1980s mail order and "Allow six to eight weeks for delivery" - why so slow?

Factual Questions
1

We live in wonderful times now. I can order a computer part from Newegg, a shirt from Lands End. or some books from Amazon, and it’ll usually arrive at my door in lexx than a week from the time I ordered it.

Before the Internet, though, if you purchased something through a mail order catalog, delivery took what seemed like forever; maybe two to three weeks for something from L.L. Bean, and much longer for most. In commercials for Ronco gadgets, compilation albums, and anything else begging the viewer to call 1-800-something to order, the last weeks of the voiceover were almost always “Allow six to eight weeks for delivery.”

Yes, I know logistics have advanced quite a bit in recent years, but isn’t eight weeks a long time to way for that ZZ Top album to arrive after I called 1-800-HOT-ROCK? Was everybody working in the 1-800-HOT-ROCK warehouse in their 90s, with the album delivered on a tramp steamer that rounded Cape Horn on its trip from LA to the East Coast? I’m not asking why mail/phone order delivery is so fast now; rather, I’d like to know why it was so slow back in the 1980s.

2

When the guy you send your check to sends your order to the guy that actually makes the stuff you order, after your check clears his bank, and then he picks up the stuff, and mails it to you parcel post, you don’t promise what you probably can’t deliver.

Vertically integrated marketing systems are a new concept. In the eighties, most merchandise was paid for at the retailer, and taken immediately from existing stock. The cash and carry transaction ws more reliable for everyone.

Tris

3

Here’s a secret. A lot of that stuff you ordered? It didn’t exist.

They’d wait until the orders came in. With the money. Then they’d make up a batch and send them out.

If the orders didn’t come in, it would be “out of stock” and you’d get your money back. Sometimes.

But it didn’t make sense for them to make up a product and incur huge warehousing fees to hold on to it for weeks or months, or worse not sell it at all.

Now obviously not everything worked this way. Much of it was in somebody’s warehouse, and got sent out after the check cleared. But if you were told to allow six to eight weeks, you didn’t get hot and bothered and call the Better Business Bureau or the State Attorney General if nothing showed up in your mailbox in a month.

IOW, everything about the ad was put in to protect the seller in one way or another. As magicians know, the part that seems to make it tough is what allows the trick to work.

4

If I might be permitted a minor (yet related) hijack, why do things from Cashbacks or Manufacturer’s Redemptions take so long to arrive? If you buy a $1200 laptop and ComputerCo is offering a $100 cashback, why does it take 3 months for them to write you a cheque?

I realise the cashback money is probably on the short term money market or something, but even so, 3 months seems like quite a long time to write and mail a cheque for something like $100…

5

[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase]
Here’s a secret. A lot of that stuff you ordered? It didn’t exist.

They’d wait until the orders came in. With the money. Then they’d make up a batch and send them out.

If the orders didn’t come in, it would be “out of stock” and you’d get your money back. Sometimes.

But it didn’t make sense for them to make up a product and incur huge warehousing fees to hold on to it for weeks or months, or worse not sell it at all.

Now obviously not everything worked this way. Much of it was in somebody’s warehouse, and got sent out after the check cleared. But if you were told to allow six to eight weeks, you didn’t get hot and bothered and call the Better Business Bureau or the State Attorney General if nothing showed up in your mailbox in a month.

IOW, everything about the ad was put in to protect the seller in one way or another. As magicians know, the part that seems to make it tough is what allows the trick to work.
[/QUOTE]

Sorry, but I must call PURE. FUCKIN. BULLSHIT. on this charge. Cite, please.

6

It didn’t just happen then. This may shock you, but I am aging. I heard and read good things about Bare Escentuals. I wanted to try them. I called the infomercial number. If I wanted “expedited” shipping it was an exorbitant amount, other than that, guess how long? 4-6 weeks for processing.

I worked for an infomercial company. When I was there, they were making/marketing their own, however, in years past, they had sold such items as “Girls Gone Wild” through infomercials. I’ve never known the company to have a warehouse, they always had a few of whatever they were selling in the office, but from what I can tell, they took the orders/money and then bought them through either through the company that manufactured them or through some sort of procurement center. Maybe like a drop-ship. (You buy from me, I buy from someone else who ships it to you)

It was kinda funny to see the stuff around the office like George Foreman grills, Video Professor, GGW, etc. We’d come across boxes with all sorts of odd stuff in 'em.

