<VV> Frustration with Clark's Corvair

[airvair at earthlink.net]

If I may put in my two cents worth, as a customer and also as his supplier
(on some parts), so I talk to Cal often. Cal gets his molded carpet (as
does Wall's, and probably anyone else who supplies molded LM Corvair
carpet) from ACC, who like Cal's wiring harness supplier, is notoriously
difficult to deal with. They have the attitude that since they are the ONLY
supplier of said goods, it's their way or the highway, so any requests
outside of the way they want to supply said part gets a big "go ****
yourself" response. In other words, it's not Cal who's inflexible, but his
suppliers.

I purchased a molded carpet (thru Wall's) back in '93. At that time, I
noted (among other things) that they had put the binding for the center
strip of carpet (which is attached to the rear piece, and lies between the
buckets) on the rear section. Totally incorrect, as ALL binding goes on the
FRONT piece of carpet. I mentioned this to Lon, and he passed the info to
ACC. Their response (if memory serves me right) was as I mentioned above.
They neither cared nor wanted to be accurate. 

Pretty sad when manufacturers of parts for the old car hobby take that
attitude. But then, they know they have you over a barrel. The Corvair is
not like something really popular, like a Camaro for instance, where
everybody and his brother can supply the same parts, simply because the
market's that big. Only then can the market encourage the best, most
accurate reproduction parts. We Corvair enthusiasts thus often have to
accept what is offered, and to his defense, Cal does try to offer the best
parts possible. But like any businessman, he often has to compromise
accuracy and quality, just in order to have SOMEthing available. He
regrettably can only control that on parts he himself manufactures.

-Mark

> [Original Message]
> From: Tony Underwood <tony.underwood at cox.net>
> Subject: Re: <VV> Frustration with Clark's Corvair
>
> At 04:15 PM 1/26/2010, John Kepler wrote:
>
> >Am I expecting to much from Clarks?  I would hate to see how Clark's
would
> >deal with a difficult modification!
> >
> >Frustrated from 'down under'
> >
> >Gee....expecting a non-standard, custom part at an "Off-the-shelf" price!
> >Yeah...you're expecting too much.  Sorry you folks in Oz have to drive on
> >the wrong side of the road!
> >
> >BTW...what the hell makes you think what you want isn't a "difficult
> >modification"?
>
> ...isn't this a bit harsh?
>
> If it had been me, I'd have been wondering why a custom carpet 
> wouldn't have been available as well.   Wasn't the request made with 
> allowances of plenty of lead time?
>
> There can't be that many middlemen between the guy who slices a 
> length of automotive carpet off a roll to make a Corvair part, and 
> the fellow in MA who stuffs it into a box for shipping.    If a 
> contractor is so arbitrary that they can't be bothered to respond 
> positively to a request by Clark's to make a carpet without the pad 
> attached, it's simply unfortunate and a bit of an example of how 
> customer service has dwindled to a trickle in today's domestic 
> manufacturing for niche items like carpet specifically made for a 
> 40-50 year old car.
>
> ...unless that carpet is coming from China... ;)
>
> Clarks might not be at fault here and may be getting a bad rap, if 
> it's the contractor who can't be bothered to make a custom 
> piece.     Seems that the flak needs to be fired off in that 
> direction and maybe not at Clark's.    Where I work, we supply odd 
> things to customers in the construction business and we'll go out of 
> our way to do custom work to keep a customer happy.   Of course we 
> don't have a lot of middlemen....
>
> Maybe the resident Aussie needs a proxy here stateside to work in his 
> best interests to see if something can't be worked out.    It would 
> make a great human interest "see what we can do" piece for the back 
> pages of a Clark's catalog, regarding a custom carpet made for a 
> Corvair from "dahyun undeah".  (tongue in cheek talk-funny reference 
> )  Probably a likely candidate for a Communique article for that 
> matter...  if it's timed right and it's a slow month and the 
> Communique is a bit light on tech articles.   The right greasing of 
> the wheels of progress and a bit of attention in the direction of the 
> right person might turn this into a satisfactory situation that might 
> be good for everyone.
>
> tony..   
>