Hornbytradeinfo - A request to retailers customers

[Mike at C&M]

Retailers received an e-mail from Hornby last night which contained the following:

Trade Info Site

For those customers who use the Trade Info Site, this link will be removed in the next few days in anticipation of a new portal being made available towards the end of this year. However should you look at the site, the data and information is no longer current as it is not connected to our live system.

 

This now means that retailers no longer have access to information such as release dates and whether an item is available for them to order from stock, without contacting Hornby HQ. [Note that much of the northern half of the UK doesn't appear to have a Hornby rep. at present].

   Information from the trade website has proved invaluable for retailers, and will be a great miss. The e-mail does state that Hornby anticipate having a new system in place by the end of the year.

 

So on behalf of all the Hornby retailers, I make the following plea to you.

 

We now have no additional information immediately to hand that you can't find on the internet yourself. So please do not get frustrated or annoyed when a shop keeper tells you that he/she is unable to provide you with information you might want, such as availability or release dates.

 

We thank you for your understanding.

[Talltim]

Why get rid of the old system before releasing the new system

[Andy Y]

[Black 5 Bear]

Call me a cynic, but is this because Hornby have no real idea of when the items they have announced are due in stock ???? 

Seems very much a retrograde step which doesn't help the retailers.....

[Vistisen]

Why get rid of the old system before releasing the new system

Yes who would fase out a much used system when  it's replacement is not really ready? ( cough... bay and sell)

[andyman7]

It's fairly obvious to me that Hornby are undergoing some fairly massive changes, what with the move of distribution to Canterbury, admin to Sandwich, the Visitor Centre to Ramsgate, the move of the company to the AIM etc.

There is plenty of evidence of improvements coming through - it's not all 'jam tomorrow', so hopefully the new system will be better for retailers. It's good to have the heads up, but I really hope this doesn't become another thread for armchair budding company executives to bang on about what's wrong with Hornby and how they would do it better 

[Mike at C&M]

The intention of the original post is make customers aware that retailers no longer have the information available that was previously available to them, and to act accordingly. This is something currently beyond the retailers control.

[Gwiwer]

I'm really not sure what Hornby are doing. 

 

They seem hell-bent on cutting the retailer out of the equation one way and another.  They are far more than just model trains but their business depends upon brand strength and credibility.  It relies upon being on the tips of tongues and seen in every High Street, Smithdown Road or Trelowarren Street.

 

Fair enough if there's nothing new to say but it would still make sense to me to maintain a link even if it's in an updated format rather than create a hiatus from which there may be no recovery.

[The Stationmaster]

By chance while in one of my 'local  (it's only an hour away) modelshops yesterday the Hornby rep happened to be in and was explaining that the new system should become operational in December - not that I heard the existing one is being dumped much earlier. The rep, who seemed quite a decent chap and not some sort of sales clone, reckoned the new system would be much better but as it is nearly 6 months away that might well have just been a repeat of the developer's talk.  Judging by what I witnessed it seems that even checking stocks via the rep - or the rep checking them by 'phone himself - could be a bit flaky on the present system so perhaps it might not be working as well as it ought following various relocations?

 

Equally I do wonder just how well Hornby's ordering system will work if retailers cannot readily ascertain information via the internet link?  Information about release dates is - in my view - a minor matter and is in any case such a shifting ground as to be hardly worth taking notice of but the important area is surely ordering and knowing what is there, or will be there at some time, to order.  Dates obviously help the planning of cash flow but the existing situation of what still seem to be 'patchy' release date information is probably no more helpful?

 

But standing that aside it does seem odd - or bad planning(?) - that the existing system is being taken down before the new one is ready.  However this does seem to be the sort of thing which happens with 'whizz-kid planning' nowadays, even our local hospital will be without beds for 6 months while the changeover is made to the new buildings!

[AGR Model Store]

From one shop to another Thank you!

