RickM Z06

They are a site sponsor and me being fairly new here, not sure it would be cool to name them.
But I do have a question. What is the opposite of 'bottom'?
RickM

Tranz Zam

Ahh, I see.

I'm of the opinion that just because a company is a sponsor, that shouldn't absolve them of any criticism.

orourke

Ecklers. Gone are the days of the smell of fiberglass resin when you drove into the parking lot.

Redvette2

I have had good luck with Corvette Pacifica. Here on the west coast of the US only a few hundred miles away from me. They also make many parts for Corvettes that other vendors sell (EC Products Design). You may want to check if they can ship to Europe. https://www.corvettepacifica.com/

gbvette62

The above appeared to be the problem that brought the end to the Eckler's we'd all dealt with for 40+ years.

It started just about two years ago, where their website showed things in stock, but they weren't, or the sales person would give a shipping date that wasn't accurate. They'd take payment but never ship the item(s). It appeared what they were doing was taking payment from one person and using it to pay for someone else's backorder. From what I was told, eventually they fell so far behind that the suppliers all started cutting them off and they couldn't fill those back orders. That's probably what Lectric Limited was alluding to.

As a wholesale customer, I had an assigned sales person and a direct line to call, which was great because I had someone who was familiar with me and stayed on top of my orders. About two years ago they started having a lot of turn over in sales and some of the new people were real con artists. They'd grab any incoming call and lied about the availability of my rep, I guess so they could grab the sale (and commission). My rep would give me an honest reply about availability, while the new people would tell you whatever they thought you wanted to hear.

I don't know if it was COVID, mismanagement, or just bad luck, but it was a shame to watch what was a good company quickly deteriorate.

You hate to see any Corvette vendor go away, and Eckler's had some of the best prices and lowest freight charges (especially from a wholesale basis), but at least there are other options for Corvette parts. As far as I'm concerned, what really hurts is what all of this did to some of their other companies like Rick's Camaro's, The El Camino Store, Mac's Ford, Late Great Chevy's etc. I don't know what all this is going to do to these companies going forward, but I thought Rick's was the best Camaro company, and The El Camino Store and Chevy Late Greats were both super parts sources, for me anyway.

GTR1999

Unfortunately, this is all too common. There was a conman here for years clipping many guys with "custom" differential, TA, etc work. I'll call him Johnny Liar, seems appropriate. He was very good at ripping people off and if caught would blame it on someone else. A few guys here got trimmed hard, which in turn throws a bad light on honest workers who work hard at their business. Buyers beware and do your homework.

kenba

All of the people that started these companies are about my age 79. Some had family in the business but some big company offers a lot of money to buy them out now its not about good products at reasonable prices but them making the most money they can before they run the business in the ground.SAD.Remember when all the guys used to come to BG in a pick up when repo items were just starting to be produced because we could not find any good used parts.

gbvette62

I was little surprised by Central because Jerry had a son involved in the business, who I think had been involved in most of the day to day business anymore anyway. Paragon on the other hand didn't surprise me at all. When one of the partners passed away it put quite a burden on the surviving one. On top of that, the widow of the first partner wanted out of the business.

When Rich of Long Island Corvette passed away, it didn't seem like Kim had much interest in keeping her father's business going, but then considering how nasty she could be maybe she wasn't interested in the business from the start?

In the case of Eckler's, Ralph got out of the business years ago. I think it's had three owners since he sold out. The founder of Corvette America (AKA Auto Accessories & Top Flight) had a personal loss years ago which I believe led to him selling, and Corvette America having two or three owners since then too. The one thing all of these companies (and Zip too) have in common is that they were all owned by individuals before, but are now all part of large conglomerates.

Some of the Corvette companies are still individually owned. Some are still owned by the founders, while others are owned by individuals that bought them from the founder(s), but their numbers are dwindling. I'm guessing that eventually most of the other businesses in the hobby will be gobbled up, or fade away as their owners get older. At least one of the well known, surviving Corvette companies has been "available" for a few years, at what I'm guessing may be an unrealistic number.

A pick up truck(?), that was big time, a friend of mine and I sold parts in the 70's at Carlisle, out of the back of his wife's Caprice wagon.

Gary, that's probably why I never got bigger (or richer ).

loup68

I worked in maintenance for 34 years at the original Modern Tool & Die company in Parma (Cleveland), Ohio until they closed my plant. We made all of the Corvette radiator supports from c1-c-3's and other Corvette parts. We made a bunch of C-4 parts. I knew the original two owners and then the one owner's son when they retired.
I was shocked that Stanley, Black and Decker first bought 25% of the company and then bought the whole thing.
MTD inc was one of the largest family held companies in America. They have plants overseas, also. Obviously the grand children did not want to work hard anymore. Lou.

vettebuyer6369

if you have something to say, such as reporting a problematic transaction, then say so in a factual thread in the Transaction Feeback section, rather than post vague references in another person’s thread. It’s not clever.


Sponsors are not absolved of criticism any more than any other seller. As long as the transaction complaint is in the right section (see above) and not interfering in a sales thread or elsewhere outside that section.