Consumer PC Sales

I would like to know what you guys are doing for Consumer PC Sales.

We have traditionally done 0 consumer PC sales. We do a lot of service though - and get asked about every week if we sell PC's. It's an idea I'm playing with, and wanting some advice on. What works? What doesn't?

Any particular distributor/manufacturer worked well in the consumer sector?

TIA!

We've worked with two white box makers Seneca Data and Equus (currently) for custom built systems for about the last 8 years. We typically sell these to our business customers but also occasionally residential customers as well.

Both companies are easy to work with and get the systems built quickly. Usually we mark them up somewhere between 10-15% which will usually put us plus or minus 10% when comparing to a business class system with the name brands.

I like doing it this way instead of reseller Dells, HP's, etc because of the ease of support. If there is something wrong with a component we just call in and tell them what we need and they ship it to us. We can also stock some commonly used motherboards, memory, and harddrives that we can pull from so we don't have to wait for the replacement part.

Both have onsite warranty options available but I prefer that we do the work since we are more mindful of what the customer needs as opposed to just swapping the part and walking away. Equus also has a reimbursed warranty option that we usually use. This allows us to sell it as an onsite warranty that we service, then Equus reimburses us $75 to do the work.

Hope that helps, let me know if you have any other questions. I think you have my email and number so feel to contact me that way also.

I was working with the parent company of Tiger direct for all consumer pc's. I run 2 retail stores so we sell quite a bit there on top of the business class machines we sold on the commercial side.

They decided last month they were getting out the PC business so that left me scrambling to fill orders for about 10 machines.

I am using Dell for the moment. I am not a big fan of dell, but that is what we're using for now.

Do you do consumer stuff through Dell? ...I can't consumer stuff through the normal channel (premier site). If I could - that would probably be my first choice.

I have been a dell partner for years, just only really used it for their support with dell products.

I have have my partner rep contact you.

Popejoy,

I wanted to chime in with my 2 cents. For 10 years we built our own. Which is not bad but can be frustrating every time a motherboard or case gets changed. We found that we spent incredible amounts of administrative time researching boards, cases, memory and etc every couple of months. Plus we had to assemble, install OS and etc.

About 3 years ago we switched to Equus and have been ecstatic with them since. They try to maintain a business look to their machines, the have excellent turn around time, wide variety, and not too bad of pricing. The margins we make off them are way better than what we would make off Dell. When it comes to servers we can usually make 30+ percent and still beat Dell. That is with Intel Case, MB, CPU and other quality parts too.

They even update Intel with our purchases to maintain our Intel partner levels. (we only sell Intel MB and CPU machines). They also have a web interface so that you can post a basic store online, if you want.

We have had luck selling their Intel "ClassMates" netbooks to schools too. Their other laptops are good and some have legitimate docking options, however, the pricing is a bit tight.

We usually sell our clients a desktop at $699 with no monitor. (they have cheaper but we go for a bit more quality) As time goes on and the station cost drops, we simply increase the processor, memory, or what not to maintain that price. We currently offer an I3, 60gb Intel SSD, 4 GB mem, intel board with DVI and HDMI, and Win 7 Pro for $699. Not great but not bad..but that is delivered, preinstalled, 1yr warranty, and we make about 15-20% each. If you order in quantities of 20+ you can shave another $50 off the cost.

We are so happy with their systems we are going to start offering them to clients with a 3yr warranty at our own risk.

If you want give Mike a call here is his info: Michael Scaropoulos - 630-622-4020 ext 249 - MSCAROPO@equuscs.com

Hope that helps
Chad

Sorry, I forgot to mention that we only do commercial sales, no consumer. However, I bet with Equus you could give it a go. You would have to use some of their AMD and lower level models. But I am sure your margins would be better and you would not be competing with Dell's website.

I contacted equus and got no response. I will give your guy a call.

Hi Guys, we also have Mike Scaropoulos @ Equus as our rep. He is definitely a great guy to work with and are very happy with the company.

Equus's prices are more expensive than what i'm used to. Is the price justified by the quality or service?

I believe so, failure rates are low since quality hardware is being used. Also since we purchase reimbursed warranties if we need to replace a component we get paid for our time.

Yes, I would say the pricing is fair as well. Then again you can't be trying to compete with Dell and Tiger Direct. Equus's PC's are high quality and assembled in the good old USA.

At this point i am not even purchasing the reimbursed warranty from Equus, but simply offering the PC's to clients with a 3 year hardware warranty on our own. I am very comfortable with their build quality. Then again we are strictly commercial sales, who knows what some residential people might do to the PC's.

It is a shame as such service has minimal margins nowadays. not look the good old days when you were making £300 per unit

We built our own until margins disappeared and the 30-60 mins to build and install a pc was basically your margin gone. I now sell Lenovos to businesses. They aren't especially cheap but they are rock solid reliable. Sell them all with three year Lenovo warranty and in 2 years haven't had one warranty claim yet.

Ditto with Natrat. But I notice you say "Consumer". Best advice there is get out of that business and go B2B. Building PC's is the past. 0 margins. We are Dell, Lenovo and Equus partners only selling the business line from Dell and Lenovo.

Bummer, Mike @ Equus was recently let go.

Equus makes great servers, but their desktops are just too expensive for me. We now sell lenovo desktops / laptops only.

Aww, shame about Mike at Equus he was a great Rep. No wonder I haven't been able to get a reply from sales in over 2 weeks! With Mike I usually had a response in an hour or two.

Surprised they didn't contact you with a new rep.