 

Also if you haven't had any invoices as-well, it is to do with the new system

[black and decker boy]

Presumably this is reflective of Hornby outsourcing their logistics operation and finding that the two IT systems are incompatible thus the current Hornby one either needs manually updating (probably no staff to do this) or retailers given access to their third party contractors IT (which they probably will not allow). Turning it off makes sense though not having a replacement is bonkers - does this system also include placing of orders or is it just a fact finding site (prices, stock levels and release dates)?

[Matabiau]

It may just be a timing problem. Given Hornby have recently changed their consumer internet interface it wouln't be a surprise that they should similarly be changing their retailer interface. As such, they will have terminated one contract and issued another, probably to a different supplier. Given how prone to delay many IT systems are it wouldn't be a surprise that the new one isn't ready yet and the old one has expired. It is also possible that the first supplier has closed and Hornby have had to commission another in a bit of a hurry. Lots of conjecture but nothing sinister, I suspect.

[edcayton]

Is it just Hornby though? Do you know when you will be getting new Bachmann, DJM or Dapol models?

 

Ed

[Mike at C&M]

One thing you learn very quickly behind the counter is that every company works in a different way.

 

Bachmann: www.Bachmann.co.uk is the usual point of reference. When a release gets close or arrives, our rep. keeps us informed by e-mail or word of mouth during a shop visit.

 

Dapol:  At the start of every calendar month, a list arrives of what is expected over the next couple of months. This will over-run slightly into the 3rd month. Long term information is not generally available

 

Heljan: Regular trade e-mails come with an order form which contains expected delivery dates.

 

DJM:  As yet, no system is in place are no general release have been made. However, I have no doubt that Dave will learn from other peoples failings and give us a steady supply of information, either direct to the trade or via RMWeb.

 

Peco and Gaugemaster keep us up to date with new release information via e-mail

 

All companies: When an item is reviewed across all the magazines, then it can be assumed that it will be available in the next few weeks

[jjb1970]

I'm not really worried about the delivery info etc as I stopped taking delivery schedules seriously many years ago and consider them to be expressions of hope rather than any real indication of when stuff will arrive. What I consider important is the ordering system, if I pre-order a model from a dealer then I think it is reasonable to expect that if the manufacturer accepts the pre-order then it means the model is not sold out and they will honour the pre-order. If the model is already sold out then that should be passed back to the retailer so the customer can be advised and have a look around other dealers to see if any have orders still up for grabs. In the past there have been plenty of examples of pre-orders not being honoured by manufacturers because they have not kept on top of their order system. That is a much bigger failure than problems with delivery slippage I think.

[ruggedpeak]

Whilst not ideal personally I see it as potentially see it as a positive thing longer term if Hornby are getting their act together. I don't think they are cutting retailers out, but are (I assume...) moving to a new platform that could provide both retailer and direct consumer with the info they need.

 

As a victim of corporate It systems I am sick to the back teeth of new systems being rolled out to find they are 1) pants 2) worse than what they replaced. 6 months should give them time to come up with something that works properly, and once implemented everyone will hopefully be happy. Remember this presumably is part of the much bigger and wider changes referred to above - a major turnaround project company. Something that works well in December is infinitely preferable to some tosh rushed out to meet an arbitrary switchover deadline.

[PCW]

From what info I can obtain talking to a couple of people I think Hornby have just gone live with a  new 'back end' system for all the stock control to do with the ordering from Hornby.com and the dispatch from wherever it gets sent out these days. Lets hope this system gets settled in nicely. I think the old system for retailers is beings switched off because it is no longer connected to the 'live' stock control system and is actually displaying the last outdated stock position before it was superseded by the new system. What I hope will be released when they get round to it will be a system for retailers to not only see live stock info but also to be able to order it via a trade section of the website.

 

The million dollar question is will Hornby then allow access for retailers to all their stock on a first come firsts served basis along with customers who are buying direct,  or will Hornby continue to ring-fence stock for their own direct sales and thus keep retailers hungry when they only get fed the crumbs of stock shortly before having the rug pulled out from under them on price!