FestoolRecon.com coming VERY soon (US)

[Cochese]

I've been very pleased with the new format, but you could tweak it to notify people what it will be beforehand, and do it at the same time each day. Otherwise what you are doing is fine. I've gotten every email, and the days I've been active in looking at it had the opportunity to purchase every tool.
Not Festool's fault demand for the tools is high.

 

[rljatl]

I have been receiving the email notifications, but did not get the email for the RO150. 

Are there any left?  Can someone provide the link?

 

[bijeshj]

I have been receiving the email notifications, but did not get the email for the RO150. 

Are there any left?  Can someone provide the link?

I get that emails randomly go to the inbox or junk folder.

 

[semenza]

Seth - I'm guessing most people don't bite on extended warranties costing 25% of acquisition cost. I bet there are published figures what the threshold is.  It's also common knowledge that extended warranties represent a sizable profit center for those pedaling them.  Which leads the smart money to conclude......................

Some times those CL and fleabay sales are for significantly more than a 25% discount. That's not a bad deal.  Sometimes they're for almost current retail - which astounds me.

FF - I thought this sale wasn't open to our friends north of the boarder ?

Exactly. Which means if someone is viewing it mostly from a warranty stand point, the discount is a good deal. The additional warranty is not worth as much as the discount. Of course the warranty value is not the only factor.

Each buyer has a set of valuations on various aspects of the purchase. And each will make a decision accordingly. I am just pointing out that if warranty is a major factor there are aspects of that to consider.

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I am betting that the methodology of the recon sale will get tweaked to function better.

Seth

 

[TylerC]

On the Canadian purchase issue, we will NOT ship recon tools to Canada. The purchase in question was purchased by a Canadian but shipped to a US address. Just wanted to clarify.

 

[antss]

Seth - I'm guessing most people don't bite on extended warranties costing 25% of acquisition cost. I bet there are published figures what the threshold is.  It's also common knowledge that extended warranties represent a sizable profit center for those pedaling them.  Which leads the smart money to conclude......................

Some times those CL and fleabay sales are for significantly more than a 25% discount. That's not a bad deal.  Sometimes they're for almost current retail - which astounds me.

FF - I thought this sale wasn't open to our friends north of the boarder ?

Exactly. Which means if someone is viewing it mostly from a warranty stand point, the discount is a good deal. The additional warranty is not worth as much as the discount. Of course the warranty value is not the only factor.

Each buyer has a set of valuations on various aspects of the purchase. And each will make a decision accordingly. I am just pointing out that if warranty is a major factor there are aspects of that to consider.

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I am betting that the methodology of the recon sale will get tweaked to function better.

Seth

Please don't take this the wrong way -  spoken just like a company man.
That's looking at it through rose colored glasses and condoning the idiocy of people buying used stuff for full retail.  caveat emptor - is such a company line cliche.

In your scenario, these handful of purchasers (the chosen ones) have declined the "extended warranty" saving 25% and not had the aggravation of being asked three times to purchase it.  Freedom of choice is great, in this case.

But, what does this have to say for the rest of us, the everyday prices and how the company views us ?

It means we are being forced to underwrite the extended warranty whether we want it or not.  And that part of the marketing spiel,  namely " these tools are great - we stand behind them with a 3 year warranty"  is subterfuge.  We're paying for FT's insurance policy covering that their tools are of no higher quality than other manufacturers- and at a HUGE cost.  And not given a choice to decline the coverage.  No choice is not good.

In addition these lucky few might just be getting a "used" tool at the real full price .  FT doesn't guarantee what kind of cosmetic condition your tool will come in.  - Making it pretty much the same situation as the CL & fleabay full price buyers I mentioned earlier.

But at the end of the day some buyers will only purchase an item if it's "on sale". Hence the three year old domino sales of $10 less than new ones on ebay and ts55's selling for 20% more than new seven years later. 

Despite outward appearances to the contrary - I think FT's marketing team are pure geniuses .

*********************
Tyler - Way to get out ahead of the Canadian sales issue that crept up yesterday.

 

[semenza]

[member=727]antss[/member]  I am not looking for some great socioeconomic debate on peoples tool buying decisions. I was merely making a point about taking the value of the warranty into account compared to the discount when someone is considering a recon tool purchase. Since that factor had been mentioned by several others as an important thing to consider. There are other factors involved in the decision to purchase new, recon, or used. I in no way said that people purchasing new are idiots.

Seth

 

[antss]

I wasn't implying you were calling anyone an idiot. 

