Do I need to buy stock in United Hardware?
- Yes, if you want to become an equity "member-dealer".
What is the stock purchase requirement?
- Voting Stock - $69.00 a share at $50.00 a share.
- Class A Stock - Purchase shares based on 2% warehouse purchases; Capped at $75,000.00 or 10 years.
What is your cost of goods?
- Warehouse - plus a low percentage adder
- Ship Direct - 0% on truckloads, 1% over $500.00, 2% under $500.00 for equity dealers.
- 2% accross the board for non-equity dealers.
Do you belong to a buying group?
- Yes, we are a member of Distribution America with $2.2 billion in buying power.
What brand of paint do you have?
- We carry Valspar and Cabot.
Do you give rebates?
- Rebates are declared, for equity "member-dealers", after year-end by the Board of Directors.
- Paid based on warehouse purchases.
- Usually paid 50% cash and 50% with 3 year interest bearing note.
- Not guaranteed - based on United's profitability.
- Valspar/Hank's Paint rebates are 3% - 100% cash.
Can I buy product from other specialty suppliers?
- Yes, in fact we encourage our dealers to be "Market Specific" and in doing so often need to buy from other sources.
Where is your warehouse?
- Milbank, South Dakota - 40 acres, 400,000 sq. ft. - high cube building
Do you have a "National Advertising Charge"?
Do you have any "Automatic" montly charges?
- One, a Web Access fee of $15.00 per month.
- Hardware Hank stores have a monthly advertising fee of $60.00 which includes the Web Access fee.
- All other dealer services are elective.
Do I have to use your Corporate Circulars?
- No, however we do offer a wide variety of Corporate Circulars, Special Event Circulars, Dealer Choice Circulars, as well as Ranch and Pet Circulars.
- Our Dealers Choice Circular is a winner and used by many of our dealers. It is up to 100% customized for your retail unit. You can have it your way.
Do you tell me what products I have to stock?
- No,you make that choice.
- We do offer a service called the RPM/Category Selection process. This is a process where we conduct a market survey of purchase potential, demographics, shop your competition for retail price and category space. After which, we review the results and then go through a Category Selection process for your store.
- We have suggested plan-o-grams of different sizes for every category.
How many items do you stock?
- Depending on the time of year, anywhere from 52,000 to 65,000.
Do I have to order full packs?
- Some of our items do have f-pack ordering points but over 90% of our products can be ordered by the each
- No up charge for ordering by the each.
How do I order product?
- Telxon, MSI, POS, or Internet.
What kind of catalog do you have?
- Paper, CD Rom, or Internet.
What is your fill rate?
- The average Corporate Service level is 95.5%.
Do you have field support?
- Yes, a District Manager will be assigned to your store.
Do I need a POS system?
- No, but if you have one chances are real good that we can communicate with it.
Do you have buying markets?
- Yes, one in January and one in June at the Minneapolis Convention Center.
What are your terms?
- Statements are sent to stores on the 1st and 16th of the month.
- Merchandise shipped and invoiced on the 1st through the 15th are due on the 25th of the month.
- Goods shipped and invoiced on the 16th to the end of the month are due on the 10th of the month.