SA online bike shops, Part 1: Chris Willemse Cycles

[Claudio]

There is much debate surrounding the reasons for purchasing a bike online. But are they all justified? I spoke to some of the main players of South Africa's growing online shopping community to find out how they started, why they did so and what some problems they encountered. I also asked about some of the typical concerns that customers would usually worry about, such as after market servicing and grey imports. This is Part 1 with Chris Willemse Jnr of Chris Willemse Cycles (CWC).

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[Tiny K]

HAHA! I had that happen to me - CWC Online sale but two guys (one being me) bought the last item at the same time. I got a different brand product, with similar spec, for the same price. Awesome service!

 

But I do see how separating the Online stock from the 'Physical' shop stock.

[rock]

but they were separate before and then merged the two which was great so you could browse the website and then walk in store an buy it for the same price, separating the two would be a step backwards right?

[cadenceblur]

interesting question - surely an online store should offer lower prices due to no overheads / staffing costs etc? So if priced the same - the online margin would be higher.

[Matt]

but they were separate before and then merged the two which was great so you could browse the website and then walk in store an buy it for the same price, separating the two would be a step backwards right?

 

From what I understood from Chris it would not necessarily mean a change to products / pricing between the physical and online. Rather a separation of the stock to a warehouse to enable better stock control for the online store. This way if the online store shows 10 in stock there are 10 available to be shipped, not 9 plus one that's floating around the shop in someone's basket.

[Claudio]

interesting question - surely an online store should offer lower prices due to no overheads / staffing costs etc? So if priced the same - the online margin would be higher.

Good point, it's actually addressed in a later part of the series.

[rock]

ok, so they get 200 ESI chunky grips (for example) and they do an internal sale of 20 to Greenpoint, and 50 to Bellville and the remaining 130 go into 'online' stock.....

 

as long as it doesn't allow them to push up the prices at their brick and mortar store......

 

was probably easier to control when it was only bellville,

 

they'll get it right I'm sure.....

 

cool feature Admin

 

Edit: Claudio :thumbup:

Edited November 18, 2013 by rock

[Matt]

...

cool feature Admin

 

Thanks rock, Claudio's the man to thank though. Keep a look out for the 3 parts to follow in the series on other local online stores.

[Sportsworld.co.za]

Funny enough, we are experiencing the exact same issue at the minute. SA distributors seem to have their own view of the world. We took the decision to be purely online so we could escape the issue of landlords, staff labour laws, opening times in malls, rent increases year on year, theft, burglary etc etc etc, the list goes on.

 

Having contacted a number of SA distributors for very common cycling products we were told:

 

"no, we don't supply online stores if they don't have a physical shop as well"

"oh you have an unfair advantage because you don't have to pay rent"

"yea, we have a problem with online (even though their own business is online only)"

 

Being online isn't easy in SA as a lot of people still want to visit a 'traditional' store, unlike a lot of europe where it's just accepted but hopefully it's changing slowly but surely.

 

So I can understand what CHris Jnr is talking about completely.

[rock]

Thanks rock, Claudio's the man to thank though. Keep a look out for the 3 parts to follow in the series on other local online stores.

 

my bad......thanks Claudio.

 

speaking of local online stores, anyone remember iCycling?

[Claudio]

my bad......thanks Claudio.

 

speaking of local online stores, anyone remember iCycling?

no worries, thanks to you too.

[Dubber]

Funny enough, we are experiencing the exact same issue at the minute. SA distributors seem to have their own view of the world. We took the decision to be purely online so we could escape the issue of landlords, staff labour laws, opening times in malls, rent increases year on year, theft, burglary etc etc etc, the list goes on.

 

Having contacted a number of SA distributors for very common cycling products we were told:

 

"no, we don't supply online stores if they don't have a physical shop as well"

"oh you have an unfair advantage because you don't have to pay rent"

"yea, we have a problem with online (even though their own business is online only)"

 

Being online isn't easy in SA as a lot of people still want to visit a 'traditional' store, unlike a lot of europe where it's just accepted but hopefully it's changing slowly but surely.

 

So I can understand what CHris Jnr is talking about completely.

 

This applies to any retailer. The main reason being that the Big Boys (Makro, Game, Shoprite etc) will refuse to sell your product if you are supplying to online stores (Takealot, Kalahari etc).

They know that the online model is cheaper - despite their huge buying power. So their only solution is to bully the wholesale suppliers into not selling to online stores.

 

I imagine the same applies to the cycling industry...

[FondyMig]

The one thing I would change if that were my business, is the payment system. In this day and age you need to have an online payment system. EFT for an online purchases is no-go. This will eliminate many of the issues being experienced on the CWC site.