The following letter was on Trainorders., and I have copied it and passed it on for informational purposes only. I hope this is not true.
This might be someone’s idea if a joke, but it does not look like it.
IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT
Unauthorized Internet Selling
Action Required
Dear Dealer,
We are pleased to announce that Horizon has contracted with Net
Enforcers, Inc., to assist us in the identification and elimination of
unauthorized distribution of our proprietary brands. Net Enforcers,
based in Coral Springs, Florida, will utilize a combination of automated
search tools and personnel to identify unauthorized resellers of Horizon
products both on the popular auction sites and third-party sites. Net
Enforcers will seek to shut down the auctions of these unauthorized
resellers thereby enforcing Horizon’s trademark rights and copyrights as
appropriate.
This program is designed to protect you, an authorized dealer and your
respective online sales from unauthorized resellers. To assist Net
Enforcers in distinguishing authorized from unauthorized dealers, we are
providing them under a confidentiality agreement the Web site addresses,
and Ebay, Yahoo!, and Froogle dealer selling IDs.
Please assist us in identifying these unauthorized sellers by sending
us the ID numbers that you list your auction under for each site by
September 1st, (please, no passwords). You may provide this information
to your Sales Rep, or send via email to sales@horizonhobby.com mailto:sales@horizonhobby.com The deadline to get this information to
us is September 1, 2004.
Additionally, please note that any authorized retailer who distributes
Horizon brands to an unauthorized reseller is in violation of our
Retailer Agreement, and we will
i would think most manufacturors have a rule similar to this, as far as selling on ebay they are reffering to those who sell in volume, not a dude selling off some of his stuff
I just checked the Horizon website, and all it says about internet sales is:
“Internet Sale Policies
Horizon Hobby, Inc. distributes its products through a network of authorized retailers. Horizon Hobby, Inc. will grant its authorized retailers use of its intellectual property for the promotion of Horizon products on these retailers’ websites or online auctions. Horizon Hobby, Inc. reserves the right to only provide warranty coverage for products purchased from authorized retailers and to refuse warranty coverage on products purchased from unauthorized retailers.”
The Hard Rock Cafe had a similar policy and they tried to hunt and destroy people who resold HRC pins on eBay and other auction sites (as they were not authorized/licensed to resell pins). It lasted less than a month as eBay said it wasn’t eBay’s responsibility to police the resale of merchandise - that is the manufacturer’s responsibility. I doubt this will last long.
I don’t think Horizon can control what ANYBODY does with existing stock from orders prior to their takeover of Athearn. After the takeover may be a different story.
This is interesting as I was in my “other” LHS the other week and they too had opted out of dealing direct with Horizon. Reason being Horizon not only wanted reference checks, notarised bank statements and credit ratings they also wanted direct access to bank accounts to inspect the books and see what the turnover was. So what they decided to do is bring in Athearn via Canadian distributors. So my question is: Is my LHS an authorized dealer? Not that it matters as the more I here about Horizon the more I seek to do business with other manufacturers.
I spent many years in commercial credit, and that’s pretty standard activity that should be done on an annual basis. I imagine that most LHS’s are not large enough to be tracked through the standard credit agencies like Dun & Bradstreet, so they need to be approached on an individual basis and asked for disclosure of this sort of financial information. It’s just common sense from a seller’s standpoint to know your re-sellers. The last thing you want to do is sell inventory to a retailer that might evaporate next month. Bankruptcy proceedings often net very little on the dollar for unsecured creditors.
You can’t fault Horizon for doing something that ALL industries do as a standard (and prudent) business practice.
Yep! The cold realities of modern business practices includes the model railroad world. Obviously Horizon is trying to “legally” protect its interest but it looks like they’re taking a bit of a “Union Pacific” style strong arm approach, sad to say.[V][8)]
I’ve recently purchased an Athearn U33B and several FP45s ONLY because no one else makes decent versions of these models. Now I have to invest more money just to replace the motors with low current drawingMashimas and the wheels with NWSLs to get them ready for DCC/Sound. I’m not planning on purchasing anymore Athearns in the future and in fact may put some of my older Athearns for sale on Ebay as I get more of the higher quality “PAKS” units. (Proto, Atlas, Kato, Stewart).
Still, I’m not putting down Athearns, they’re a great bang-for-the-buck! [;)][:D][8D] Hopefully Horizon doesn’t make it too difficult for businesses. I’ve already heard an LHS rep say that if he gets “goosed around by Horizon” with their demands, he’ll cut them loose as the IM, Atlas, and other RTR lines sell well in his shop. [8D]
I don’t think Horizon can stop Hobby Shops from selling on e bay.Once a Hobby Shop pays any distributor it becomes the Hobby Shops own to do as they wish-even give it away if the hobby shop owner wishes to…
Now with all the hatred there is against Horizons buyout of Athearn and MDC there is a lot of BS going around including from hobby shop owners that can not get credit due to their bad credit ratings with other distributors.No hobby shop owner is going to tell his customers that he has a bad credit rating.Shops like these MUST PAY CASH UP FRONT ON DELIVERY.Their orders come COD.No cash- no order simple as that.
