Relevance of the Scottish Store?

[Colin]

Well, the local shops are getting the goods from the same shops you can buy from online. So, they have the same costs to get the goods as you do: actual item cost, shipping, duties, etc. Then, they have to add their markup to cover the cost of their operations and a profit.

The only way they could get it cheaper is if they could get quantity discounts, and you just can't do that with custom tailored clothes. And there is probably not enough sales to justify ordering in quantity the things they can.

The only benefit to those stores is being able to actually see and touch merchandise. But even then, you can examine the goods at the store, then go home and order them for less money.

I don't completely agree with that, the local shops are getting products from wholesalers (in most cases the same as the online shops), where as I am not.

Now I understand that maybe the local shops are adding the duty to bring the products into the country and are therefore including that and mark up into their price to the consumer, but I am than paying a % or average of duty from a large shipment rather than product specific duty. I think we need to remember that alot of these "mom and pop" shops also do online shipping, so they too are using the chaging environment to meet their cost needs and to bump up their profits.

Yes it is nice to be able and go in and touch the product, see it in person, and maybe walk away with it that day, but is that worth the huge mark up of products?

In most cases, I would think that the online businesses have as much, if not more overhead costs. Luckily for them they reach a bigger market share and split the costs more efficiently. It's not like they are working out of a big warehouse full of product, but employing customer service people, shippers, fiancal people, ect adds up quickly. Most of these online businesses are at a disadvantage that they don't have the "walk in" clients that a local shop has.

Out of curiousity, how many people have a Scottish shop that sells Highland wear near by? I have one within 15 minutes, one downtown Vancouver, and a few others locally.

[Barclay]

Out of curiousity, how many people have a Scottish shop that sells Highland wear near by? I have one within 15 minutes, one downtown Vancouver, and a few others locally.

Talk about lucky! My local Scot shop is The Scottish Tartans Museum shop. I think most of us know how knowledgeable and nice the manager of that store is.

While I do but stuff online, I have bought a good deal of my kit from Matt, including 4 kilts (with 2 more to be ordered soon), sporrans, hose, belts, etc. While the prices may be a bit higher, though I've not found them to be prohibitively higher, I find a lot of comfort in knowing that if I have a problem or an issue I can call or show up at Matt's door and ask him to fix it and I know that he will - I'm not so sure that the same is true of online vendors, necessarily. Besides, every single time that I'm in Matt's shop I come away knowing something new about history, a tartan, our shared heritage, etc. That kind of knowledge, not to mention the friendship that's built over time, is
worth the extra dollars. I also like that Matt is extremely focused on quality and offers only high quality goods which will naturally be a bit more expensive.

I'll still buy stuff online - online vendors like Jerry at Stillwater have always provided a great product for a great price. But I'll always buy some stuff locally because I like Matt, I like Matt's products, and I always look forward to spending time in Matt's store. And he offers service that no online vendor can match. My hat is off to Matt, Ronan and Chuck.