Rip Off Britain ???

[Nightwing]

Tica is making a very good reel. Our "house" reel where I work is made by Tica, and is every bit the quality of Shimano at a good 1/3 less per equivelent features. Tica has been selling under their own name here in the States for about 10 years, and is recently quickly gaining market share from Shimano and Daiwa. Okuma is also making waves, even more than Tica so far.

BTW, you all have been buying and using Tica reels for years already, you just didn't know it.

[Ron Clay]

If there is any ripping off being done in the UK it's by the middle men if you ask me.

 

When I lived in South Africa I purchased all my tackle from a large wholesaler in Joburg who imported directly from the factories in the far east and elswhere.

 

Shimano reels were less than 1/2 the price you would pay in UK. Not only that, Maxima line cost less than £1 for a 100 m spool.

[G. Reaper]

Could we get some sort of explanation from the tackle trade on why we, in the UK, are paying so much more than others.

Also, could the trade umbrella group (ATA) get something rolling to get us more reasonable prices?

 

Ray Farrell

[davidP]

I'd guess we get charged such high rates because people will pay them! I always thought that Silstar were a bit of a trailblazer on prices, they seemed to make the established companies sit up and take notice, but eventually they seemed to lose the plot and push their prices up to match the others (and still went bust anyway!). More recently I've always considered Masterline products to in general be extremely good value (all things are relative of course), and in the last year or so there does seem to have been an influx of companies offering extremely good value for money. Okuma is a good example, Ron Thompson, Badger etc etc. They may not be the absolute highest quality but then you'd always expect to pay for that anyway.

Perhaps we're finally starting to see the availability of information over the internet having an effect however.

[Colin Brett]

I'm not trying to make excuses for the tackle trade, but before you criticise too much, just ask yourself "how much do you think the shops and warehouses pay in rent and rates?". How much solicitors charge to draw up a contract etc. We are all being held hostage landlords, solicitors and the like.

Colin

[Colin Brett]

Colin Brett:

I'm not trying to make excuses for the tackle trade, but before you criticise too much, just ask yourself "how much do you think the shops and warehouses pay in rent and rates?". How much solicitors charge to draw up a contract etc. We are all being held hostage landlords, solicitors and the like.

Colin

Sorry missed out the "by"

 

I'm not trying to make excuses for the tackle trade, but before you criticise too much, just ask yourself "how much do you think the shops and warehouses pay in rent and rates?". How much solicitors charge to draw up a contract etc. We are all being held hostage by landlords, solicitors and the like.

Colin

[Zinky]

If you ask the Tackle shop owners most will tell you that they have been held to ransom by the Big Guns of the Angling World for many a year but we can not mention names or I will be in deep Sh*t with Elton again.

Okuma look as if they are drifting away from the angling cartell lets hope others follow.

[davidP]

The point about the cost of shops etc is a valid one, but I feel the basic problem is the high wholesale price rather than the retail markup. There is one other aspect of the UK market however - the rediculous RRP marked on many items (recommended retail price for our US friends just in case they've never heard the phrase). Look at the magazines. Can you find a rod or reel outside the extreme top end or specialist market being sold for it's RRP?? What's the point of giving a rod an RRP of £200 if its never actually intended to sell it for that price? It's because we as anglers expect discount. They'll sell more rods for £150 if it has an RRP of £200 and is seen to be discounted by £50, as opposed to them actually having an RRP of £150 for the same rod and selling it for £150.

The problem is however that people will think of it as a £200 rod as opposed to a £150 rod and thus don't act too surprised when the next one is £250 marked down to £200. We get conditioned to high prices.

 

As an example I give you a certain large mail order tackle shop in the West Midlands. They regularly advertise their own range of rod and poles in the magazines and every one is discounted by huge percentages under the RRP. Yet I've never actually seen those items advertised at anything other than the discounted price. Even the brand new models are immediately shown with an RRP twice the price they're selling them for. It's pretty obvious that it was never intended to sell them for the RRP price - it's merely a marketing ploy to make tight arsed anglers think they're getting a better deal than they actually are.

[Nightwing]

David, the RRP(MSRP here in the States), is a universal thing.

The manufacture or importer puts a rather high price in their catalog, but the actual retail price is generaly much lower. So that at least is not exclusive to the U.K.

Here in the States at least, no one takes the MSRP seriously, everyone knows that the actual price will be much lower, often by a third or more!