Suppliers & VAT

[arnoldbuchsassinger]

Is it me or am I the only one to have noticed that prices seem to have taken something of a hike recently, Treemotion now priced at £240, various elements of kit seem to have gone up and we are in a recession, depending on which sites you go to, For a minute I thought the next generation harness was out. Best adjust my pricing structure and pass on this cost to the customer, thanks Gordon Brown, for reducing VAT, yet suppliers seem to be recouping there stationery reprint costs back to those wishing to spend money. Hmmm

[Steve Bullman]

its tied into the euro mate, nothing to do with vat rates. most of the climbing stuff we use is either european or american, both of which are doing very well against the pound at the moment which means we lose out!

[Jonesie]

Have you seen what the Euro, Dollar and Yen has done. We the dealers have been stuffed bad enough, its not going in our pocket all I seem to be doing at the moment is price updates.

I have been telling our local guys about the price increases for months and the need to adjust their pricing accordingly.

Hopefully with time the prices will come back down a bit.

[Mike]

In Jan 2007 a chipper retailing @ 20,000 Euro would retail at £12,905.00 (1.55). Today that 20,000 Euro machine would be £18,350.00 (1.09). Thats a £5,445.00 increase in exchange rates alone. Add to that price increases from manufactures etc and work it out for yourselves. Most dealers have swallowed a high % of this rise out of profits and many of you would be surprised at the profit margins being acheived in the current conditions.

 

With hope the £ might recover in the future, but at the moment things don't look too promising. Economists are predicting exchange rates against the Euro to be at about 1.25 - 1.3 by the end of this years 3rd quarter and to stabilise at that rate for some time. This still makes the UK expensive for anything that has involved the Euro.

 

Even UK manufactured equipment will suffer as most of the components used originate in the Eurozone.

 

Tough times for everyone!!!!

[michb]

Just in case anyone is muddying the waters with reference to component manufacture. I would just like to point out that Timberwolf is designed and manufactured in the UK, using as many British suppliers as we possibly can! ALL Timberwolf designed parts are manufactured in the UK.

 

As a result we have not suffered the price increase from Europe to any great extent and Timberwolf dealers are offering superb value deals on all models in the ranges.

 

Timberwolf - proud to be British and pleased to be selling chippers back to Europe for once!

[Mr Ed]

So does the Timberwolf have British built engine? British built Hydraulic components? British built bearings? Steel smelted in British foundry's?

[michb]

No Mr Ed, it does not – and nor does your long awaited chipper!

The same could be said for the majority of German chippers who do not fit German engines or hydraulic components etc; in fact you could say the same is true for almost all chippers built in the world apart from the USA where they can source all these components from their own country because they understand the importance of manufacture, the importance of self sufficiency and why it is better for a country to be an exporter rather than an importer!

 

We cannot source the parts you listed from the UK because successive Governments (and short sighted unions) since the 2nd world war have ensured that UK manufacturing has become almost extinct! The backbone of any strong country is its manufacturing base (USA, Japan, China etc) why is this? – Because manufacturing creates jobs and ensures the country receives the profit from the whole supply chain mechanism rather than just the interaction between importer and seller.

 

Timberwolf deals with approx. 40 British companies supplying us with over 2000 different parts. All of this contributes to GDP to a much greater extent than if we were just an importer of foreign machines dealing with one foreign manufacturer who in turn deals with 40 or so suppliers from their country and not ours!

 

So to answer your question – We are as British as we can be after 60 years of having the heart ripped out of our country!

 

Richard Marshall

[Mr Ed]

Richard, you miss my point, yet obliquely answer it. You are still affected by the rising price of the euro due to a lot of your parts having to be sourced in the eurozone - much like most other chipper manufacturers.

The same could be said for the majority of German chippers who do not fit German engines or hydraulic components

 

On the subject of succesive governments destroying British manufacturing, I wholeheartedly agree. We used to be respected for our engineering, and in some small niche markets (woodchippers anyone?) we still are. But any who do succeed do it against all odds, as the help from our government is non existant.

 

Btw, you might still be waiting a while to see my chipper, as chippers are a hobby for me. But its nice to know you care

[michb]

Mr Ed,

 

What Michelle was saying in the original post is that, in terms of component cost, 15% to 30% of the machine (depending on model) is impacted by the Euro, compared with 100% impact from anything built in Euro land (or USA) – therefore our machines have not been subjected to currency impact to anywhere near the degree of that from Johnny Foreigner! Our price list has remained stable since August 2008 and we have not looked to ‘profiteer’ from the currency situation. Timberwolf have always represented good value for money, but now our competitors are unable to use the strong pound to their advantage the price gap is clearly evident! That £5445 price increase that Mike talks about from Jan 2007 is not the Germans improving the machine and putting more metal into it etc – that’s the extra cost of just buying something from Europe. The smart money now buys British!

 

BTW A lot of successful businesses start out as ‘just a hobby’. What is now Timberwolf actually started out in a double garage next to the house. No condescension was intended in the ‘long awaited’ statement – very happy to have another British manufacturer banging the drum and giving people more opportunity to buy British rather than foreign goods! Just saying if you could produce it sooner rather than later your timing would be good with regard to foreign chipper pricing!

 

If you’re ever in the area, I’d be glad to show you round our facility and maybe give you some insight to some of the technical challenges we have had to overcome.

Best of luck.

 

Richard Marshall.

[josharb87]

how would we as a country be sitting financially in this recession if we hadnt joined the E.U??