After moving to take on their PC partners with competing hardware Microsoft is set to directly challenge their retail partners after admitting in New York overnight that they intend to roll out a network of retail stores in Australia that will direct sell to consumers and business.
David Richards
Harvey Norman CE Financier On The Skids
One of the largest financiers of consumer electronic in Australia is on the skids with their shares slumping from a high of $3.00 to $0.41c. Key to the Companies future is the CE market that last month declined up to 30% for some CE distributors.
ABC Now Using Google To Buy Favouritism
The ABC who has been accused of being “left wing” and whose Q+A news coverage is currently under investigation is now using tax payer dollars to buy favouritism.
Dick Smith Store Revenues Slump, Creditors Meeting Delayed
Administrators to the failed Dick Smith Chain have moved to delay the next creditors meeting until August 2.
BenQ To Enter Oz Phone Market
BenQ is set to enter the Australian mobile phone market with both the BenQ and Siemens brands.Fast growing technology group BenQ who recently aquired the Siemens mobile phone business is set to launch a major assault on the Australian phone market. The product range will include both BenQ and Siemens branded phones. To implement this move the company has hired four former executives of the Siemens they include, Christian Nyman who takes on the role of General Manager of BenQs Australian phone business. Ann-Maree Butler joins us as National Sales Manager and will play an integral role in developing relationships with Carriers, Distributors and Resellers.
Chris Stellmach has been hired as National Channel Manager for Telstra. Chris will be responsible for BenQ’s partnership with Telstra.
Adrian Cook has been appointed Customer Care Manager and will be responsible for the development and expansion of BenQs Mobile Phone service and after
sales support.
BenQ Displaces LG In OZ Monitor Market
BenQ has displaced LG to capture the #1 spot in the Australia PC monitor market according to IDG.
The top 5 brands in the second quarter were BenQ with 18.5% LG Electronics with 16.0%, Samsung with 14.5%, Philips with 12.8% and Acer with 10.8%. 27.4% is allocated to others. More than 750,000 units were shipped. One of the big deals in the period was 10,000 monitors for the Australian Department of Defence. This deal was won by BenQ.
IDC claim that he seasonal spike in desktop PC shipments, aided largely by a surge in demand from the government and education sectors, contributed to the robust growth. However, the continued price aggression exhibited by vendors remained a critical factor for the surge in PC monitor shipments.
Mercie Clement, IDC Analyst for PC Hardware said “It is notable that vendors in the local market continued to pursue extremely aggressive pricing strategies, despite slight price increases on panels, specifically the 17 inch LCD. Vendors wanting to remain competitive had to absorb these price hikes, even selling below cost in some instances. Assuming that panel prices continue to experience slight increases over the next few months, it will be interesting to keep an eye out for which vendors are able to sustain their current pricing strategies and how market shares stand to be gained or eroded,” said
In 2Q 2005 the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) market (PC vendor), accounted for 51% of the total PC monitor shipments, growing 62% sequentially from the previous quarter. The strong performance was more pronounced as several PC vendors saw the chronic shortages on LCDs come back into alignment this quarter, enabling them to fulfil pent-up demand. PC vendors are now more tactical providing better pricing schemes for PC monitors with desktops and are offering more compelling deals to their channel partners.
“The 2Q 2005 market saw some major changes in branded vendor rankings. BenQ achieved the top position with 18.5% share, 4 percentage points up from last quarter. LG Electronics fell to the second place, with 16.0% share of units shipped, while Samsung finished the quarter with 14.5% share. Philips climbed to the fourth spot, accounting for 12.8% share, as it benefited from the seasonal surge in demand from the corporate, government and education sectors. Rounding out the top five was Acer with 10.8% share,” Ms. Clement added.
EXCLUSIVE:How A The Good Guys, Steinhoff Deal Could Seriously Hurt Harvey Norman
If Gerry Harvey believes that a combined JB Hi Fi and The Good Guys, is a threat to his business, then he might want to think twice, because lurking in the background is a Company that could create a lot of grief for the mass retailer.
Call For Legal Action After Harvey Norman Refuses To Deliver Advertised Discounts To Hundreds Of Consumers
They love spruiking so called “Massive Discount Sales”, but when consumers responded recently to a Harvey Norman offer, the big retailer took their money and then refused to give them the cheap price the goods were advertised for.
