I recently was given a referral to bid on windows for a 42,000 square foor monestary in Virginia. My window distributor spent the last 4 months working with contruction company on pricing,drawings and procedures for installation. All other major window manufacturers were eliminated because they could not, or would not work the builder to supply many standard windows, but about 200 windows with stained glass. Just before the the bid was awarded, the builder contacted another distributor in Canada for the same brand window. They gave them a better price because they did not have to do all the research to get to this point. When my distributor called the window manufacturer they would not stand by them. As far as they are concerned they will get the sale anyway. The value of this contact is $280,000.00 US. Any ideas on how to approach this dilema.
John
Replies
John who are "YOU".
You don't seem to be the distributor or the builder or the owner the way that you described this. But yet you said that you bid on these.
I am not clear what your roll is in this.
Bill,
I am a distributor for a Canadian company that manufacturers EPS wall panels. I am located ourside of Philadelphia, but have shipped crom Bismarck, ND to Maine and as far south as Dayton, Ohio. I also have a working agreement with another Canadian distributor to supply me with windows for my projects. One of the builders I am working with gave me the lead for this 42,000 square foot Monestery in Virginia,so I put them in touch with my distributor. I would be receiving a percentage of the complete project valued at $280,000.00 US. The window distributor spent about 50 man hours putting the quotes together along with correcting errors on the blueprints.
John
John, contact me! I am a distributor for a Canadian vindow company and they would love to deal with you direct. [email protected]
Maybe the builder is cheap and you are better off without the job. How much less is the other bid?
Another day, another tool.
this is a standard problem, for example in the environmental cleanup field.
One company does all the work, presents a job scope, lists all the possible problems etc, suggests better way to do it, etc
then the customer takes that work scope and "shops" it to othersasking "hey can you do this for 10% less?
its all about relationships with the customer
what the fix is i don't know.
they are jerking you around
Wain,
I understand going out looking for the best price, but the parent company should have told the second distributor to back off on bidding the project, and support my distributor. It is not every day a project comes along for a Monestary, so they should have recognized that. We had a telecon yesterday and are still trying to get to botton of this and get the contract. Stay tuned.
John