The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk Caveat Emptor: Let The Buyer Beware (LMC)

Hope you guys learn from my oversights........

I bought a bunch of parts for my '65 Chevy from LMC before Christmas. I competitively checked prices on all of the items before placing the order except for the rear coil springs. The springs were $170.

When I got the parts the quality of everything looked good. The springs had a "CPP" Classic Performance Products sticker on them. I looked them up on the internet, the springs were $100.00

A $70 mark-up by LMC? What the ?@#!!

I called them, informed them of the 70% mark-up and asked them what they could do to make it right? The gal snapped back "we don't do price matching!".

I sent the coil springs back to LMC and bought them from CPP.

Even though I had to eat the shipping charges I still recouped some of my losses.

Now I fully understand that this is my bad, I should have checked around. But I still feel that LMC is price gouging on this item. There are a lot of other options for pieces parts; you can bet I won't pick LMC as my first choice in the future.

Good to know, John. Just shows everyone you have to do your home work.

There is alot of drop shipping even from a good outfit like Jim Carter. I bought brake lines from JC that were from Inline Tube,BUT JC charged exactly the same. It is wise to cross check catalogs.

Most drop shippers charge the same as the source company. The source company sets a suggested selling price so that all of their seller can compete equally.

I have found LMC to be very high on shipping and handling. 20% of the total cost seems outrageous to me. That's approx. what I have experienced from them.

I have bought a lot of parts for 54 from LCM and only part that i was disappointed with was the insulation kit. the sound deadener was paper and tar and it was dried out and cracked and the upholsterer refused to use it. i just threw it away. ron

I've never dealt with LMC but let me play the devil's advocate for a bit. We live in a capitalistic country, making a profit is the name of the game. If LMC buys the springs for $100 and then sells them for $100 they won't be in business long. Does LMC pay the full $100? Beats me but if they get a discount I doubt it's much. Two friends of mine have a local hotrod shop, selling dress up & performance parts. When they buy from another dealer (Moon Eyes, King of Dice, etc.) they get 10% off of retail. By the time they pay shipping and overhead they are breaking even on those parts but they carry them as a service to their customers. Is a 70% mark up excessive? I don't think so. What little dealings I've had with retail sales showed me that a 100% mark up is common. Had LMC not left the CPP sticker on the springs you'd be happy with the purchase. Understand I'm not banging on you for getting a better price. I am saying, however, that you don't necessarily want to vilify LMC for wanting to make a profit on what they sell.

i have bought plenty from LMC, but also all of the other catalog houses that everyone knows about and uses. LMC is rarely the cheapest. But I find myself doing research on their site which has nice exploded-view pictorials and it is always easy to find the part i need - sometimes i don't know the name of the part i am looking for.

someone at LMC developed that site, wrote the code, set up the layout and links, etc. And it surely wasn't free. So from time to time I purchase from them to support their enterprise. they have made my restoration easier by publishing the information that they do - if no-one buys from them they will of course go belly-up and we all lose a resource.

my 2-cents anyway...

I agree

Been at this for about five years now and found LMC to be high on a lot of things. I've narrowed it down to what I call my "Big Four", JC, Chevs of the 40's, Filling Station and Classic Parts of America. That said, I find just like Jewel or Dominic’s that where one is cheaper on one item the will be higher one another.
So if your really pinched for coin then you can spend the day matching prices and in the end you will probably have to send an order to all of them to get the best price. I’ve also found on a large order, one will carry part of what I want but I'll have to go to all the others to complete my order. Generally what I do now is just pick out the one that carries most of the items to fill my order regardless of price. It all seems to balance out in the end.
I was going to order add a steering gear rebuild kit to an order with The Filling Station and noticed their price was nearly twice what Jim Carter’s was. Thinking that the kit from Jim Carter had to be short some parts to sell it that cheap, I called them. The answer was that they made up the kits and the other vendor was buying the kits from them.
So you see, it’s not just LMC marking up parts, they all are trading back and forth to fill out their catalog listing. I suppose the vendors just can’t get a discount on some items because they only have one source and they have to mark them up. After all, they are in business to make money.
Denny Graham

100% mark-up is not unusual for car parts...just go to a new car dealer parts department. Anyway, I am just starting my resoration slowly and am almost complete with restoring the speedo and cluster. I was going to order from LMC (because of their nice catalog I have at home). Anyway, the did not have a part or tow for the speedo, so I went over to Classic Parts and found ALL the restoration parts needed at a $20 or more overall savings. So, I did the price comparison. Some parts were more or less at each place, but in the end I order from the place that had EVERYTHING I needed.

