as I told him to feel free to contact me at any time day or night. I then placed my order and it was on my door step less than 48 hours later, being he is just over in Ohio. I just ordered from Mark's site and did not contact him prior to the order but everything went smoothly there too.

I work for a web based company that sells automotive parts. Getting the company set up so we could quickly respond to the volume of inquiries took a little work, and costs money. In our experiences, you can't just hire some noob who knows nothing about the products you are selling and expect them to deal with customers, and one man can only do so much in 24 hours.

Having been buying online for years, I have learned what to expect when ordering from small companies using off the shelf shopping cart solutions. They are typically folks running a side or specialty business and can not be on call all day, but have good intentions and you get what you pay for from them.

In my line of work, an educated customer is my favorite customer. Nothing wrong with asking the seller questions of course, but many times if you take some initiative and ask on the forum or search, you can find the answers you need and then decide to order or not, letting the vendor focus on other things like getting parts packed and shipped or ordering more from his suppliers.

:beerchug:

That's the ticket right there.

We can't operate in a vacuum and expect vendors to be all knowing - all seeing. It's up to us to take the lead and do the best we can to provide them with as much info as possible and understand it may take some time to bring everything together. It can be difficult at times when you deal with folks who have expectations that all vendors will provide them with instant gratification.

As vintage Cub owners we're part of a VERY vertical market and what we want is so often NLA from mainstream sources . . . We're the ones who have decided to resurrect these machines instead of buying the newest HD/Lowes offerings so the fact that there's some version of a supply chain out there is a blessing.

None of this to say that every vendor is a saint or has a rock solid business model in place. If a company expects people to buy from it, it has an obligation to live up to advertisements and service claims. If they don't, its fortunately a pretty self-correcting problem as the market will soon weed them out.

All in all I think we've got a pretty good support community both with each other and those who put the effort in to making product available for these great machines!