Retail Up 2% And That’s Official
Retail sales over the Xmas New Year period were 2% higher than last year, claims the Retail Traders Association proving that the Federal Government handouts did makes their way into the economy they say.
Retail sales over the Xmas New Year period were 2% higher than last year claims the Retail Traders Association proving that the Federal Government handouts did makes it’s way into the economy they say.
The Association’s executive director, Richard Evans, says the Federal Government’s cash handouts, and the falls in petrol prices and interest rates have helped buoy the retail market.
And he says he is expecting the handouts to continue to flow through to cash registers.
“It’s too much to expect that people went out immediately and spent it, they may have used it on their credit cards or to reduce debt, but they’ll soon realise that they’re cashed up and they’ll start re-entering the market place,” he said.
Mr Evans also says retailers have been slashing prices to get rid of stock but he says prices are unlikely to remain low with the slump in the Australian dollar.
“Expect less range on the shelves over the winter months and probably a little bit more extra in price,” he said.
“What we have to understand though, this is a normal cycle… a bit more severe than normal though of course, but we’re expecting growth to come back into the retail market in April-May this year and with strong growth in the September quarter.”
Why Storage World Is A Not A Very Smart Business
COMMENT: What is it about Australia and the lack of service by retailers? In the US and the UK retailers go out of their way to build databases of customers and in some cases they even issue them with barcodes or cards so that regular customers get priority service.
Even corner store dry cleaners in the USA use CRM systems to gather intelligence on their customers. But in Australia the attitude of retailers is totally the opposite.
For example last month I walked in Storage World at Northbridge in NSW where during the past few years my wife and I have spend litterally thousands buying storage gear for temporary accommodation while we built a new house. We also purchased wardrobe rack systems for the new house as well as things like tie and belt racks as well as kitchen and laundry storage gear.
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This is not some corner store mum and dad store. This is a chain of stores run nationally across Australia with the Northbridge store being owned by the Company that also franchises the Storage World brand.
So when I walked in there some four weeks ago to buy some more clothing racks similar to ones that I had already purchased I discovered that they were out of stock and this is when I realised that this was a Company that had a major problem when it came to customer service.
After inquiring as to whether they could order stock in for me I was told “yes” not a problem and after giving the assistant both my name and that of my wife I was told it would only take a couple of days.
Four weeks later and after numerous calls to the shop I still don’t have the goods but I do have a poor customer experience.
On two occasions I was told it would only be a few days but on my fifth call some three weeks later I actually asked them to repeat the telephone number of either my wife or myself.
After an 8 minute wait during which time I ended up talking to two assistants a Storage World employee came back and said “What was your name I don’t seem to have a record of the order”.
Now if this was a Company that took customer service seriously they would by now have both my wife and I on a database.
They should have also offered to phone other stores in their group to see if they had the items in stock.
They should have also, after telling me that it would be in stock within days phoned me after a week to tell me that they were still waiting for the goods to arrive.
But they didn’t because the pimple faced youth on the floor that served me and who just happens to be the critical interface between the customer and the business did not care. He failed to go to a master database and enter any customer details.
All he wanted to do was move onto his next customer finish his shift and get paid. He made no attempt to deliver a good customer service experience and I blame management for this.
Storage World is not alone when it comes to delivering poor customer service in Australia. Harvey Norman and the likes of Dick Smith make no attempt to build extensive CRM databases so that they can offer their regular customers exclusive services and viewings.
Organisations that do understand customer service are the likes of automotive Companies who while taking an order build an extensive database which they later market to in an effort to stay in touch with their most valuable asset a customer who has the ability to spend money.
They send out magazines that constantly remind the customer about the performance of the brand. They invite customers and their friends and partners to cocktail parties and special viewings of new products.
I also wonder how many interior or kitchen designers are on the Storage World database, because every day these trades are recommending storage options to customers.
I for one have never received a marketing brochure from Storage World despite going to their store for more than 10 years but guess what I still get a regular brochure from a store in South Coast Plaza in the USA where I have on several occasions purchased goods.
So what is the difference? One understands the value of customer service and the other doesn’t give stuff.
So what is customer service all about? See our recommendations and those of the NSW department of business.
