Ron: I can't keep up with the marketing trends. In this case the coupon was for a particular tuner. That's what made me think that he was doing it for just the $49.95 with the dealer not paying any more. I don't know that to be the case, but I know the dealer and the tech. dave __________________________________________ David M. Porritt, RPT Meadows School of the Arts Southern Methodist University Dallas, TX 75275 dporritt@mail.smu.edu ----- Original message ----------------------------------------> From: Ron Nossaman <rnossaman@cox.net> To: <dporritt@mail.smu.edu>, Pianotech <pianotech@ptg.org> Received: Mon, 20 Sep 2004 16:49:24 -0500 Subject: RE: Customer ethics--no more extras! >>A local dealer here just had one of those mega-sales and a friend bought a >>piano there (new). Rather than get a free tuning, he got a coupon good >>for a 50% discount on a ($100) tuning from a particular tuner. I'm sure >>the tuner is doing it for the 50% so the dealer is paying nothing for the >>first tuning. Is this common? I'd certainly never heard of this before. >> >>dave >I don't know if it's common, but there's a dealer doing that here too. >Rather than use tuners he knows and trusts, he gives $50 coupons toward >paying for the customer's choice of tuner. So the customer directly pays >the tuner the difference. The tuner then redeems the coupon with the >dealer. The idea is for the tuner to get paid full price, rather than have >to discount his work for the dealer. It was intended as a way to insure the >dealer could afford first rate techs to represent him in the field. What >this does, in fact, is to send the customer shopping for the cheapest >tooner she can find, to not have to pay anything extra for her "free" >tuning. This effectively cuts the capable technicians right out of the >loop, and eliminates any incentive these capable techs might have to be >inclined to cut the dealer any slack on in-store prep work and disaster >recovery. This, in turn drives the dealer to look for someone cheap (and >therefore almost certainly less capable) for repair work, and usually >eliminates any hope of pre-delivery prep as a consequence. It also doesn't >make for warm and fuzzy feelings when it comes to mutual referrals between >capable techs and the dealer. All in all, good intentions notwithstanding, >it seems to me to be a pretty stupid idea as it works here. >Ron N
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