Also, if you are penny pinching for parts then, you have no business doing a restoration. Nothing is really cheap here.

SAY WHAT?

Another thing to keep in mind is Jim Carter offers a 5% discount for online orders and Classic Parts offers 10% by typing in the promo code STOVEBOLT when you order. That knocked $40 off the price of a reproduction grill I recently bought from them.

Now that sounds like a good body swap...

We all use the term penny pinching pretty loosely somtimes I think. But I don't call it penny pinching when one place has a metal bracket for $20 that I can get at another place for $10.50

Yes its good to be able to get all your stuff at one time if you can and from the same vendor. Making a lot of orders from different places no on wins but the post office or other carrier.

Bottom line is what someone said earlier. Do you homework and check the bottom line.

I don't penny pinch,but when your main source of parts is a 1/3rd of the way round the world,every 'penny' counts.

Things can get really expensive really quick!

>Things can get really expensive really quick!<

You just made my point, restoration isn't cheap!

I see your point but I was referring to overseas shipping,import duty and here they also slap V.A.T.(Value added tax)on at 20% of the value of the goods.

I bought a Flexlite fan for my engine and by the time it was here i'd paid more than double the cost of the part just to get it over......

So in my eye it pays to shop around to get the best deal.

OK, been waiting to tell this story. I would like some feedback even if you don't think I want to hear it.
Got my parts list together after shopping from several catalogs. Finally decided to get everything from LMC including a tie rod that was listed at 419.00 and was on sale everywhere else for 29.99. I told the girl that it must be a mistake, she said abruptly, '419.00 is the correct price ".... I asked her to check with a anyone, maybe a supervisor since the part was 390 dollars more than anyone else. She said again, that was the correct price.
I wrote a letter and asked for an explanation and a response. Nothing in 1 year and a half. I did notice the part came down to 379.00 dollars on the next issue. In each catalog it came down some more. Now it is 65 ish. Check it out and double check me. Look at the 47-54 tie rod. Check out the 55-62 tie rod. I think it is the exact same part. It is 29.95. I know Classic sells it for 34.95 Mmmmm. To me it sounded like no one cares there. Maybe it will turn out ok, maybe it won't.

Why would you buy from LMC when your own research shows they are price gouging?

Why not buy from Classic Parts when your own research shows they have better pricing?

EarnestT....you don't say for sure but did you buy the parts from LMC? Or everything but the tie rod? or did you split the order?

I think we all experience the senario you describe at one time or another. It seems I get a different person every time at some places. As for ME I don't shop at LMC.

Its not just LMC though. I run across it from Mo. to Ca.

Just recently I ordered some parts from Classic. They had everything I wanted except for the little $4 mirror brakket and would have to back order it. I ask the lady would they charge me the additional shipping.....immediately she answered NO. I said are you sure about that? She said YES. Still leery I asked "would you check on it please". Dead silence for about 20 seconds then she came back on and said YES there would be the usual shipping charge. I told her to forget the bracket. Had I not been suspicious I would have took her first answer "no" and ordered the bracket. Then I'd have been ticked and had a bad attitude myself for being charged for additional shipping. What would they have done about it when I called to complain? Nothing, which in essence is calling me a liar when I tell them I was told by their employee there would not be any additonal charges. I've gotten to the point I feel like telling them "this call may be recorded for quality purposes".... and actually do it.

Turns out she had only been working there 6 months.

You are right, Alvin: Sometime ago I asked a James Carter employee if they still offer free shipping on orders over $350.00
She said James Carter has NEVER offered free shipping.
I understood immediately that she hasn't been working there that long, for I recall once placing an order years ago and I got free shipping on that particular order, which was almost $400.00

One of the things about being a 'Bolter is being able to do it yourself. The point of DIY is to save a buck. I know plenty of people who do restorations with deep pockets who would have paid $420 for that tie rod when they could just as easily have got it for $30. They don't care. They got deep pockets!

For those of us on budgets however, we look at prices for parts. As has already been stated, you are responsible for your own research and homework, whether it be parts prices, assembly procedures, or historical accuracy of your vehicle. It's your truck and your experience restoring it!

The best part about stovebolt.com is we share information we learn from our projects.

I am someone who shops around the different vendors, and I have learned to bundle as many parts together as possible. Sometimes we make bad buying decisions; that's part of the learning process.