Geez! I hate that!

[danzvtil]

When it comes to plants Bunnings controls the supply chain. With regional stores years ago, the suppliers delivered directly to each store (at their cost), the seedling supplier, the general outdoors supplier, the tree supplier etc etc. the benefit of that is they could also deliver to other garden centres along the way, sharing the cost.
Then all plants went via a plant third party with a central delivery place in each state, and suddenly it wasn’t viable for growers to run trucks to the regions, forcing the independents to pay for their own freight. The tragedy is Bunnings prices on anything are a ****take, they are big enough to dictate what the market will pay, and suppliers are held over a barrel with a gun to their head.

[Citroënbender]

There are some products I’ve seen in there (not nursery items) that baffle me as to how they got on the shelves at all, or in consistent quantity. One that sticks in my mind is washing machine hoses, premade - but the wall end fitting is for a US tap. The threads will never mate well enough to seal!

[ESPJG32]

Ah Bunnings.....the Chinese Shop.....the chinese green shed.... their best price guarantee or beat it by 10% claim is useless....most of their stock is special buys from China...no one else has the same item.....a lot of the stuff they have is crap, especially fixings but a lot of other stuff as well....if people knew the mark ups they work on they would be astounded, I know of items that can be bought in China for $8.00 US and they sell it for $150.00 in Bunnings...so when they discount stuff they still make a killing.....good place to stay away from

[Itsme]

Originally Posted by ESPJG32

Ah Bunnings.....the Chinese Shop.....the chinese green shed.... their best price guarantee or beat it by 10% claim is useless....most of their stock is special buys from China...no one else has the same item.....a lot of the stuff they have is crap, especially fixings but a lot of other stuff as well....if people knew the mark ups they work on they would be astounded, I know of items that can be bought in China for $8.00 US and they sell it for $150.00 in Bunnings...so when they discount stuff they still make a killing.....good place to stay away from

Hmmm this can be said for all the other hardware store brands!

[Citroënbender]

Getting towards the end of an epic “whenever” timing belt (etc) replacement that’s taken nearly ten weeks. Just drained and triple rinsed the cooling circuit, added chemical flush and water… Immobiliser fault - car won’t start!

[Citroënbender]

Further to my kvetching yesterday, companies who’ve removed the “everyday business” phone contact details from their websites and replaced with a web form and Captcha. Really un-handy when you are wanting to progress a job and there’s zero feedback on how long it may take to get an answer.

I suppose this will eventually creep to services currently rendered by dialling 000, one will have to fill in a web form and then click all the squares with bicycles/boats/wigwams in order to submit your request. Hopefully they will allow people to upload a picture of the emergency situation.

[DFB FGXR6]

Originally Posted by danzvtil

When it comes to plants Bunnings controls the supply chain. With regional stores years ago, the suppliers delivered directly to each store (at their cost), the seedling supplier, the general outdoors supplier, the tree supplier etc etc. the benefit of that is they could also deliver to other garden centres along the way, sharing the cost.
Then all plants went via a plant third party with a central delivery place in each state, and suddenly it wasn’t viable for growers to run trucks to the regions, forcing the independents to pay for their own freight. The tragedy is Bunnings prices on anything are a ****take, they are big enough to dictate what the market will pay, and suppliers are held over a barrel with a gun to their head.

I live in regional Victoria. The freight costs to have our stock delivered from our Melbourne based suppliers is significant. That cost is then passed onto the customers. It makes it hard to compete but also hard to explain why an identical plant sold in Melbourne (or Bunnings) is considerably more at our nursery.