7

[QUOTE=Triskadecamus]
Vertically integrated marketing systems are a new concept. In the eighties, most merchandise was paid for at the retailer, and taken immediately from existing stock. The cash and carry transaction ws more reliable for everyone.
[/QUOTE]

What is a “vertically integrated marketing system”?

8

[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase]
Here’s a secret. A lot of that stuff you ordered? It didn’t exist.

They’d wait until the orders came in. With the money. Then they’d make up a batch and send them out.

If the orders didn’t come in, it would be “out of stock” and you’d get your money back. Sometimes.

But it didn’t make sense for them to make up a product and incur huge warehousing fees to hold on to it for weeks or months, or worse not sell it at all.

Now obviously not everything worked this way. Much of it was in somebody’s warehouse, and got sent out after the check cleared. But if you were told to allow six to eight weeks, you didn’t get hot and bothered and call the Better Business Bureau or the State Attorney General if nothing showed up in your mailbox in a month.

IOW, everything about the ad was put in to protect the seller in one way or another. As magicians know, the part that seems to make it tough is what allows the trick to work.
[/QUOTE]

What? I’d like to see a cite for this. The Wiki article on just-in-time manufacturing says that the goal is to have enough merchandise to meet current sales demand without having a bunch of stuff sitting in a warehouse. In other words, if Ronco knows it can sell 100 Pocket Fishermen in a week based on historical trends, it’ll keep 100 Pocket Fishermen on hand to fill current orders. Next week, they’ll have made another 100 to fill that week’s demand. Special orders may have to be built on demand, and some technologies such as CD or DVD duplication permit immediate on-demand manufacture, but for the most part, the goal is to have enough on hand to be able to fill current order needs.

The Federal Trade Commission requires all companies who offer goods for sale through some means of telecommunication or by mail to complete the sale within 30 days, or offer the customer a new ship date, to which the customer can either consent to the delay or cancel the order. Otherwise, you can make a statement as to when you can reasonably expect to ship the product, which is where the “wait six to eight weeks for delivery” comes in. This is under their Mail or Telephone Order Merchandise Rule. This rule is still in effect.

The reason for the lag time is to permit checks to clear or credit applications to be approved. Of course, payment clearance is now done by computer, and lots of people now have Visa- or Mastercard-branded debit cards, so you can get your Pocket Fisherman faster. True, manufacturers may use the lag to build the product, but that doesn’t appear to be the norm.

Robin

9

Exapno was using the past tense, note.

10

[QUOTE=Usram]
Exapno was using the past tense, note.
[/QUOTE]

I understand that, but the just-in-time philosophy has been around since the turn of the 20th century and apparently hasn’t changed much.

Robin

11

[QUOTE=MsRobyn]
What? I’d like to see a cite for this. The Wiki article on just-in-time manufacturing says that the goal is to have enough merchandise to meet current sales demand without having a bunch of stuff sitting in a warehouse. In other words, if Ronco knows it can sell 100 Pocket Fishermen in a week based on historical trends, it’ll keep 100 Pocket Fishermen on hand to fill current orders. Next week, they’ll have made another 100 to fill that week’s demand.
[/QUOTE]

so what happens if they have a particularly good week and sell 150, but only have 100 in stock? That means that next week they have to make an extra 50 on top of their normal 100. So there’s likely to be a backlog.

12

[QUOTE=Martini Enfield]
If I might be permitted a minor (yet related) hijack, why do things from Cashbacks or Manufacturer’s Redemptions take so long to arrive? If you buy a $1200 laptop and ComputerCo is offering a $100 cashback, why does it take 3 months for them to write you a cheque?
[/quote]
The float.

You answered your own question. Add up all those $100 rebates and bank a few $mil for 3 months, you got yourself a pile of new cash. They hold on to it as long as possible until the customers’ squeals get too loud to ignore.

