N

Business reality and greed is what has ruined this world in 2015 Richard. The chances are, that a young B&O PLAY customer has saved and saved for an extremely long amount of time for that first Play product and they deserve the same kind attention as the rich guy who is spending £20K out his 'spare' cash.

When I bought my first B&O - A Century, it took me over 1 year to save up enough money for it. When I opened the box, there was a note from the CEO saying 'I know how you feel' and he took the time to tell his customer about his first experience. I always remembered that. When I later bought a BV6 and there was no note or attention to detail, the magic kind of went away :)

But for the BeoPlay customer, maybe one day, just maybe, he may work into that showroom and order a BV11 with speakers for around his house.

My first MINI Cooper, I travelled 150 miles to buy it. Why? Because the salesman treat my friends and myself with kindness and respect when we were poor students with no money. Three years later, I'd saved enough to buy one with all of the options and I visited him and proudly told him that he deserved the sale and he got it! Kindness and genuine care is the ULTIMATE quality in sales people and it separates the excellent from the downright lousy! 

Gotta agree w5bno123, Nick is brilliant!

Paul W wrote:

" "BeoPlay" type of client took time away from more lucrative bespoke installations.

That is just pure arrogance. Any dealer that thinks like that really does not deserve any sales. My God, that's disgusting. Pure revolting. Seriously, that's pure greed and arrogance like that is what has given BANG&OLUFSEN such a bad name that it's tried to concur with Play. Shame on any sales guy to think like that!

Thank God, some of our B&O sales reps here in the UK don't think like that. Sheffield are amazing and I get the red carpet treatment from the boys in Harrods just when I pop in to say hi!

Richard wrote:

Oh, Christ, get me out of here. This is every bit as bad as the Quad, Naim and Classic Car forums. Will never visit another forum. I have music to listen to and a wife to go to bed with. Nighty night.

propaganda wrote:

Location is essential if your business relies on passing trade, less so if it is a destination. B&O stores are very much destination stores.

Yes, but Richard contradicted this by saying it won't be a "drop in centre". You can't have a destination store, spreading the lifestyle vibe, but try and avoid people coming in to experience this lifestyle.

As a B&O customer of 15 years, I disagree with the point about location. The store on Lansdown Road is in a very strange location. Just too easy not to go in. Also, the store hours were insane. Wasn't open on a Sunday or a Monday, only open until 5pm on a Saturday and never on an evening. When are retailers going to understand, if you want to create this 'destination', you need to work within the time limitations of your intended customer. Retailers would be far better opening at 10am and staying open until 7pm, as an example. We need to bring this retail culture to the UK.

Some of the things I read on this board are swaying me away from the brand. My lack of posts on this forum is a good indication of how I feel lately. This forum thread hasn't exactly encouraged me. The new Bath B&O store owner (from B&O Cardiff) contacted me today, but I've been buying from B&O Cheltenham recently. I think I'll stick with Cheltenham. 

N

You get it all the time in the car industry, company car buyers coming in to the dealership on a Saturday wanting test drives etc then sourcing car elsewere.

The sales team are on commission with families and mortgages to pay,and this just takes a potential sale away from them on a busy Saturday spending a couple of hrs with someone who is never going to buy a car.

To Paul w, who says about the young play customers, who save and save, a long time to spend £150-400 on play items.

Thats nonsense, as that kind of customers seems to find that kind of money for £150 trainers or ps4/Xbox consoles latest iPhone etc.nights out aswell.

I have been in sales and business for years and I agree that you should never prejudge and treat everyone the same and with respect, but reality is, that doesn't pay the bills or make you money, that's why you have processes in place to prioritise customers,And reappoint if needed.

You can either volume sell like currys/PC world ford/Vauxhall. Or high price aspirational B&o rangerover etc.

I play a lot of golf, and I know many people who go for a custom fit session at a rep day spent hrs,then buy the clubs cheaper elsewhere, it happens in every retail sales environment.Play customers do the same.

butch1 wrote:

You get it all the time in the car industry, company car buyers coming in to the dealership on a Saturday wanting test drives etc then sourcing car elsewere.

