Their catalogs don't really show brand names of anything. I personally spend over $40,000 a month on tooling for the company I work for. The butt load goes to MSC, J&L. McMaster maybe gets 1% just because the guys in the shop don't have their own catalogs to browse though, and they don't have computers next to their Bridgeports. In my opinion it's another American company that were going to cry for because they went out of business when it was a poor business plan and too watered down of a product offering. Just my 2c.
Having read bits and pieces of this thread I decided to give them a call today. They seemed eager to send one right out, until I failed to give them a company name and indicated it was for a hobbyist. The young lady (Atlanta Office) then directed me to the web site where there is a full catalog online.
Perhaps if you'd give them a business name and have it delivered to you at the business address they'd get one to you. I dare say most of us could do that, or arrange to have one sent to use in care of a friend's business.
Just another over priced $0.02.
Al
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Russ Wiz> Their catalogs don't really show brand names of anything. I personally spend
My point was that, for me, it's not always convenient to use the website. It depends on what I'm looking for. If I need a TiN-coated HSS
8-32 H3 4-flute plug hand tap, I'm all set--I can find it on their site in 10-15 seconds, and they get $6 of my business. But when I'm buying something big, their site's hierarchal system fails me; I don't want to go down a text list of products clicking on each one to see it, and then clicking again to see a CAD drawing of it, I want to flip through 5-6 pages and know in a minute or two exactly what my options are complete with photos.
And then there are all the items I never knew I needed (until I saw them in the catalog), or the items that I knew I needed but didn't know what they were called (online won't help me there!). These situations account for at least 1/3 of what I buy.
There is easily the potential that I would do over $1000 in business with them, since their prices seem to be generally lower than MSC's. Should I send them printouts of my MSC purchase orders? I spent $4,288 at MSC in 2003 and $18 at McMaster. If McMasters catalog is like MSC's, it can't cost them more than $100 each to publish.
i was in this thread earlier, and my business address and home address are the same. no problem getting catalogues, but only after i made an initial order. a great co., imho, exempellary combination of old and "new". --Loren
that may be the key, what the previous poster said, ordering online. that is what i did, not the catalog, but parts (small first order) gave me a couple years of catalogues. --LOren
Good idea, but mark those items you didn't PLAN to buy, but found while browsing the MSC catalog.
I sent them a link to an ebay auction for catalog #110. It was up to $45 at the time, and finally sold for $75.00
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The seller was obviously one of their "preferred" customers, who only used the catalog to make a profit at their expense.=20 Maybe this will turn some heads there. =20 I suggested, once again, thhat the order 1000 extra catalogs from the printers and put them up for sale on the web site at $20 each. I just hope they don't decide to sell them on eBay inetead :-)
(I didn't get the usual form letter in response this time.)
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