[asterisk-biz] Why so many international customers ask for free samples

[Trixter aka Bret McDanel]

On Mon, 2008-10-27 at 13:49 -0400, Steve Totaro wrote:
> To an extent yes, but he is not selling minutes, he is selling
> hardware (as far as I know).
> 
> Using the terms "VoIP isn't a single sale" is misleading since he is
> selling phones or whatever, which very well may be a single batch
> sale.
> 

oh its hardware?  that is even more likely to attract people who ask for
samples.  Its a hardware engineering thing, call up mouser, digikey, or
any of the other top 10 global component resellers, call up
manufacturers such as Ti, they all have a samples department.
Fortunately for me there was a Mouser right by the college I went to and
their samples department basically gave me more than enough stuff back
then to make some neat toys :)  So yes it does get abused, but generally
its seen as a cost of doing business in such firms.  

However end user retail goods generally do not get samples the same way,
for some its like Sun where you try before you buy, basically you clear
credit and all that, and if you like the system after your term (90 days
or it used to be) you had to send it back or pay for it.  Sure they run
the risk of the type of crowd getting the big screen just before hte big
game and returning it just after, but that is why sun runs credit and
sees how many systems you can demo this way.


-- 
Trixter http://www.0xdecafbad.com     Bret McDanel
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