| there is a definite jaded response that comes from his announcements or updates. I believe it's fairly apparent that he has an uphill climb to gain back any lost credibility when it comes to the availability dates of his products. As well-intentioned as his updates may be to keep people informed on his progress, it has the same impact on the community and gets viewed as empty promises ("I'll believe it when I see it"). In my line of work, this is very taboo - you don't announce your product until it's ready for the market. Otherwise the industry turns its back on you. IMHO, he really needs to get his product development sorted out to the point that he has parts coming off the production line before he stirs up the hype. There's nothing wrong with promoting something new and generating interest and potential sales orders....just be sure there is something to sell when you do that. The resulting effect of Ash's approach is that he makes an announcement that a new product is coming out soon or in 2 to 3 weeks. Then months go by (with several "Has anyone heard from Ash Powers lately?" posts tossed in for good measure). Finally after enough people on the forum call him out, he pops back up with an coincidental update on the project status. Then it goes back to dead silence for another period of time. All of the rhetoric of it being a one man operation (or two or three...whatever) has no bearing on the fact that he tries to get the jump on a product introduction and makes the announcement prematurely. I would worry that because he's placed the anticipation of the new product out there so early that in his attempt to get them into customers hands as quickly as possible could lead to the potential for some fundamental engineering, testing, or manufacturing steps to get accidentally overlooked in the process. And before anyone thinks I'm picking on him or making this up, I have to deal with this very problem on a daily basis. I have no ax to grind with Ash Powers. I've installed some of his parts on customer cars and haven't noticed any problems at the time of the installation. But until he can get his processes in order, this viral marketing campaign has gotten old and, dare I say...tiresome. I might have had a different response if this wasn't something that is pretty close to home for me. And I'm offering this feedback as constructively as possible. Dave
Shortly after his promotion to general
of the Confederate army, Cletus made a grave
miscalculation...thus handing victory over to
the Union army and ending the Civil War. Sig Quotes: "Your sausage scares me!" - TT-XTZ 6/13/05 "Or he's having a rough week like the rest of us and decided to take out his agressions of not being breast fed on me." BigTDogg 15:45, 09/25/03 "Pick her up from day care and take her to Dairy Queen for a snow cone." YugoBernie 1/7/04 of course those are canadian bannings and beatings, which after the conversion rate is really only a "hey! stop that!" Chris(NJ) 1/14/04 see the green "n" next to my name? what's COZ? (n/m) - 300zx88 8/11/04 |
