Club Parts Stock.

[The Express Valeter]

I went into the section advertising parts for sale over a week ago & clicked on several items asking costs etc & as of yet had no reply at all!!

[Oli]

Been there, done that!
I know of other people who've experienced this too....

[tony]

yes....
http://www.maestro.org.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=8577

[D87SMW]

Or the simple answer:

Maria doesn't get much chance to sort this out these days. Chris Y might be able to assist you, though.

[Dave]

Guys, give us a chance. We've got tons of stuff and desperately trying to get it archived and sorted - mostly at our own expense and completely in our own time! I'm sure Maria has her reasons, and i'm sure this situation will improve - but in the mean time, please bear with us.

[The Express Valeter]

Will stock be coming to Saloon Day? If so I could possibly get it there.

[Beaker]

Stock doesnt seem to go anywhere

[Dave]

Thanks for your productive comment Lindz. Much appreciated.

[matthewsemple]

Please don't take this as a criticism, but I have suggested in previous years that MMOC bring along spares, etc. to put up for sale at MG Saloon Day which is the biggest gathering of these cars. In the past this has never happened which is disappointing.

I am not sure what the rationale behind this is, but the MMOC committee need to bear in mind that it may appear to ordinary members that the club spares/stock/panel library/decals catalogue, etc. etc. are only available for the benefit of the committee - because every time people ask about this stuff we are told that the committee is too busy to sort it out. Whilst this is understandable, we all have busy lives after all, it is not an acceptable response to give on a long-term basis.

On a personal note, I have bought spares from Maria and regalia from Richard Gelder recently and the response to my e-mails and speed of which I was sent the items was quick and efficient. It seems that other members are not receiving the same service.

[Guest]

i put in a parts request about 6 months ago and have heard nothing. I will put in the same request today and will see what happens.
If more help is needed in sorting out parts then i would be more than happy to help out.

[Dave]

Thanks for the constructive feedback Matt, the problem is the volume of spares that need sorting before we can efficiently sell/move them.

Maria is already working on the organisation problems and has made good progress. The difference in the response times is probably due to what particular part was requested... if it is near the back of the rack it is difficult to get to. Please bear with us, progress is being made.

Thanks for the offer of help mr.Henocsr, we are looking at organising a 'spares' day, in the guise of selling parts, and sorting/cataloguing them... watch this space.

Dave

[Maria]

Firstly, I would like to apologise for not giving the level of service you expect. In the past few months, it's been because I've been spending literally every waking moment completing a project for work. Since then, I can only blame my lack of effective time management. I will try to answer all pending emails today, and keep up a reasonable response time from now on.

The second current barrier to speedy email responses and spares shipping is how the stock is currently held. The pictures below will hopefully give you an idea of why tracking parts down is currently a nightmare if not completely impossible and why bringing parts to events is also out of the question for the time being.

Since getting the Ledbury stock, my house has been the main repository for parts, and since a water leak at New Year which rendered one room upstairs unusable, the parts distribution has got even tighter.

My upstairs main room:



(The large wood panels are to refurnish the camper)

Upstairs "bathroom":





(Yes, that is a toilet hiding under the plastic trim...)

"Dining" room:





And last, the garage - packed literally to the rafters, and stacked 2 racks/boxes deep at the back:







There is a light at the tunnel, however. My Dad has been kind enough to design and fund a new garage, and is building it single-handedly, hence it taking longer than hoped to complete. Currently, this is the garage status:



As soon as the roof goes on, it'll get a lick of paint and then the entire spares stock will be moved in, sorted, photographed, catalogued, priced up, stacked sensibly and put into a new database.

I hope this gives you some idea why the answer to any given "Do you have...?" isn't as simple as yes or no. At the moment, it's likely to be a case of "Probably, but the chances of finding / getting to it are non-existent"

Once again, apologies to anyone whose email I've not answered, or haven't got to promptly. I'll catch up today and keep you posted on how the garage progresses.

[Guest]

After seeing first hand where the parts are kept, Chris, Maria and the rest of the committee have my sympathies on this matter, as there is just so much stuff there! I'd also be happy to lend a hend where I can.

Edit: just seen Maisie's post - that's how I remember it

[E_T_V]

Whilst I can sympathise with Maria and Chris whose entire house is now stuffed to the gills with maestro parts, from a members point of view this problem is nothing new, its been going on for several years now and must be resolved somehow. I'm not going to blame anyone, but I think we all agree that things must be done to resolve the situation.

As members, if there is a problem with storing parts or delivering them to members then we need to know as perhaps some of our members could help in some way. Why hasn't this been raised as an issue to the members?

As I see it there are several key issues.

Space - I know that Chris and Maisie have given over most of their home to maestro parts in a huge gesture of goodwill but in the long term that is obviously not a sustainable solution. Whilst their new mega-garage will obviously help, we need to look at alternatives or strategies for managing their volume.

Organisation - All these parts need cataloguing as a first stab, photographing if possible and then storing somewhere where they can be found easily. This is a vast task that it is unfair to expect 2 people will full time jobs to be able to complete quickly in their limited spare time. This task will require organisation and manpower to achieve.

Selling - Part of the issue is knowing what we have to see which ties in with the above, but also we need to make a concerted effort to sell some of the bigger bulkier items. Why? well it frees up space, it gets the parts into the maestro and montego community where they can be used, and it releases revenue for the club so everyone wins. We don't need to know every single part that we have in order to sell a widget to someone, we just need to know that we still have one in stock for the "archive". Why not put some selected parts up in the magazine that we think will sell quickly, at a price that will attract people to buy them.

My suggestions are:

Investigate storage solutions, perhaps a container somewhere could be used as they did at ledbury. Once the mega garage is water tight then obviously storage is less of an issue perhaps, but there is no point putting anything in there until there is a system in place to catalogue and store it easily, we don't want the same situation to occur again! Whatever happens we are most likely going to need some racking/shelving etc and a storage system that we can work with rather than "I think it is in the back bedroom third pile from the left". How do we fund this as a club? Well sell some of the bulkier items that are near the top of the pile

Next we need a concerted effort and manpower to sort out the stock and store it effectively. A spares day is a fine idea but it needs to be well organised to get the best out of it and of course well attended. We need a dozen people at least to make a dent in the project and this can only occur when there is sufficient space to store the stock once it is catalogued. How do we get a dozen people to spend a day trawling through spares, well we offer them a discount on any spares that they wish to buy from us, say give them 20% off spares purchases for a year, or extend their membership by a year as well as feed and water them with Chris and Marias cooking

To get the best from it beforehand you'd have to put several things in place
1. Storage space
2. Cataloguing system (I'm sure Chris could set up a PC or two for people to punch in part numbers and a location code along with a webcam pic of the item to put on the website as parts are sorted and transferred - I know something has already been developed for this website which is similar)
3. Time - We need a date we can publish well in advance to drum up some interest
4. People - See above. Give people an incentive to come along and have a rummage. Not only should they be able to catalogue a fair chunk of stuff but I'm betting they'll buy some of the stuff there and then. Make an event of it, perhaps looking at other clubs you could do a spares and servicing day, to show people how to service their car or do basic bits and bobs or even how to get a car looking its best. Generate a bit of interest and people will come to have a nosey and before you know it you'll have them sorting and stacking parts!

[Dave]

To quote Maria: "As soon as the roof goes on, it'll get a lick of paint and then the entire spares stock will be moved in, sorted, photographed, catalogued, priced up, stacked sensibly and put into a new database."