We'll just disagree ( or not) that a 2 year,  25% insurance policy/warranty is not a good financial value on a festool or anything else. 

That was my main point.

 

[luke duke]

It means we are being forced to underwrite the extended warranty whether we want it or not.

Who's forcing you? Did a German fly over and put a gun to your head and demand that you buy Festool? If you don't like the way that Festool does business, spend your money elsewhere. If enough people stop buying their products, Festool will change their business practices.

Most of the people complaining on this thread are acting like Mr. Festool walked in your house, kicked your dog and then ran off with your wife. None of you are any worse off now than you were a week ago before the sale. The exact same number of people have benefited from this sale that would have benefited from the sale if it were held under the old format. You're just POed that it wasn't you.

 

[Cheese]

Most of the people complaining on this thread are acting like Mr. Festool walked in your house, kicked your dog and then ran off with your wife. None of you are any worse off now than you were a week ago before the sale. The exact same number of people have benefited from this sale that would have benefited from the sale if it were held under the old format. You're just POed that it wasn't you.

You don’t know that...that’s purely speculation on your part. I’ve already acknowledged that from my perspective, I was better off under the old rules and regulations.

I’m POed not because of the results of the sales, but rather because the original Festool statement of streamlining the process for both the retailers and the purchasers never came to fruition. This current process is 2-3 times more frustrating and cumbersome than the original method was. At this point I could care less...as I stated last night, I’ll just use the funds I’ve stashed away for the Festool sale to purchase items from Mafell instead.

Purchasing angst relieved...

 

[ScoFF]

You don't sound like your angst is relieved, you still seem agitated just like your dog got kicked and they ran off with the soccer star.
Wow.  Is this a woodworking forum?

 

[semenza]

How about we ease up a bit with the jabs. There are some actual problems with the function of the sale. That seems to be the crux of most of the complaints.  And I still am hoping that the function of the sale may get adjusted to work better.

Seth

 

[semenza]

  The exact same number of people have benefited from this sale that would have benefited from the sale if it were held under the old format.

You don’t know that...that’s purely speculation on your part. I’ve already acknowledged that from my perspective, I was better off under the old rules and regulations.

I am thinking that luke dukes statement there is probably pretty accurate considering that there were a limited number of tools put up for sale and they all sold.

Seth

 

[amt]

For those not happy with the recon sale, especially if you are having to pay sales tax, I would suggest getting an account on freeshipping.com, and get 10% rebate on Festool 100% of the time.  If you are paying tax with the recon, then (in my case) the discount is 17%, and a reduced warranty and no returns.  With freeshipping.com, I save 10% with a brand spanking new tool, with a 30-day return and 3-year warranty.  And occasionally freeshipping runs 20% rebates (like black Friday).  Last year I ordered a OF2200 router and saved almost $200.  You could save almost $300 on a Kapex with 20% special.  The only disadvantage I see is that there's only 1 retailer via freeshipping.com that sells Festool (starts with an A and ends with ME), and the rebates are paid quarterly.  And since this is a rebate and the products are still sold at 100% of MSRP, Festool should not be able to stop this discount -this is really no different than a 1% cash back credit card.  Freeshipping also costs $12/month, but I also use them for my Home Depot and Lowes purchases (buy online and "pick up in store") and the 10% savings from the things I buy from them anyway pays for the $12/month cost).

 

[Michael Kellough]

Festool wanted to change the way it sold refurbished machines to reduce the load on dealers and that worked 100%. But they said they thought buyers would like the change and that didn't work very well (except for the people who bought the limited supply of tools).

I have received all the notices in a timely manner but the only tool I wanted I missed due to being out of range. If I had know what tool would drop when I might be a happy camper. So my suggestion is simple and it should be easy to implement too.

Festool knows what tools it wants to unload.

1. Post the list of tools to be sold
2. Post the day and time each tool will become available

 

[amt]

Perhaps a simple but small change could be to have Festool text you when the deal comes up.  You should get a text in under a minute.  For those who have crappy email service, this could level the playing field.

In all these cases, you are still "racing" against other customers who want what you want, so there will always be losers.  Only other alternative I see is a eeee-bay auction, which will drive the prices up.  So, in the end, it's either you race and win or lose, or you pay the market rate for a used tool.

 

[SonOfMI]

Perhaps a simple but small change could be to have Festool text you when the deal comes up.  You should get a text in under a minute.

