New Riccars For Sale Online

[bagintheback]

Riccar is now selling new vacuums directly from the company. I'm not sure what to think of this. I am happy American made products are now more widely avaible, but this will certainly hurt their dealers.

http://shop.riccar.com/products/category/Uprights/9002.0.1.1.102004.98958.0.0.0

 

[gsheen]

I don't know that it will hurt the dealers at all. People who shop online hardly would go to a store to buy a machine , If your product is not available online they simply buy a different one. If I am not mistaken dyson was one of the first large company"s to sell there products themselves online. 


It helps widen there brand.


 


We sell machines online and in our store. Its interesting to note that many customers will look at the machine online but still come to us and buy it in the store.


 


We personally deliver every vacuum we sell online in Cape Town and there is a massive difference in the customers who purchase online to those who come in to the store. 


 


One thing it does do is that it helps stop  bad  dealers screwing customers over on price.  

 

[sebo_fan]

Yes, but the U.S is not S.A and the U.K have very few private dealers in so far as privately owned electrical shops are concerned; most have closed down because of the mark up they've had to put on products and buyers getting it cheaper at the department stores and "big box" franchises like Comet, Currys et al. I'm sure you are aware that shopping experiences differ per country, not marked by the same products all continents get. Shopping online has its pros and cons too - but I admire private dealers if they still hold a market share for profit.

There's only a handful of shops I know that are still independent in Scotland compared to the 20 to 30 I knew of back in the 1980's. One shop in Edinburgh for example is notorious for SEBO uprights but also sells refurbished commercial versions of Hoover uprights from the 1980's that are virtually unobtainable online.

 

[blackheart]

I could be wrong but

It seems like the prices on the website are much higher than the prices of the vacuums in the shops i've been to

 

[bimmer740]

I'm not too familiar with Riccar products but I too thought their prices seem very high. Just out of curiosity I looked at the Premium 35' Direct Connect Electric Hose Kit for their central vacuums and saw the power nozzle kit costs $859! I think that is outrageously over priced compared to even some of the most expensive kits on the market, which I don't think I've seen any for more than $600. Is there anyone more familiar with what the retail cost at a dealership is on some of the Riccar machines?

 

[gsheen]

I see they sell riccar branded bags for eureka, hoover & panasonic 

 

[director12]

Riccar-branded bags for Hoover, Eureka, and Panasonic? How strange.

 

[trebor]

The prices of Riccar...

vacuums are higher online to drive people into the dealers. Lindhaus does the same.
If people buy something else, they will need something for it, and perhaps then go to a store that sells Riccar (or Lindhaus) and find out the price is lower. Someone who is interested will stop and compare purchase from the store.

 

[kirbysthebest]

The RSL$ Online

is roughly $225 higher than I paid at the vac shop.

 

[kirbylux77]

Riccar Factory MSRP Prices....

If you go to Riccar.com, & take a look at the info for the vacuums online, the prices on Riccar's online store are the same as the MSRP prices on the official website. And even then, the prices aren't that much higher than what vac shops charge....in my area, there is 2 shops selling the Riccar Pristine canister for $699 & $799, vs. the $999 MSRP price on Riccar's website.

The prices won't be Riccar's drawback here....it's the fact that they are STILL promoting their vacuums to be "made in America" yet they SHOULD be putting "assembled in America"....that's what the actual truth is, as they are still putting underneath "with globally sourced components" in miniscule lettering. Anybody with a brain knows that means it has Chinese-made parts in it. They aren't fooling anybody, especially those consumers who do their research online & are comparing Riccar/Simplicity models directly to Miele & Sebo models. Nobody would buy Made in America with Chinese components online, when they can buy Made in Germany for about the same price online.

Plus, as Bagintheback pointed out above, this will hurt their dealers, & cause some resentment. The dealers WILL backlash over this, especially if they do more than just sell from a factory online store. Same as what happened to Miele when they chose to start selling online & in retail. Especially when I have heard that many dealers still aren't satisfied with the quality of Riccar/Simplicity products....this will give them even more excuse to drop their line of products from their stores.

Rob

 

[gmerkt]

You've got to wonder about the mentality of buying something relatively complex and often expensive online. Like a vacuum cleaner, which has certain expectations of performance. I suppose there are some people who will go look at the product in person, then go back and order the same thing online if the price there is lower. But then again, the machine you will be getting online isn't the one you may have tried out in a store.

Then there are people all the time who go to a big box store and buy a vacuum cleaner in a sealed carton without having tried it out.

I can understand someone living in a rural area ordering a vacuum cleaner online, but doesn't 90% of the population in the US live in cities and suburbs now?

My own opinion is that I'd want to give it a test drive before I bought it.

Yes, the motors and very possibly all of the electronic and electrical compliment within a Riccar are made in Asia.

I have one Miele currently for sale, and it's made in China. What it actually says verbatim is, "Made by Miele Assembled in China from components of Germany and China."