GBM - greater boston motorsports

[scottieducati]

Wow, perhaps this is the norm for you folks. Can't say how many times there's been a mixup, misunderstanding, etc. at a dealer, or whereEVER that a manager has helped resolve beyond my expectations. No wonder local shops are going out of business left and right with people expecting nothing but perfection from every employee.

[PinHead]

Scottie, are you reading anything you write?
You seem to be able to come up with some sort of lame ass excuse for any and everything GBM did. This should have been a 5 min. stop for, Awesome or anyone else looking to get a spark plug. If you need to seek out a manager for a simple sale, then they suck and need to hire better help or close the doors.
BTW, GBM is a motorsports specialty shop, doesn't matter how many different lines of bikes they carry. They sell power sport toys and accessories, that's it. Your not cruising the isles looking for laundry detergent or fucking tampons.

[nhbubba]

Over less than $20.

I feel compelled to point out that $20 is 100% of the MSRP of the item in question.

[WinVT]

Ok, I am in no way defending this place. I have never been there and don't know a single employee there... but I am just speaking from a parts employee stand point.

For people that don't work at a shop: If someone comes in and wants a part, we typically have a couple of different options to get it for them -Either OEM or various aftermarket suppliers. Most of the time aftermarket is cheaper, but not always the case.

If a customer comes in and asks for a plug, I will either look it up OEM or look it up in an aftermarket catalog. Sorry, but we do not memorize every plug for every bike.

In this case, I imagine the employee grabbed one of the aftermarket catalogs to look it up. The two largest in our industry are Tucker Rocky and Parts Unlimited. If you look up this plug in either of these books it will show the MSRP at about $45.00. The employee did nothing wrong at this point... He looked up the plug and that is what price either catalog would tell him. It is actually the correct price as well. If I were to order this plug from Parts Unlimited, it would cost me $45.00. It is still an NGK plug. Same manufacturer that Honda uses, so it technically could be called the OEM plug, you are just not ordering it from Honda.

In most cases, aftermarket would be cheaper, so this employee probably has no idea that straight from Honda the plug is actually half the price. He probably thinks he is actually saving the customer money by looking aftermarket.

What happened after this is up for debate because none of us know what conversation took place between OP and the employee. When I called them it took all of 5 seconds for them to give me the OEM MSRP of about $20.00.

Now if it was brought to his attention and he didn't investigate it further, I would say he made a mistake.... But remember, none of us were there to hear that conversation.

[jasnmar]

@WinVT - I completely agree.

If, however, the dealership website lists a lower price than the employee has immediate access to, there's a process problem somewhere.

[nhbubba]

..none of us know what conversation took place between OP and the employee.

One of us does.

Based on my experiences with "multi brand" motorcycle dealers over the years, I have no reason not to believe him.

[scottieducati]

The website quoted was via Honda part number. So the Honda part shows up.

[Awesome]

The website quoted was via Honda part number. So the Honda part shows up.

The honda part was the one he picked up and put on the counter. I looked at the part number to match the MSRP that I had looked up. Next hypothetical excuse?

[TheIglu]

Aliens.

[butcher bergs]

Nobody will ever make your experience right, but it also sounds like someone called in for the same thing and got a much lower quote. We can only guess what led them to quote you $43 for a $20 spark plug, but MY guess based on a decade of experience there doesn't lead me to believe they're price gouging. 99.9% sure there was SOME kind of honest mistake in there...

With the kinda cunt Jay can be sometimes, I'm going with "asshole price"

[Degsy]

Wirelessly posted

Holy shitshow thread. Lol.

I use Bettencourts all the time. I'm in there so much I almost think I should be invited to the Xmas party.

Here's why I use them and not the online places.

Ronayers is great for the fiche and prices....as long as you can wait until next June for your parts. Jesus, they take forever to ship.

I get almost as good prices from Bettencourts and I have Honda parts in 2 days with no shipping charges.

I guarantee you if I went into Bettencourts parts dept and asked ANY of the parts counter guys for that plug, they would grab the plug off the parts shelf and put it in the system. If the price came up $43, I can guarantee the conversation would go something like.

Parts counter guy "shit, that's expensive. Let me look something up. Oh yeah, that's the PU retail price. That's way off. Lemme check Honda pricing. Yep. $21. I'll adjust the price.

Also, if I'm doing a valve adjustment and need a shim or 10,I can go there and get a shim in 30 seconds. I can't hang around 10 days for Ron ayers to ship my shim while the bike is on the lift taking up space.

Try going into adrenaline cycle (an independent shop) and asking for a plug for a crf250 and I bet Justin would say "yep, it's an XYZ plug and its $20" without even opening a book. What's more, the plugs are on a shelf in the showroom area. You just go and grab your plugs and bring them to the counter. I never understood the mentality of keeping plugs behind the counter anyway.

The bottom line is that I don't think the GBM guy was trying to rip anyone off. He just didn't do his job well after Jay pointed out that the plug price was double what it should be.

I'm pretty sure the $43 price is correct for current pricing as plug prices change all the time. I'm willing to bet the $20 Honda price is because Honda don't update their parts pricing as quickly as PU do to reflect NGK changing their costs. The $20 price is a throwback price from probably years ago.

I have plugs at home that a Ducati dealer will charge you $60 for. My cost as a WPS dealer? $9 a plug. I charge $15 a plug.

[Eddie]

Well, I'm with Johnny, Jay and Iglu on this one. One way or another the customer would be at a loss had he paid the $43 for the plug.

Concerning supporting the local business, one has to realize that the local dealer is not just that guy around the corner anymore. It is that guy who you call in North Carolina, who is on a first name basis with you, who by the way happens to run a family business, who not only is technically savvy but gives you fair price every time. And guess what? My stuff is usually delivered in a couple of days after ordered.

Tell you what: I support the dealers here at this forum. Outside of that, do you know who I trust? Me. That's who.

I beg to differ with some of you but I do think Jay did something about the matter when he pointed out to the salesperson that MSRP is just under half of the price they asked for the plug? When you have to call the manager to resolve something of that sort in the least the transaction becomes a nuisance.

[Stoneman]

I dunno. I feel the parts guy - as his job SHOULD REQUIRE him to, should've simply cross referenced the plug as soon as (the customer) questioned the doubling of the MSRP. That's it, literally a coupla minutes of research would've most likely resulted in a satisfied customer. Toss all your excuses and theories around all ya want. Very little effort on the seller's part would have netted very different results...

Hell, even the flunkies at your local auto-parts chain usually automatically offers you a number of alternatives cost-wise. No offense to any flunky-parts-counter-auto-chain employees, of course...

"Holy shit, that's double MSRP for that?"

-"It is? (click, click, click) Oh wow, you're right. Lemme check something"

- (click, click) "Here it is. I can give you the one from Honda for the MSRP you saw"

"Cool, thanks!"

[TheIglu]

Wirelessly posted
I'm pretty sure the $43 price is correct for current pricing as plug prices change all the time. I'm willing to bet the $20 Honda price is because Honda don't update their parts pricing as quickly as PU do to reflect NGK changing their costs. The $20 price is a throwback price from probably years ago.

I have plugs at home that a Ducati dealer will charge you $60 for. My cost as a WPS dealer? $9 a plug. I charge $15 a plug.

I just paid $4.51 each for the 4 plugs on the Vmax. God I love old bikes.

[nhbubba]

$9/ea for iridiums for the 'strom. I had to buy 5 because I am a klutz and dropped one. Don't do that.

[KnuckleBallz]

$9/ea for iridiums for the 'strom. I had to buy 5 because I am a klutz and dropped one. Don't do that.

Ninja Rocks!