Technically this may be a possibility already. Use your 10 digit cell phone and look up your cell phone service provider's email domain online. If you use AT&T, it would end up being 7705551234@txt.att.net. If you use Verizon it's 7705551234@vtext.com.

This works to send messages from email servers to your cell phone via SMS. This works reliably and is something I used to take advantage of all the time back in my software engineering days before the advent of email apps on smart phones. You are limited to 160 characters per SMS message, but that should be enough to see it's from Festool. Longer messages get chopped up. You then would open the recon sale web page to see what tool is posted. Has anyone tried using SMS email for this sale? If you're having issues with delivery of notifications it might be worth your time to try. I can't remember if you need to confirm anything via email though.

For me though, this recon sale has been working fine. My primary email is through gmail and it's been delivering to my inbox right around when the tools are posted. That said, I keep a laptop in my shop and run an extension in Chrome that dings and pops up an alert immediately when something hits my inbox. I have the laptop connected to the shop stereo system via 3.5mm cable as well as to my headphones via Bluetooth. Unless I'm in the middle of a cut I can stop to look at the laptop to see what came in. This is just standard protocol for me. I hate leaving my customers waiting on replies, but really works to my advantage here.

If you are relying on Outlook or your smartphone to get email, you're literally waiting on it to get email usually.  Check how your email client app works.  Most do a pull from your email server at regular intervals as opposed to an automatic check or notification from the server that something new was delivered. The Gmail app works better than a third party app because Google has written its app to be alerted just like the extension I use in Chrome on my shop laptop. It's not waiting to check the server every 5 minutes. This could be some of your issues as well.

It would be nice if everything worked the way we think it should, but with modern technology there are many hands and minds involved. Not everyone is on the same page. I'm not cutting anyone down, just sharing some information to help you get technology to work for you.

 

[antss]

Who's forcing you?

If Seth's line of thinking is correct , And I suspect it is, Festool is forcing buyers of their tools to pre pay this "warranty".  And the "policy" is pretty expensive too.

Of course you're correct that no one is forced into buying a Festool.  I'm talking about those that do. 

I've seen this model used at a well know German appliance company.  Standard warranty in the industry is 1-2 years even for luxury brands.  This company announced they were showing faith in the quality of their products by offering a 5 yr. parts and labor warranty.  Still unheard of in the industry.

Guess what the very next announcement was ?  Yup, a 30% price increase - in a year when their competition had no increase or if they did was a few % at most.  And none of the technology or features of the product changed either. 

It's easy to have faith when someone else is footin the bill.

 

[TylerC]

If you're not getting the recon emails consistently, I recommend that you whitelist the email address sales@festoolrecon.com. When an email doesn't arrive in an inbox, it can be an issue on the side of either the sender or the receiver. We're doing what we can to make sure that thing are working correctly on the sending end. Here are two links for how to easily do this based on what email client you use:

https://www.benchmarkemail.com/help-FAQ/answer/what-is-whitelisting-how-do-i-add-email-addresses-to-my-safe-senders-list-in-my-email-client-or-my-security-software

https://help.aweber.com/hc/en-us/articles/204029246-How-Can-My-Subscribers-Whitelist-Me-

I hope that helps.

 

[southrider]

As stated before - the problem is not with white listing or the receiver of email when 2 emails are received one day and one or none the next.

In my case I SEE every email that comes to MY server, regardless of the source.

Again, I received 2 emails the first two days, 1 email each of the next 2 days, and none on Friday (apparently only one tool offered Friday - but who knows?).

My server is pinged every 3 minutes for new email, and as I work in an office I am sitting in front of my computer mostly all day during the hours these tools are posted.

I AM NOT having a problem receiving these emails. They are not being sent to me regularly.

Tyler, I appreciate that Y'all are doing your best to rectify the problem, and am sure it will get better by next time around.

This system of sale is infinitely fairer to more potential buyers, as few can make a trip to a specific city on a specific day, and obviously much less hassle for the dealers when it is done through them.

I lucked into a Rotex on Friday. Though I received no email I had left a browser window open on the recon site, and as I came back to my desk I happened to hit the refresh button while the tool was being offered and still available.

I respectfully hope that the suggestions in this thread are considered. It would be better for all if their was more transparency regarding the number of each model available and when they would be. Buyers could decide whether or not they wanted to bother "putting in" for a tool, and free to go about their day when tools undesireable to them are being offered.

And lastly - if North American dealers were free to compete on pricing and extras as dealers in other countries are we wouldn't all be like dogs beneath a table scrounging for snacks.