Originally Posted by quiltilicious
Originally Posted by Favorite Fabrics
Originally Posted by quiltilicious
Originally Posted by LittleMo
My LQS owner was complaining to me that her purchase price on a particular line of fabric was more than what Spotlight was charging retail for the exactly the same line. She had to place her order over 12 months ago. What the importer had left over (orders not honoured?) was offered to Spotlight at a bargain basement price. Any why not, the importer had already made his money from all the LQS's. It sure made the LQS owner look greedy, but she could not match the Spotlight price without losing money.
Someone is making alot of money, but it is not the LQS owners. By the time we buy fabric, it has been through alot of middle men each wanting to take their cut.
That really stinks! I'm surprised that your LQS owner doesn't have a contract with the importer (or the manufacturer with the importer) about minimum prices for stuff and if he sells lower to someone else, the first buyer gets it at that price, too. (I've seen contracts like that with my CDs when I was selling them through distributors - I could not sell to anyone else for less than I sold to them).
Well... the industry just doesn't work like that. Key information here is that "12 months ago" part. Twelve months means an "old" fabric; it's been discontinued by then. So if there's any left, it will be dumped at a low price to whatever buyer is willing to take most or all of it. (There are large businessess who buy exclusively closeout goods.)
Your LQS will likely not have a
contract with anyone, be it an importer or a manufacturer. The manufacturers probably do have contracts with mills, but I believe the way that works is that the manufacter agrees to purchase x yards at x price. So in theory there should not be any extra yardage produced. However, if the manufacturer is not able to sell all they have left, they'll clearance it.
Yeah, I see your point. In my example/case, I was the "manufacturer", not the "retail store" and this is between the fabric manufacturer/mill and the distributor. However, it does not seem to be good business practice to screw over the bulk of your customers (all the LQSs).
I guess that's why I'm not wealthy, because I don't want to screw people over. :?
I don't think it's really a question of the manufacturer taking advantage of their customers. Each LQS knows the cost of the fabric at the time they place their orders with the manufacturer. If they don't like the price, they don't have to order it. But once the order is placed, to expect the manufacturer to go back and retroactively reduce the price on existing orders, well, that's just not going to happen. (At least, not in my world...)
If the manufacturer took too long to deliver the goods, and the LQS no longer wanted it, a shop can put a "cancel if not shipped by" date on their orders.
I'm trying to imagine what happened here.
You see, if as a LQS buyer you're not "on the ball" and you don't get your order placed for a new collection, you might get shut out of the first printing. And then your fabric just doesn't come. The manufacturer may still be "collecting orders" on that particular print, and when they have taken enough orders to reach their threshold for reprinting (1000 yards? 3000 yards?) then they will place their order with the mill. But it could take many months before they accumulate enough orders to warrant a reprinting, by which time the collection is "old hat" and people are starting to lose interest... and so it comes in and quickly goes to clearance status.
There's a whole lot that goes on behind the scenes in this business!