Places to buy tools?

PJF · June 25, 2012

I just have a hard time supporting a business that has tenticalls that may be my competition.

Thanks for the feedback Tom. :thumb Not sure I follow you though. Zola has a sister company that is a film supplier on the west coast, but so does 44Tools. In our case, those two entities operate completely seperately. They even have seperate books, bank accounts, financials, etc. I am not sure how Zola could ever be involved in anything competitive with you in MA.

If you are thinking back to when I was involved with NGSG, I am no longer involved with that entity. We still use the email NGSGllc as it was our corporation, but the actual company NGSG was sold to a company in the UK. To be completely transparent, I serve as a Board member for that company, but have no involvement with day to day operation with that business.

If you have any questions about that, or if you are reffering to anything else, please let me know. I would be happy to be completely clear and forthright about anything you are concerned about.

Thanks again.

TomTint · June 25, 2012

I understand that your film distribution in on the west coast. And that you activly peruse national accts for your 3M dealers. So let's say I'm buying tools from you here in Mass and one of your national accts ( Burger King) for example has 10 corporate stores that need film...... Who is going to get the heads up? ....... It would be my competition.

PJF · June 25, 2012

I understand that your film distribution in on the west coast. And that you activly peruse national accts for your 3M dealers. So let's say I'm buying tools from you here in Mass and one of your national accts ( Burger King) for example has 10 corporate stores that need film...... Who is going to get the heads up? ....... It would be my competition.

Tom,

I dont do the national accounts thing any longer. That company was sold and I am no longer involved with that. I did do that at one time, but I have been out of anything to do with that for over a year now. Thanks for the clarification on your end so that I could understand. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Customtinting · June 25, 2012

I understand that your film distribution in on the west coast. And that you activly peruse national accts for your 3M dealers. So let's say I'm buying tools from you here in Mass and one of your national accts ( Burger King) for example has 10 corporate stores that need film...... Who is going to get the heads up? ....... It would be my competition.

Tom,

I dont do the national accounts thing any longer. That company was sold and I am no longer involved with that. I did do that at one time, but I have been out of anything to do with that for over a year now. Thanks for the clarification on your end so that I could understand. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Patric, your words contradict themselves. In one statement you state you are "NO LONGER INVOLVED WITH THAT". But in another, you stated, and I quote "

If you are thinking back to when I was involved with NGSG, I am no longer involved with that entity. We still use the email NGSGllc as it was our corporation, but the actual company NGSG was sold to a company in the UK. To be completely transparent, I serve as a Board member for that company, but have no involvement with day to day operation with that business."

If you are still serving on their board, you DO have a vested interest in that entity. This would mean you are, in some form, as Tom says, has tenticles that may be our competition

If you are completely out of that, which I find difficult to believe, I still find it impossible to do business with a company you operate. This is due to the fact that I still remember comments from you in the past that had no qualm with operating the business that would , in my mind, steal work from local businesses such as mine and Toms and route it directly to our competition.

I do remember your logic, at the time, that the work you would be taking was from outlets that would not be contacting the local vendor. This thought was flawed at the time, because companies, local as we are, consistently receive calls from national accounts. When NGSG solicits national companies, it did, or does, become our competitor.

Longwinded as my reply is, it still states a truth.....My ethics and conscience do not allow me to do business with your present company, because of past practices. Others may choose to, I, however, do not.

Roach · June 25, 2012

I just had a question for Customtinting and the others that are not buying from Zola. What could we do better that would cause you to consider doing business with us?

Honestly? Nothing. I've been buying from 44 since day one, except when it's something small that can be placed in a box of film... I continue to purchase from them simply because I'm loyal with the companies/people I deal with. Just as I'd like my customers to continue to use my services.... It's nothing personal, it's not about prices, etc. It just is what is it.

PJF · June 25, 2012

Patric, your words contradict themselves. In one statement you state you are "NO LONGER INVOLVED WITH THAT". But in another, you stated, and I quote "

If you are thinking back to when I was involved with NGSG, I am no longer involved with that entity. We still use the email NGSGllc as it was our corporation, but the actual company NGSG was sold to a company in the UK. To be completely transparent, I serve as a Board member for that company, but have no involvement with day to day operation with that business."

If you are still serving on their board, you DO have a vested interest in that entity. This would mean you are, in some form, as Tom says, has tenticles that may be our competition

Customtinting,

Thanks for your resposnse. My words actually do not contradict themselves. I was open that I was on the Board. However, I receive no compensation from that company and I have no shares of stock in the company either. I serve as a consultant on the Board regarding overall business, and not day to day of that entity. I do not think that I am concealing anything about my involvement.

Regarding my past at NGSG, I have always been extremely transparent about my role and what the strategy of the company was. At the time the entity was created, some large, national retail outlets wanted a contact that they could deal with that could manage installations for them accross the country. NGSG never installed one square foot of fiim. We contracted all the work out for every job to a local installation company. NGSG was merely acting as a project management company at the request of the large national customer that refused to impliment a network wide program if they had to manage each install with a different company.

I think that I have addressed this before, but I am happy to add clarity to it again in this post if there is still some ambiguity as to what NGSG was doing.

Thanks for the replay. Please let me know if you have any other questions.

PJF · June 25, 2012

Honestly? Nothing. I've been buying from 44 since day one, except when it's something small that can be placed in a box of film... I continue to purchase from them simply because I'm loyal with the companies/people I deal with. Just as I'd like my customers to continue to use my services.... It's nothing personal, it's not about prices, etc. It just is what is it.

Cool. I respect that Roach. Thanks for responsing. :thumb

msheurs · June 25, 2012

thats interesting, I know nothing of the past problems but is this a company structure that patric built or was he someone at one time that just managed these accounts.

PJF · June 25, 2012

thats interesting, I know nothing of the past problems but is this a company structure that patric built or was he someone at one time that just managed these accounts.

Mike,

The company existed before I came aboard. They had contracts with some large national retailers. I was brought on because of my experience and background to help educate these national accounts about window film and then project manage installations if the went forward accross their network. We never did any installation and used all local labor to do the work. The only reason that NGSG existed was that these large retailers only wanted to work with one company to manage the work instead of 100s of individual companies accross the country.

We were doing this work for some of the largest retailers in the country, most of whom would be household names. In the end, much more window film was installed than would have been as these companies were prepared to do nothing with window film if they had to try and locate each local dealer themselves. So, we implmented and managed the program and then gave all the installs to the local dealer.

If you have any questions, let me know. As far as I know, in the 100s, if not into the 1000s of installs that occured, I have never had one dealer claim that we stole a job from them. That would be against everything that I stand for and I would not have been involved if that were the case. In the end, the company was sold to a firm in the UK that now manages these install worldwide for some of the same retailers that I once dealt with. I serve on the Board of the company that bought NGSG as a window film consultant, but have no dealing with their day to day business any longer.

msheurs · June 25, 2012

I dont see the big deal then. im not a flat glass guy so I cant really speak from experience but I dont see it as a big surprise that giant companies would rather work thru a corporate concierge then rely on individual branch managers to find the best local option. is that more or less the gist of it?