Welcome back to another installment of our 37th Annual Dealer Survey. In this issue, you’ll learn about dealers’ biggest challenges and how they rate their A3, A4, production print, print management and ECM/document management providers, and their leasing partners.
From our perspective, the most interesting part of the Survey is the comments that explain dealers’ A3, A4, and leasing company ratings. Not every dealer includes a comment to explain their ratings, but many do, and as you will see by the representative—and sometimes colorful—comments in those three Survey sections, dealers pull no punches. If a dealer has an issue with a manufacturer, real or imagined, that issue is likely to find its way into the comments.
Not surprisingly, one issue stood out in the comments, and that was backorders. Even OEMs with a reputation for doing a good job of managing backorders took some hits from their dealers. Unsurprisingly, backorders are a topic subscribers have asked us to write more about. They especially want to know when these problems will end. The challenge is, having something new to say on the topic. No matter whom we speak with, there is no definitive timeframe as to when things will get better. There is a fair amount of conjecture, but like the title of the Chicago song, “Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?”, no one knows when backorder problems will be completely eradicated. It’s all guesstimates. For those hoping we will publish the exact day things return to normal, your guess is as good as ours.
By the time you read this, we will have announced the winners of our 37th Annual Awards. To find out “The Best” in 13 different categories, visit www.thecannatareport.com to view the winners or watch the November 11th episode of Fridays with Frank.
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You can also go back to the previous page and read the stories featured in the issue directly on our website, which follows this edition of HARD COPY | From the Editor’s Desk in our MAGAZINE section.
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