Now to look good in front of his customers he will put the blame on Horizon or any other distributor including Walthers that refuses to give that shop credit…You ever wonder why it might take weeks to get your order? How about the old standby-It’s back ordered even though (Say) Walther’s shows it in stock? Then you have hobby shops that are slow pay.Of course slow pay is frown upon by any distributor has it ties up the Distributor’s money…The reason I know this is because I have work in hobby shops part time and I also know at least 3 shops that has bad credit…As their orders come COD…
So,I would not get fired up over a letter that might be a hoax…
A company can set rules for re-sellers of their product. An excellent example can be found in the toy train business. Re-sellers of the Learning Curve brand Thomas The Tank wooden trains were held to very strict rules concerning retail pricing. Stores were limited in the number of days per year that they could put the product on sale. I think they were allowed 2 weeks of sale per year. In simple terms, if you did not agree to the re-seller agreement, you did not get to be a re-seller.
Well,I can still get Athearn at discount prices including the new releases at 3 discount hobby shops-I would say local but,they’re not so local seeing it requires a hours drive.
So,then this would be in the agreement? I never heard of that and up to last year I worked part time in a hobby shop.Interesting…Learn something new every day.[:D]
This is essentially what this is all about. Net Enforcers did not only just recently go into business for Horizon. They’ve been around awhile becuase this is a fairly common practice. They’ve been doing it for many other companies. Horizon ain’t the first. In fact, they’re coming pretty late to the game. Further, Ebay didn’t establi***hat guideline (#3)) for Horizon. It’s been around awhile, again because it’s a fairly common practice.
I have a couple of questions though. Is this letter real? From what I see, it’s pure hearsay at the moment. The guy who posted it at Trainorders is known to have a very strong dislike for Athearn and their products. He has a long history of it. They’re constantly jabbing him over at Trainorders over his boycott of Athearn. You’d be very hardpressed to find a post from him that says anything complimentary (unless it’s done in sarcasm) about Athearn. I have serious reservations about his objectivity about most any mfgr, and not just Athearn, based on most of his posts there. This letter could indeed be very real, but considering the source makes it less than a certain bet. Many of the others who jumped all over that thread were also themselves guys who already don’t buy Athearn products or don’t buy through Ebay. None of that makes sense to me. If you don’t buy Athearn products or don’t buy off of Ebay or other such auctionsites, it’s not affecting you,.so why would you even bother to care? Besides, Horizon is not doing anything immoral or illegal. I’m not saying you have to like such business practices, personally I don’t either. But I’m in the hobby to enjoy it as a hobby, not to worry about business practices that don’t affect me. Enjoy the hobby and back to the modeling!
Such a reservation is legally useless. Unless Horizon can prove that the products were stolen, AND the consumer knew it, they have to honor their warranties if the product was supplied by Horizon (or companies that it has acquired) into “commerce.” Leastawise, that’s how I read Title 15, Chapter 50, U.S. Code
How the case law bears on this, that I don’t know. As for any company attempting to control how its products are sold, well, they can try, but not always succeed. They can only control their own merchandising materials (logos, trademarks, slogans, etc), not the product itself. So, somebody can put a picture they took themselves, along with their own written description, up on E-Bay.
It is designed as a measure to keep controls over distribution and sales from retailers. There are many sellers on Ebay that are stores using the site for sell their merchandise that are not Horizon Authorized. An individual seller is within his right to resell what he wants, as long as he doesn’t misrepresent the item as NEW. By definition, it may be in an new in an unopened box, but if you buy it retail and sell it, it is used. Just like a car. It becomes used the minute you cross the boundary of the dealership. So combined with stricter production runs to tighten the surplus, they clamp down on the EBay only retailers, trying to make Horizon distribution the only way to go if you want to sell Athearn. Dougal they’re not going to come after you unless you go into business selling NEW Athearn products. And if they did, the courts would toss em on their butts.
To reiterate one point: it is NEW if it has never been sold at retail. If a gadfly liquidator purchases the entire inventory of a shop that is closing, then sells it on E-Bay, it is new product, regardless of whether or not the seller is “authorized” by Horizon, and Horizon can’t touch the liquidator except with regards to unauthorized use of merchandising materials.
Guys,If you check into this you will see what it really means…I can not get on e bay and sell Athearn or any of the product lines that Horizon carries and state 'Authorized Horizon Dealer" when in all truth I am not. and use their logo in the process…That applies to Lionel as well…I can not say I am a Authorized Lionel seller or License repair shop if I am not and use the famous Lionel logo in my ad…
Please read the following carefully. http://www.netenforcers.com/
