Mark, you and others make some good points. However, I have talked to our local "full service" camera/hobby store and they told some pretty dreary stories about how the Pentax rep would rarely visit their store or do much of any communicating. Eventually the store owners just dropped Pentax from the line. They lament that they would love to carry Pentax but it's hard to do meaningful business with a voice on the other end of a phone or via cryptic emails. One of the owners gave me the name and phone number of a camera store in another "southern" city that sold tons of Pentax gear because they had a responsive sales rep. I was very surprised to learn it was the very same store in the city I grew up in and where I bought all my photo gear as a young teen just getting into the hobby. That was over 50 years ago. For any store to not only survive but even flourish in this day and era says a lot about how they do business.
Walt On 4/5/08, Mark Roberts <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > John Celio wrote: > >> http://theonlinephotographer.com/the_online_photographer/blog_index.html > >> > >> I think this explains what has happened. Anyone want a job? > > > > Wow, interesting! I wonder how this will affect their relationship with > > shops like the one I used to work at. I also wonder how one goes about > > applying for one of those jobs! > > Sadly, the *reason* for changes like this is that stores like the one > you used to work at (and the one I used to work at) are going the way of > the dinosaur. This is simply a recognition of that reality. > > I think the days of sales reps who visit local stores (and I mean this > in general - not just Pentax and, in fact, not just the camera business) > are numbered. > > Welcome to the 21st century and the era of the Big Box retailer. :( > (Ironic that the "dinosaur" analogy breaks down here because it's the > lumbering giants that are out-evolving the smaller, nimbler shops...) > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > PDML@pdml.net > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow > the directions. > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
