QBP Dealership Agreement/Rules

Well howdy y'all...let's open a can of worms...

I haven't seen the dealer agreement for QBP, but is there a clause or stipulation in that contract that prohibits dealers, or their employees, from revealing the wholesale prices of the items in the QBP catalog to outside parties?  A confidentiality clause?

Also, I'm wondering if there are minimum retail prices for each item, where selling any given item for less than X is a violation of the dealer agreement.  Assuming this would apply to sales in physical stores, and to online sales (a QBP dealer selling on Amazon, for instance).

Might be touching a nerve here, but I'm just curious how this all works...

Views: 1087

Replies are closed for this discussion.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Doug Haynes on March 19, 2013 at 1:25pm

The real question is why do you want to know?

See what I already see coming is some great festival of complaint about how much stuff costs at shops vs. how much it costs online which is a road we have been down here already.

QBP has a MSRP and MAP (minimum advertised price) for most of the products it sells.  Shops are supposed to adhere to the MAP and sell close to the MSRP.  The guidelines are in place to keep smaller shops from being priced out of the market by larger shops who, due to volume, can operate at a lower margin.  It is also to prevent online retailers, or shops with online sales, from using the reduced overhead to offer stuff at prices no brick and mortar store can hope to match.

Of course it rarely stops it from happening...  Large shops, ones right here in Chicago, will get around MSRP restrictions by selling last years models at crazy pricing, often without letting on it is last years model.  Shops with online stores will set up 'discount clubs' people can buy memberships in.

It is touching a nerve, especially for those who work in shops.  Bike shops do not operate on a great margin on much of what they sell, especially bikes and are continually bitched at about how much stuff costs.

Permalink Reply by Far'arned Retrogrumpalunkus #63 on March 19, 2013 at 2:24pm

If you want to know what the QBP price is go to http://www.niagaracycle.com/ and check out their online price and multiply by about .75 and that will be pretty close to the QBP wholesale price.  

Permalink Reply by Kevin K on March 19, 2013 at 2:28pm

Yeah, I'm not slamming LBS's, I do realize it's hard for LBS's to stay in business, and they're not making a ton of $$, and without them we'd all need to buy $2000 worth of Park tools and spend 200 hours taking bike mechanic lessons.

I'm sure this discussion has occurred 1000 times on the interwebs already, so I'll just read those...versus everyone getting angry at each other on Chainlink...comment closed!

  

RSS

Groups

© 2008-2016   The Chainlink Community, L.L.C.   Powered by

Disclaimer  |  Report an Issue  |  Terms of Service