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  #21  
Old 11-05-2007, 12:05 PM
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ghrocketman ghrocketman is offline
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RD,
It looks like your WM carries the same (maybe larger) selection of Estes motors as mine, except mine always has plenty of USELESS A10-PT's.

Not a single "B" engine to be found, and has not been one in the Fenton, Mi. Walmart (or any Michigan Wal Marts I ever get to) for the past TWO freakin' years.
If they can't order individual items that they are out of stock, I therefore judge their system to STINK !

I think local Wal Marts saying that they cannot order individual items is just a lot of double talk that really means that they could order individual items, but choose not to put forth the effort it requires.
Any store that is forced to have certain items on the shelf via corporate directive but is not allowed to individually order well selling but market location specifically popular items is managed at the corporate level by incompetent greedy buffoons that really care NOTHING about their customer base. Wal Mart is one store that may have low prices, but they obviously have never heard of the concept of "the customer is ALWAYS right"
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  #22  
Old 11-05-2007, 01:34 PM
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tbzep tbzep is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ghrocketman
RD,
It looks like your WM carries the same (maybe larger) selection of Estes motors as mine, except mine always has plenty of USELESS A10-PT's.


They aren't useless if you fly alone. You can dig out the plug and you will have A10-0's. Not recommended for use at clubs for liability reasons.

Disclaimer: I don't recommend this to anybody even if they do fly alone. Safety Nazi's leave me alone!

(Yes, it does work.)
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  #23  
Old 11-05-2007, 02:10 PM
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Shreadvector Shreadvector is offline
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Wal-Mart dropped the A10-PT many months ago - perhaps as long ago as January. If your store still has any, they have failed to do inventory and mark them down for clearance.

Mark downs vary but usually start at $3 per pack and rapidly approach $1.50 to $1 per pack as they get stale.

They will not see those motors without the rocket cars designed to take them. They were dropped by Wal-Mart at the same time.

if anyone has a more accurate drop-date for these, please chime in.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ghrocketman
RD,
It looks like your WM carries the same (maybe larger) selection of Estes motors as mine, except mine always has plenty of USELESS A10-PT's.

Not a single "B" engine to be found, and has not been one in the Fenton, Mi. Walmart (or any Michigan Wal Marts I ever get to) for the past TWO freakin' years.
If they can't order individual items that they are out of stock, I therefore judge their system to STINK !

I think local Wal Marts saying that they cannot order individual items is just a lot of double talk that really means that they could order individual items, but choose not to put forth the effort it requires.
Any store that is forced to have certain items on the shelf via corporate directive but is not allowed to individually order well selling but market location specifically popular items is managed at the corporate level by incompetent greedy buffoons that really care NOTHING about their customer base. Wal Mart is one store that may have low prices, but they obviously have never heard of the concept of "the customer is ALWAYS right"
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  #24  
Old 11-05-2007, 04:36 PM
Rocket Doctor Rocket Doctor is offline
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When WM gets a master pack, whatever is in that master pack is it, as far as I know, they don't have the capability of ordireing seperate items unfortunately.

WM complains that they aren't selling rocket stuff, Estes complains that WM isn't ordering, it's a viscious cycle.

I talked to those in the know at Estes, when I was still involved, and it fell on deaf ears, I was told by the VP of sales and marketing, not to inquire with WM, he since has left the company.

There needs to be a good sales rep from Estes that can educate the buyers at WM as to what they really need inorder to maintain sales.

I sent an email to corporate, and, they pass it off to your local WM, and the managers there have no clue as to what is going on.

I was told by a assistant manager, if I were to ordr $100.00 worth of rockets/engines, that they could special order them.

But, like I have been saying, over and over again, same old motors, no change, and having 14 packs of A10-3T's is ridiculous.

And, like it has been noted over and over again, try to find a B motor, only one pack of A's then all C's............HELLO, what is wrong with this picture ?????
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  #25  
Old 11-05-2007, 05:19 PM
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barone barone is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Shreadvector
Wal-Mart dropped the A10-PT many months ago - perhaps as long ago as January. If your store still has any, they have failed to do inventory and mark them down for clearance.

Mark downs vary but usually start at $3 per pack and rapidly approach $1.50 to $1 per pack as they get stale.

They will not see those motors without the rocket cars designed to take them. They were dropped by Wal-Mart at the same time.

if anyone has a more accurate drop-date for these, please chime in.

