Perhaps you don’t understand what I've been saying because you assume my stance is based on something personal or emotional, as has been stated more than once. Apparently people here think I want Restaurant Depot to change their policy to suit my needs, which is the farthest thing from the truth. In reality, I don’t care if they change their policy because their policy will never affect me.
Most of you seem to be looking at this from the perspective of an awestruck consumer who has only recently seen the inside of a foodservice warehouse for the first time, which apparently makes you assume I’m looking at it from the same perspective. But I’m not. One of the ways I’m looking at it is through the eyes of a prospective small business owner who will someday have to choose suppliers, based on things that matter in business, like which prospective supplier has already treated me as if my business matters to them, even if I’ve never bought anything from them. Another way I’m looking at it is through the eyes of a successful small business owner who has no time to look at the pretty warehouse or drive to the pretty warehouse, or shop at the pretty warehouse, or check out with the cashier, or load my purchase into my non-refrigerated automobile, or drive back from the pretty warehouse with a dangerously loaded, non-refrigerated automobile, or unload and stock my purchase. I’m also looking at it from the perspective of someone at the top of the distribution company; someone who wants the company to be as profitable as possible. Not just profitable today but also profitable in the long run.
The comparisons to diamonds and auto auctions are apples and oranges. If some regular Joe approached wholesalers, serious about buying the standard quantity of either diamonds or cars, the wholesaler would sell to him because it’s not about who he is; it’s about whether he can or will buy the quantity that’s for sale. The main (or only) reason it doesn’t happen is because there aren’t many consumers who have the resources or the desire to buy a stash of diamonds or a couple truckloads of used cars. No one sells to a market that doesn’t exist.
If I expected RD to rip open a 50-pound bag of flour and sell me 10 pounds of it, that would make your arguments valid, and everything I’ve said in this thread would be total BS. But that’s not what I’ve said.
RD and Walmart will both be gone in the not-too-distant future, and it’s not because I don’t shop there. Every day, people come to realize that the hassles of shopping at Walmart outweigh the money they might save by shopping there. The novelty is wearing off, and it will continue to wear off until there is no more Walmart. The same thing will happen with RD. Their top executives already know it will happen, but they’re milking it for every cent they can make before it finally does happen.
On the other end of the spectrum, In-N-Out Burger will be around for years to come, through good economies and bad, although on a smaller scale than Walmart or Restaurant Depot. Why? Because In-N-Out Burger’s business model functions in harmony with the law of supply and demand.
Look, I really don’t care how RD does business. I simply asked a few questions, first of all because I suddenly realized RD’s policies seemed stupid to me, but also because I had recently wasted some of my valuable time looking through their web site for an answer to a question I’m sure they get asked more than enough to justify publishing it on the front page of their web site. I asked the questions because I’m always trying to figure out how things work, independent of the societal and economic rules our civilization has created, which operate on premises contrary to all the rules of nature. I asked the questions because the quality of posts on these boards impressed me enough to suspect I might receive some quality feedback.
Unfortunately, my questions still have not been answered. Or maybe I already knew the answers, but I just wanted to find out if anyone had any good hypotheses that I may not have already considered, or at least explanations that would make me think a little deeper than I already had. But basically all the responses so far have been in line with the “common knowledge” that has essentially destroyed the global economy.
If no one wants to respond with a well-thought-out response to the questions I asked, I’d like the thread to die. But if people are going to keep replying with the assumption that I meant something I didn’t mean, I’ll probably keep responding.
