Ewing Irrigation

[Mike Leary]

Originally Posted by 1idejim

No matter where you go you will be priced in accordance to the amount of business you do with the supplier and your attitude toward the staff.

Yup, true. I used to shop (and pimp) the three suppliers up north until one of them said, "I'll meet or beat their prices, and I'll personally deliver daily." I was with them for twenty years.

[SoCalLandscapeMgmt]

I've been buying from Ewing pretty much exclusively for almost 25 years now. They take excellent care of us and they take care of us on the pricing. From time to time I have to purchase product from other suppliers and the service is never as good. That said I think it also comes down to the indivuidual branch manager. We've had the same manager at our local branch since it opened in the late 80's.

[irrig8r]

I buy mostly from 2 distributors. One is a single location that I've done business with him since the previous owner, maybe since 1985.

The other one, Ewing, got my attention via some aggressive marketing from Hunter in the early 90s. They were the first to carry FX Luminaire too, and so I buy any of those products from them, along with lots of drip supplies and boxes of fittings.

The other one has better Rain Bird and Vista pricing, and has carried Nightscaping since the 70s.

I think I've been buying more from Ewing since they moved to about a block away from the other one.

[grassman177]

i love ewing, always great.

[DanaMac]

I went to my local Ewing store today just to shoot the breeze with the guys there. If you have an off season, I highly recommend going in to your supplier while they are not too busy, and just hang out for a while and chat with them. Get to know them, let them know you, both professionally, and personally. You will both benefit, and learn from each other.

One of my employees met me there today and we just talked about different things for an hour and a half. The store manager has been in the biz a long time, starting back in Cali.
We discussed:
Locators - 521, 521A, Armada 800, and 1eyedjim I talked to them about the TDR.
Classes they will host. My employee that was there wants to learn about pumps and wells. Lo-and-behold they are putting on a pump class Jan 30, but hadn't announced it yet. I am attending their marketing seminar next week.
We discussed me getting the Hindsite software, and once I get up and ready I will demonstrate to them how it works.
Talking about Hindsite got them thinking as well. They showed me the new Ewing app for the smartphones http://ewing1.com/general/ews_srv_mobileapp.htm It has calculators for precipitation rates, run times, voltage drop and fertilizer application rates. It has a calculator to help measure square footage, conversion tables for length, volume, weight, area, temperature, etc. Already downloaded to my phone.

Still, it all comes down to the actual people working there, and I feel our local staff are incredible at helping us.

[Duekster]

Originally Posted by DanaMac

I went to my local Ewing store today just to shoot the breeze with the guys there. If you have an off season, I highly recommend going in to your supplier while they are not too busy, and just hang out for a while and chat with them. Get to know them, let them know you, both professionally, and personally. You will both benefit, and learn from each other.

One of my employees met me there today and we just talked about different things for an hour and a half. The store manager has been in the biz a long time, starting back in Cali.
We discussed:
Locators - 521, 521A, Armada 800, and 1eyedjim I talked to them about the TDR.
Classes they will host. My employee that was there wants to learn about pumps and wells. Lo-and-behold they are putting on a pump class Jan 30, but hadn't announced it yet. I am attending their marketing seminar next week.
We discussed me getting the Hindsite software, and once I get up and ready I will demonstrate to them how it works.
Talking about Hindsite got them thinking as well. They showed me the new Ewing app for the smartphones http://ewing1.com/general/ews_srv_mobileapp.htm It has calculators for precipitation rates, run times, voltage drop and fertilizer application rates. It has a calculator to help measure square footage, conversion tables for length, volume, weight, area, temperature, etc. Already downloaded to my phone.

Still, it all comes down to the actual people working there, and I feel our local staff are incredible at helping us.

Did you get some peanuts too.

[Stuttering Stan]

Downloaded the app. Thanks Dana.

[irrig8r]

The app isn't compatible with my Nexus 7, running Android 4.2. I have it on my Droid X phone though, running Android 2.3.4

[SoCalLandscapeMgmt]

The only thing that Ewing does that irks me is the $.48 "inbound freight surcharge" that they put on every invoice. Just call it what it really is.... "a bullshit because we can get away with it charge". LOL... I'm entering bills right now and it's a pain in the ass when I'm recieving inventory into the system because I have to keep switching between tabs to book the $.48 as an expense rather than as inventory.

So if one of the York's is paying attention... find some other way to fuel the corporate jet.

[DanaMac]

Originally Posted by SoCalLandscapeMgmt

The only thing that Ewing does that irks me is the $.48 "inbound freight surcharge" that they put on every invoice. Just call it what it really is.... "a bullshit because we can get away with it charge". LOL... I'm entering bills right now and it's a pain in the ass when I'm recieving inventory into the system because I have to keep switching between tabs to book the $.48 as an expense rather than as inventory.

So if one of the York's is paying attention... find some other way to fuel the corporate jet.

Yeah, that irritates me as well. I don't enter inventory into QB though, so it's not a big deal for myself. I'm sure if you're a big enough buyer, with enough pull, they would waive it. I'm not fighting it, but would rather they just add a penny for the top 10-20 items in their stock instead.

I'm going to one of their seminars tomorrow. Marketing Tactics for Green Industry Professionals. I would like for Ewing to do more business seminars like this to go along with their field/troubleshooting/product type seminars. Too many of the guys in this industry do not know the business end of things, and that is how they fail. They don't know how to price jobs, don't know daily, weekly, monthly or yearly costs, don't know how to market properly, and they don't know when to say NO to a job. Many folks, myself included, got into owning their business by branching out when the opportunity came up, but don't know squat about business, and they don't take the time to learn. They think - money comes in, money goes out, any left over and I am good.