13

[QUOTE=Auntbeast]
It didn’t just happen then. This may shock you, but I am aging. I heard and read good things about Bare Escentuals. I wanted to try them. I called the infomercial number. If I wanted “expedited” shipping it was an exorbitant amount, other than that, guess how long? 4-6 weeks for processing.

I worked for an infomercial company. When I was there, they were making/marketing their own, however, in years past, they had sold such items as “Girls Gone Wild” through infomercials. I’ve never known the company to have a warehouse, they always had a few of whatever they were selling in the office, but from what I can tell, they took the orders/money and then bought them through either through the company that manufactured them or through some sort of procurement center. Maybe like a drop-ship. (You buy from me, I buy from someone else who ships it to you)

It was kinda funny to see the stuff around the office like George Foreman grills, Video Professor, GGW, etc. We’d come across boxes with all sorts of odd stuff in 'em.
[/QUOTE]

I ordered from their website on, I think, Monday, and if it wasn’t for the holiday I’d get it today.

14

[QUOTE=Musicat]
The float.You answered your own question. Add up all those $100 rebates and bank a few $mil for 3 months, you got yourself a pile of new cash. They hold on to it as long as possible until the customers’ squeals get too loud to ignore.
[/QUOTE]

Some cashbacks are not funded by the person you’re buying from but the manufacturer. So the cheque can be delayed while the make sure you’re a real & genuine customer and not gonna return the goods or otherwise rock the boat.

15

[QUOTE=Peter Morris]
so what happens if they have a particularly good week and sell 150, but only have 100 in stock? That means that next week they have to make an extra 50 on top of their normal 100. So there’s likely to be a backlog.
[/QUOTE]

Then they still have the 30 days to get the extra stock. But since they’ve likely given a wait time of six to eight weeks, they’re still in the clear, at least as far as the FTC is concerned. Besides, stock numbers are determined by historical trends, so they can adjust that as needed.

Robin

16

[QUOTE=essell]
Some cashbacks are not funded by the person you’re buying from but the manufacturer. So the cheque can be delayed while the make sure you’re a real & genuine customer and not gonna return the goods or otherwise rock the boat.
[/QUOTE]
I was under the impression that ALL rebates are funded by the manufacturer. Is that not the case? I don’t see what difference it makes, anyway.

Since many refund policies give 10 or 30 days as the limit, that doesn’t justify holding up a rebate for 90 days. But the float does.

17

As always, The Master has spoken on the subject of rebate processing, at least in the US.

Robin

18

I still have a hard time believing that most mail-order and phone-order before the Internet era involved drop-shipping and waiting for a manufacturer to build the item, while the post-Internet era fully stocked warehouses and one-week shipping are the norm. Was "six to eight weeks’ purely CYA? For those that ordered anything by phone back in the 1980s - what did you order, and how long did it take to arrive?

19

[QUOTE=MsRobyn]
I understand that, but the just-in-time philosophy has been around since the turn of the 20th century and apparently hasn’t changed much.

Robin
[/QUOTE]

The JIT manufacturing methodology didn’t actually get big until Detroit ripped it off from the Japanese, principally Toyota. A big author on this is Taiichi Ohno, a long-time Toyota manager.
You’ll notice most of his books are actually from the mid to late 1980s.

As an aside, back in the ‘80s I’ll submit that not only were your orders not in the vendors’ warehouses, but frequently if they did exist they were in the vendors’ suppliers’ warehouses. Overseas.
When they got your order over the phone, they wrote down your order and sent a weekly fax to the manufacturer, who proceeded to send the product to the US warehouse of the product marketer. I’ll posit that at least some of the time this was via slow boat freight, which could explain most of 6 weeks all by itself.

20

[QUOTE=MsRobyn]
I understand that, but the just-in-time philosophy has been around since the turn of the 20th century and apparently hasn’t changed much.
[/QUOTE]

That doesn’t mean it was used by small catalog retailers. They didn’t.

As Triskadecamus said in post #2, today’s marketing systems are brand new and were not in use in the 1980s.

Post #2 nailed it, but nobody seems to have noticed but me. Please read the entire thread first.