The Bizarre Dahua North American Tour
Dahua = Great affordable products with terrible sales strategy and distriubtion channel control. The USA team seems to be as clueless if not more clueless than the Chinese team.
Is the USA sales team staffed or directly controlled by either imported personnel or overseas personnel? I'm wondering if there is a culture issue.
This is all about culture.
In my limited interaction with Hikvision and Dahua, I get the impression that Hikvision has people who understand low-context culture, who have apparently been raised and/or educated in Europe or the US. I have yet to meet someone at Dahua who fits this description.
It would be interesting to hear if other IPVM members share this impression.
"I have yet to meet someone at Dahua who fits this description."
Agreed. Hikvision is much farther advanced in its 'Westernization' of its international sales force. Dahua seems to be aware of the challenge, e.g., Dahua Massive American Expansion but still struggling to get there.
Why has another company not purchased Dahua and set up proper distribution in the US?
Who can afford to buy Dahua???
"Dahua is worth $7 billion USD, more than twice what Canon paid for Axis."
I've argued the opposite that Dahua should purchase a big Western brand, e.g., Why Dahua Should Acquire Pelco
Not for nothing, but it's high time they hire that local yokel to edit copy. Or at least someone who knows that Texas is not O.K.
For real.
I think most of the country thinks Oklahoma is essentially North Texas anyway.
Source: I'm native
Were you thinking of attending any of these rodeos?
Could be a rare chance to interact with some Dahuan Corporate Execs. Assuming that this is not just an Automated Outlet deal featuring product by Dahua.
But based on the copy of the announcement it sounds like the real McCoy...
There are many Texans, particularly those from Austin, who consider Oklahoma to be southern Kansas, at best.
I would go to something like this if they had it in Michigan and it was within a 30 minute drive. I would probably not stay for the "Farwell" portion of the event since it looks like it is practically a full day. That is a lot to ask of people time wise with no real draw other than lunch and a chance at “Lucky Draw”.
I believe the chance at the traditional "Lucky Draw" is in addition to the guaranteed gift, both of which I expect to receive in quadruplicate.
As Brian can no doubt attest, this road show is proceeding at quite a leisurely pace; a cattle drive from Oil City down to Big D might be quicker than four days.
Yeah I thought the whole thing was a weird but was curious enough to sign up for the Dallas (aka Lewisville ??) "tour". We'll see how it goes. I have to say that all of the tours are fairly far from the nearest airport... whoever planned this did not take out-of staters into consideration.
Although, I have to say I have not received confirmation so I am a bit worried about making plans and then having to cancel them.
"I have to say that all of the tours are fairly far from the nearest airport... whoever planned this did not take out-of staters into consideration."
Wow, that is commitment! They better give you a prize :)
From what I can tell, it is at Automated Outlet's office / warehouse, not an actual hotel meeting room, like this is normally done.
The Lewisville location looks like a small office in a strip warehouse area:
Had my first experience with "Dahua USA" the other day. A lady calls me up and leaves a voicemail explaining that she is looking for distributors in my area to sell Dahua products, she apparently didnt take time to look at our website before calling because she explained who Dahua was, she even spelled out their name for me. So I call her up, nice lady, but obviously was just a telemarketer of some sort who really had no clue. So she directed me to the "Southern Regional Manager". I explained how long we have been dealing with Dahua products, how we started out, and even explained to him some of the large distributors that we have purchased from in the past years. When I told him some of the names of these companies, he had no clue who they were and even a person with the slightest bit of knowledge would know these companies.
At any rate he finally said that he already has an exlusive distributor of Dahua products for Texas and Oklahoma, "Automated Outlet". I said how much of a foolish business decision it was to grant exclusivity to a small company such as this and block out everyone else, even potential larger buyers, in such a large market. He said "Oh well, they gave me a [purchasing] number and numbers dont lie".
So from what I understand, if you want to be an exlusive distributor for an area. All you have to do is have first contact with them and verbally give them a number and your good to go. Genius marketing strategy.
So from what I understand, if you want to be an exlusive distributor for an area. All you have to do is have first contact with them and verbally give them a number and your good to go.
Thanks. On the phone attempting to secure the entire L.A. basin. ;)
If it is this hard to just buy the products I could only imagine how difficult the RMA process will be. Thanks but no thanks we will stick with Hikvision for cost effective products.
Good point. Have you found Hik's RMA process to be reliable, time after time?
If they keep the RMA process like they have it now, they will rely on the distributor to deal with integrators/customers RMA issues for Dahua
I actually have not received an acknowledgement from them although I registered twice now. Anyone else have that problem?
When I registered they showed me a pop up that read "Registration Succeeded!" and that they would send me an email later, but I have not got it yet either.
Undisclosed C & E, you are both more than welcome to print my unserialized ticket to present for dog and pony admission. Fortunately I signed up for all 4 shows. Here's a cleaned up untraceable copy, suitable for framing:
You can have the gift but, I call dibs on the Lucky Chance if it hits...
It's a lookin' like a BBQ with all the fixins now:
Southern hospitality, Dahua style...
Is that from a new email or? Anything else new in it? Other dates? Cities?
Did they figure out that Oklahoma is not a county in Texas?
Tulsa's a BBQ. Dallas may be a Rodeo, dunno. They seem kinda serious about the whole 'bring your ticket' thingy. I guess as long as you can prove you're a Sir or Madam you can use this one....
Apparently they cut 2 hours off the tail of the presentation as well, now ending at 2:00 instead of 4:00, possibly impacting the q&a and lucky draw!
Update from Automated Outlet:
Just to set the record straight, we ended our relationship with Dahua in December. Too many issues to discuss on this forum be we determined it was in our best interest to end the relationship.
Martin Custer, President, Automated Outlet
Hahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahah
Wow, this is amazing. BRB I need to go make some popcorn...
I hope Dahua is reading this. Michael, Tim, Lydia, Duke- you guys remember any of the advice I gave you? Seems not based on this thread's comments!
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