Quote:
Originally Posted by MortonH
I noticed a while back that Bintel had dropped the prices on many/most of their own brand GSO gear to match or sometimes even undercut Andrews. I don't know what proportion of their sales are attributed to "standard" gear like GSO & Skywatcher. Unlike Andrews they also sell high end stuff like Tele Vue, Swarovski etc.
Yet if competing with Andrews was a factor you have to wonder about the likes of Sirius optics. No website for months due to the change in ownership and now that it's up again, I see so many prices that are so high. I suspect the only shops that will survive will be large volume discount stores (e.g. Andrews) or stores that have exclusive rights to certain brands (e.g. Bintel with Tele Vue, MyAstroShop with Vixen, etc).
I might have to help Bintel out by buying another DeLite from them.
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The US exchange rate has been brutal on many importers, it's putting 20% to 30% increase in costs. A year ago it was near parity.
Still, I didn't expect this coming from Bintel...
as a fellow retailer it's very upsetting to hear about someone so established and respected on the market to have to close down a major storefront. The Orion prices on the old Sirius Optics website had not been updated for years and was actually *below* cost to fulfill website orders so we had to take it down and start from scratch. I don't know if this affected other shops trying to match those crazy prices but I'm not surprised if it's spoiled the market for everyone already.
Skywatcher have raised their prices too. Even Chinese suppliers deal with US dollars so those prices have gone up too.
It's not turning out to be a good year to be a telescope retailer, but let's hope we'll all be able hang in there until the exchange rate improves and dealers lower their prices.
Fingers crossed for Bintel... hopefully reducing overheads will help.