Announcing the FlexRadio TradeIN+ purchasing program

Tim - W4TME

FlexRadio Systems is excited to announce an extension of our TradeIN!/TradeUP! Programs by now offering TradeIN+.  This program affords you the ability to trade in third-party radio gear and accessories towards the purchase of any FLEX-6000 series radio.  More information can be found on our website.  So be sure to tell your friends that it’s now even easier to get a FLEX-6X00 in their shack.

Tony Hateley

Hear we go again,uk buyers that have invested in a company by buying there products and then are left out in the cold when it comes to offers,at least the other manufacturers includes all there customers worldwide.

Steve K9ZW

@Tony - it isn't UK buyers being slighted whatsoever, not with the occasional reports of the UK FRS Dealers taking in quality trade-ins since the 6000 series came out in 2013.

Rather it is the USA buyer getting the same fair shake, as we do not have a dealer network willing to work deals like you've had all along.

More generally though it is impossible to work a scheme like this across borders for modestly priced items like ham radios.  Might work if radios cost the same as a good sized car like they relatively once did.

all best and 73

Steve K9ZW

Rob G6EIH

I agree Tony, it's a failure on FRS's part to implement a global sales strategy, they only see the their own market, ROW is foreign to them due to the size of their own domestic market and I include the US government in that.The big three understand how important ROW is as their domestic market is small by comparison.

It's all too common a problem with USA manufactures having a huge home market as they really do not enjoy exporting, if only they would realise how big a place the world is. Once the patents start to run low on time they will jump on it, by then it will be too late so I urge FRS to act now and go fully global.

Only having one authorized repair shop in the EU that we are leaving is utterly ludicrous.

As a big importer of US products I could go on and on about this, I know the pit falls and problems very well.

Rob G6EIH

Steve, right now a 6700 will cost me $8850 US plus delivery from a local UK dealer plus delivery charges, FRS list price is $7499 now discounted to $7199 that's a difference of $1651. These dealers and that's what they are dealers are not distributors and they are only here to make a quick buck at our cost, they cannot repair the 6000 series so we have to endure long lead times when sending a 6000 back for repair to the one and only repair shop who do a great job.

When you consider that FRS sell to the dealers at discounted prices who then markup plus + plus we are being ripped off here and I can only blame FRS for lack of global sales strategy.

I traded a two or three week old 6300 in last year for a 6700 and lost more than the cost of the 6300 rig in dollar terms, I was **** and got conned, totally my fault but it will not happen again with a UK dealer his card is marked now.

I know what the real costs of importing is down to the last cent of importing from the USA and believe me we are being ripped off not just in the UK but also the rest of Europe.

I would love to see a dealer respond here but you will never see a "dealer" comment on here as the backlash would **** them off.

Now don't get me wrong I love my Flex and do not plan on changing it any time soon so I guess I'll have to put up with being ripped off in the UK for now.

Sad but true....

Steve K9ZW

Hi Rob

How does VAT figure into the price comparison? 

There are some interesting larger than typical currency movements that will eventually factor in for future pricing.  I know we topped-up our personal UKP account with 2017's expected travel needs on the hunch that USD $1.25/1£ UKP was advantageous enough to do a transfer now. 

As the FlexRadio Systems product line price structure is mainly a direct-to-retail-customer structure that squidgy extra to make room for a dealer layer might not be there.

It is always a frustrating area, which with your import/export experience you will know better than most. 

And I don't know why a so quickly forget when currency, tax and other costs brought a large professional equipment purchase in under budget, yet I will never forget when NatWest "lost" a wire transfer for three weeks and the Pound rose 6% against the dollar costing me almost two months rent in lost value, while at Grad School in the UK. 

Back on track, whatever the reasonableness of price, the FRS you have is a fine rig, and one would hope the eventual uptake in the UK (and the EU) is enough to create a more harmonized world marketing scheme. 

While that all evolves as an early adopter you sure have an advantage over other hams being brave enough to buy a low-volume import rig.

All best and 73

Steve K9ZW

Gerald-K5SDR

Hi Rob and Tony,

I believe there are a few things you are missing in your understanding of the facts:

1. Our distributors in the UK and elsewhere receive competitive discounts off of the US list prices.  To their costs they must add incoming freight from the US along with their marketing costs.
2. FlexRadio has no control whatsoever over distributor end user pricing.
3. It is my understanding that advertised prices in the UK must include VAT of 20%, which is not included in US list pricing.  
4. In the last two years the British Pound has gone from 0.6 to 0.8 dollars to the pound.  That means that the exchange rate has caused imported goods to be inflated by 33% in two years.  Brexit has exacerbated that problem.  I was told by one of our UK distributors back in September that prices on other radios were going up substantially due to devaluation of the Pound.
5. FlexRadio functions as is its own distributor in the US.  Think of all offers as being from a US based distributor in US dollars without tax, freight, or currency exchange rate adjustments.  We bear all US marketing and sales costs within our internal distribution margin. All US based transceiver manufacturers operate in this same way as their own distributors.
6. There is no possible economic model that would allow FlexRadio to take trades across the ocean.  We know for a fact that our UK distributors there already provide that service.  

I hope this helps to understand the issues a little better.

73,
Gerald

Rob G6EIH

Hello Gerald,

I appreciate your response and believe me I do fully understand the issues, as a FCL and LCL importer of US products from East and West coast for 25 years plus I know the system very well.
My background is volume manufacturing but jumped the fence a long time ago into import - export and EU distribution of niche products.

Currently we run operations and distribution for two US companies here in the UK plus our own sales company we also import from several other US companies two of which recently provided us with 5% retrospective discount to help offset the exchange rate variance, they know how important it is to keep sales moving, we passed the discount directly to our customers.


I don't want to say any more on here, you have my PM email if you wish to contact me.

73, Rob

Tony Hateley

Could you not open a small manufacturing plant in the U.K.,employing U.K. Labour and then you would have you hand on the paulse as they say,and I'm sure you market share would increase tremendously as buyers would then know they a dealing with a truly worldwide company,I'm not as versed in the business world but I think I know what the customer wants.

Marc Lalonde

relocate part of production to second site was not cost effective

this will increase cost by lower the volume to the primary site ..
and on new site will not have big volume so huge price per unit 

ruining and own my self a electronic assembly shop  i may tell that 
start the line for build a batch was big part of the cost ,and you what to split it on as many unit as possible  to got decent price

start a UK shop for build something like 25-50 radio will cost MUCH MORE that built in in USA in 100-200 batch and ship it to UK