The sales team are on commission with families and mortgages to pay,and this just takes a potential sale away from them on a busy Saturday spending a couple of hrs with someone who is never going to buy a car.

To Paul w, who says about the young play customers, who save and save, a long time to spend £150-400 on play items.

Thats nonsense, as that kind of customers seems to find that kind of money for £150 trainers or ps4/Xbox consoles latest iPhone etc.nights out aswell.

I have been in sales and business for years and I agree that you should never prejudge and treat everyone the same and with respect, but reality is, that doesn't pay the bills or make you money, that's why you have processes in place to prioritise customers,And reappoint if needed.

You can either volume sell like currys/PC world ford/Vauxhall. Or high price aspirational B&o rangerover etc.

I play a lot of golf, and I know many people who go for a custom fit session at a rep day spent hrs,then buy the clubs cheaper elsewhere, it happens in every retail sales environment.Play customers do the same.

As a person who actually designs and delivers products for the car industry I presented yesterday to field sales managers to explain what we do in the design studio. I heard the speakers who proceeded me talking about their world and it struck me that they work on a monthly cycle whereas we spend months on development  of things the sales staff know nothing about. They just spend their time saying how  " the sales manger is in a good mood today" to customers to reach the months target. Whether it's a volume producer or in the case of friends recently buying a new Discovery. I do not get this feeling from my local B&O shop and I wish the projects I've been responsible for were sold by people who loved the product and had a longer sales objective than a month. The car dealers all come across as being the manufacturer themselves but as they've not actually had a hand in producing the product why should a customer believe they should shop around. If we had the marketing budget to spend on the product itself instead of the deals the cars would sell themselves. At least B&O is not something you feel you should have shopped around for longer after you get it home as you do with a car as the price is the same at all the dealers.

I have a Land Rover dealership in the group, 3-12 month wait on some models and no discount, you could say the brand and car sells itself.People can design and spend months doing it, but the shop floor and general public decides in the end what is successful or not.

You are a puppet to the manufacturer as they pull the strings,and when there's problems you get the blunt of it,being front of house for the brand, not the people hiding behind the desk etc.

Something can look good but it's only one part of the jigsaw, also times have changed,loyalty lost, people will travel 100 miles for a free set of mats etc.

We have 2 modern Landrover dealerships which have to be replaced at millions investment as jag and Landrover have to be combined under the same roof now, we are lucky because we have a jag dealership already, but others in cities will lose out to each other.

When you invest a lot of money into a brand to keep them happy, sales and targets are key.

Our bmw dealerships are no different, loads of models released, targets through the roof, and new dealerships to be built, more a volume brand now and residuals prove it.

Profits with Landrover are 4 times that on average to bmw, so it shows you brand values,desirability count and price has nothing to do with it, how times have changed for jlr, I wish B&o were the same.

butch1 wrote:

I have a Land Rover dealership in the group, 3-12 month wait on some models and no discount, you could say the brand and car sells itself.People can design and spend months doing it, but the shop floor and general public decides in the end what is successful or not.

You are a puppet to the manufacturer as they pull the strings.

When you invest a lot of money into a brand to keep them happy, sales and targets are key.

Our bmw dealerships are no different, loads of models released, targets through the roof, and new dealerships to be built, more a volume brand now and residuals prove it.

Profits with Landrover are 4 times that on average to bmw, so it shows you brand values,desirability count and price has nothing to do with it, how times have changed for jlr, I wish B&o were the same.

You may feel that you are spending a lot on your point-of-sale brand identity etc but the manufacturer spends the same as a showroom on a bumper mould and it's them who add value to the plastic that comes out of it . The amount of material in an Evoque is no greater than a Freelander but it's Design gives it a better mark-up and once the customer goes on the configurator it gets better. That's down to years of work by Gerry and his design team campaigning and doing design proposals. This is more than making it "look good"?

The customer has already decided from seeing cars on the road and looking at the configurator what they want nowadays and the sales process is an obstacle of having to deal with people who've had nothing to do with the creation of the product who you then have to negotiate a price. I've just been through this in buying a new Kuga for my wife and the emphasis is more with Gap insurance and paint protector add-ons. The equivalent process with B&O and the TV installation etc was much more pleasurable .