I bought all the A10-PTs my loal walmart had for $.50 a pack of four....
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  #26  
Old 11-05-2007, 05:55 PM
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Doug Sams Doug Sams is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rocket Doctor
There needs to be a good sales rep from Estes that can educate the buyers at WM as to what they really need inorder to maintain sales.
You can say that about any "big box" store. They all do programmed buying, but the programming is flawed. If they had solid programming, the computer would give them the right stuff to order.

One home center I remember is a great example. They always received the same number of #1, #2 and #3 phillips screwdriver bits in each replenishment. The computer was controlling this...without correlating it with sales data. The result was, since 90% of the time, customers need a #2 bit, that the peghooks for #1 and #3 were always overflowing while the #2 hook was empty.

Similarly, I remember a vending machine that got serviced twice a week. It was pretty much empty when the guy got to it each time. Most vending machines internally log the purchases, but nobody uses the data. If they had, they might have seen the machine was half empty withing 24 hours of being refilled. They could have increased their volume over 50% each week by coming every two days instead of twice a week.

Anyway, I can only imagine what's going on in Bentonville. I rarely ever saw any kits on the shelf at Dallas area WalMarts - only starter sets and motors - but almost no launchables. Surely if they'd been looking at run-rates, they would have seen that the launchables were selling out so fast that they needed to be replinishing them much more often.

I guess it's like this: WalMart gets a big crate of rocket stuff. Half the crate sells within 2 days of being placed on shelf. Other half of crate languishes for frickin' ever. Without looking at timeline, analysis shows crate moved too slow, thus rocket stuff not fast sellers. Detailed breakdown - by someone with IQ > bodytemp - would have shown that all the good stuff sold in two days and WalMart needed different mix of product in crate.

Of course, that would be too easy....

Doug
Turning into curmudgeon...
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  #27  
Old 11-05-2007, 07:11 PM
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sandman sandman is offline
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Some times the big chain stores overbuy and have to correct their mistakes.

A while back I was in a local Meijer store (like Wal-Mart) and I grabbed a Fat Boy to replace the one stuck on a power line.

When the cashier rang it up she told me, "that will be $0.88 please."

I said, "Excuse me???...I'll be right back."

Need I say more?
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  #28  
Old 11-05-2007, 07:48 PM
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Gus Gus is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Doug Sams
I guess it's like this: WalMart gets a big crate of rocket stuff. Half the crate sells within 2 days of being placed on shelf. Other half of crate languishes for frickin' ever. Without looking at timeline, analysis shows crate moved too slow, thus rocket stuff not fast sellers. Detailed breakdown - by someone with IQ > bodytemp - would have shown that all the good stuff sold in two days and WalMart needed different mix of product in crate.

Doug,

This is absolutely my experience with Walmart, and I just don't get it. Walmart became the biggest retailer in the nation by having tremendous inventory control and incredible data management. But what I see with regard to rockets should give them reason to worry. I know rockets are just a rounding error on the overall operation, but they are so poorly managed that it suggests WalMart's systems aren't working very well.

When the shipments come in, the good stuff goes quick and the dregs just sit and sit. If my local Walmart put a gross of Space Ship Ones on the shelf they'd be gone in a month. But the Gauchitos and Lucky Sevens will sit there forever. And that's what they have. Most of what is on the shelf is dead inventory.

Walmart's systems aren't working the way they should. And I imagine it's not just working that way in the rocketry department.
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  #29  
Old 11-05-2007, 08:41 PM
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CPMcGraw CPMcGraw is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Gus
Doug,

This is absolutely my experience with Walmart, and I just don't get it. Walmart became the biggest retailer in the nation by having tremendous inventory control and incredible data management. But what I see with regard to rockets should give them reason to worry. I know rockets are just a rounding error on the overall operation, but they are so poorly managed that it suggests WalMart's systems aren't working very well.

When the shipments come in, the good stuff goes quick and the dregs just sit and sit. If my local Walmart put a gross of Space Ship Ones on the shelf they'd be gone in a month. But the Gauchitos and Lucky Sevens will sit there forever. And that's what they have. Most of what is on the shelf is dead inventory.

Walmart's systems aren't working the way they should. And I imagine it's not just working that way in the rocketry department.


You want a bigger example of this? Look through the grocery section for your favorite items. Chances are, you'll find an open space on the shelf where it should be. Not just something else in its place, but open space. The WM here at my front door (literally) is horrible about maintaining stock on the shelves. Other WMs in Mobile are just as bad, some better, others worse.

The problem is systemic, not simply localized.
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  #30  
Old 11-05-2007, 11:16 PM
al_packer al_packer is offline
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Default WalMart, or the Evil Empire

It's also possible that the fault does not lie with WalMart, but with a supplier who pumps a "recommended" product combination into the pipeline.
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