Is Wilson going to kill the retailers ?

How many bottleshops and fuel stations do you own Kitepower?

Did you know they own most Parking Meters at the beaches now?

Personally i think that BW should have supported the Aussie retailers after all didn't they support him to start off with. He would have probably got more kites out there and earned more supporters in the longer term.

Undercutting the local shop guy on the corner who has been flogging away is fkn poor form and won't win BW many mates IMO.

I am yet to see hoardes of BWS kites at my local ......so I think the retailers are safe for now.

Besides kiting has become very image driven I cant see BWS kites making much of an impact unless they team up with a well known wakestyle rider and develop wakestyle kites as well......then and only then could they begin to make an impact on the local retailer.

This is what all the Sub 25 yr olds want...... flouro look at me wakestyle setups

Maybe over in WA where there is more of a surf kite culture he is already having an impact.

BWS would have been in a difficult position. Adding another brand to the fold with no history of sales is a hard task. IMO not many retailers would have been prepared to support another new brand. By going internet direct with an initial program with 'test team' riders has created a brand name and a demand that has ensured BWS has hit the ground running.

Who knows where it will go? What I do know is that in a few short months, BWS has a recognisable brand name with a product that is popular and good quality.

Puts them in a very marketable position for the future!

oohh you just jealous Ian..you know you want one They are sick kites..I love them

248 .Not bad for a retailer .I would be pretty happy with that

It is illegal in this country for wholesalers to enforce retail prices or attempt to control pricing in any way. (Trade Practices Act)

They provide a recommended retail price list but each retailer can sell for whatever price they like.

The ACCC looks very closely at manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers who try to restrict competition by 'enforcing' RRP's.

These are quality companies including North, cabrinha, fone etc.

I didn't claim there were 150,000 new kiters starting each year?. My guess is that most kiters update there gear on a regular basis.

If you look back 5 years ago they were pumping out around 120,000 kites a year between all of the manufacturers, since then kiteboarding has grown probably 10 times. So the total no of kites would be huge. Companies like cabrinha make a lot more than 30,000 kites a year. There are a lot of people on this forum that cant see the big picture and can't realise that Australia only holds a couple of percent of the world wide kiteboarding market.

Kites and lines/bars can be made in China for a cost of approx $250USD, this is for a 12m. Several of these kites are in use on the South coast of Adelaide and I have had a close look at them, and to be honest, the quality is very good and they look exactly like a late model Switchblade. One owner told me that he landed the complete kite package for just over $500AUD. That said, I prefer to support my local shop, and most of my gear is all late model North. If BW is selling his kites for $1100, good on him, as he still will be making some profit. I personally would love to try one of his kites, but that may be very difficult, with no one here to demo it.
Here is a link to just ONE generic kite manufacturer in China.

http://www.chinese-kite.net/product.asp?MID=0&SID=1

Believe it or not the ACCC is one of the most powerful bodies in Aus. When they decide to investigate you there is nothing they can't or won't do.

If a retailer decides to sell a something at cost and the wholesaler tries to control the prices or block supply, one phone call to ACCC gets them off your back.

As a sales manager for a national company I had a card in my wallet with the '10 commandments' of the ACCC. If I was in breach of one or more of those I was liable to a huge fine and my employer was liable X 10.

One of those 10 was trying to control retail prices, or refusing supply to a customer because they were cutting prices. The TPA is one of the most enforced acts.

If someone starts a price war, suppliers cannot get involved.

ACCC=Toothless Tiger manipulated by big business and big money. It was set up for political reasons.
Wholesalers can stop supply to a retailer for any reason, in fact they don't have to give one to the retailer and they can just tell ACCC they did not have enough stock or some other crap.
Retailers do not have a right of supply, I got this direct from an ACCC staff person.

Pricing, well based on the above then there are means to enforce pricing as Kiteryder clearly points out with his Apple example. JB HiFi don't discount Apple products, unlike most other things they sell.

Sorry Dave but i speak from experience here .the ACCC were about as useful as a boob job on my granny particularly when it comes to big business vs small fry. what about 2 large grocery/booze,pubs,pokies,fuel retailers in Aust they are proven guilty of collusion and predatory trading and they get a slap on the wrist and are straight back too it.How about fuel prices at the moment ? The price per barrel drops and retail goes the other way big time and no-one competes against it and no one says or does anything about it except for a page 4 bleat in the papers yesterday.

The legislation is there.

ACCC only enforce it when they receive complaints.

Apple are walking a fine line. If retailers don't discount because they are asked not to, it's called collusion and there's hefty fines. It will only take one retailer to start the discounts.

When Allan Fells (sic) was in charge of ACCC he reamed many big companies for price fixing and collusion.

When a customer is big enough, no supplier will stop supply based on selling prices. Wesfarmers and Woolworths are the two hugest examples. No hardware supplier says no to Bunnings even if they are bastardising their brand by selling it at or below cost.

In the kiting industry, most shops stick to the wholesaler's RRP because thats the price they need to make a profit on. However, I mentioned the TPA because someone said the kite manufacturers need to control pricing.


Any kite shop can sell their product at whatever price they choose to. Look at the end of season specials.

Funny how these threads always end up with kiters thinking the shops are ripping them off. Funny how kiters won't drop their wages to benefit their customers/bosses yet they expect the shops to throw away money just for one sale! And we try and screw the retailer for our once every two year purchase of a new kite !!

We are a unique insular community!!

Saw my first BWS yesterday, and funny you should talk about relaunch. - A guy at our Local mention yesterday relaunch was very hard compared to his fuel.