The 'wal-mart' type of business model has no business being in the Marine industry. Wal-Mart sucks today and Wal-Mart will suck tomorrow. Lets get away from 'Trick' threads altogether and move on.

they do offer some marine items in the catolog , but if you go online to summit there is alot more products across the board , including marine. i think the catolog just scratches the surface...

i have had parts delivered on saturday at no extra cost because they use fedx ,now , this was back in 03', i was like , wtf is fedx doing here?? and saw the summit box..:cool-smiley-011:

some aspects of Fred's business were spot on

Since none were readlily apparent, how about cluing us in.

Classic, but so true!

Chris, obviously indefensible what has happened recently and seems it may have been going on for awhile; however 7 points come to mind that I will continue to apply in my own business (37 years in biz and 44 years in my industry). My dealings with Fred/Trick were characterized by 1. rapidly returned inquiries by phone and/or e-mail. 2. professional product and application knowledge. 3. reasonable prices. 4. fast and accurate delivery and order fulfillment. 5. good product selection. 6. on two occasions Fred was able to suggest a lower cost yet appropriate alternative.
7. Fred actually seemed to want my business which was a completely different attitude than what I received from a number of marine suppliers; although this last point seems to talk to a dynamic that is endemic across all industries in the past several years. - Jeff

I misunderstood your point.

They may have been "spot on" for you but as evidenced by the small but steady stream of "did Trick go out of business?" and "why won't they ship my stuff or call me?" threads over the last year, I think the key word is "consistency". Even if it's consistent mediocrity, you at least have an understanding of what you're going to get.

Chris, let me clarify; I'm not defending Trick Marine. Ultimately, nothing that they did well excuses what happened in the end. I'm merely saying that SOME of what they did constitutes good practice; probably what every world-class business does day in and day out over the course of decades. - Jeff

No, not suggesting you were.

It's funny- there seems to be two completely separate groups of Trick customers. One's that had multiple transactions and were treated well and others that got poor service on more than one occasion. it's almost like they spun a wheel to see who they would jerk off.

Kinda interesting, Chris; since all this nonsense came to light I've been giving my own business operations some additional thought. It really is becoming clearer that we don't really do anybody any long term favors by keeping prices artificially low. Lots of lessons to be learned. - Jeff