I’ve been a straight dope lurker for a long time. I am having a problem.
I am trying to find a conveyor belt system for handling apples. You’d think it would be as easy as searching online, comparing prices, and buying, but NO. All of the sites just list their product and specifications and force you to jump through huge hoops just to find out their pricing!
Also I am looking for the pricing of a complete alcohol distillation system for industrial uses (like a size a small brewery could use). Does anyone know any good makes and the prices? Same for a Mash tank.
Then my last question: WHY do these companies intentionally make it more difficult to buy their products? It seems to me that if I was one of them I would just list prices, and avoid wasting my time answering calls on pricing, and also people would be attracted to not jumping through so many unnessecary hoops. What is the purpose?
They do a lot of on site checks to help design a system that works for the producers. All the work they put in and how much you buy, is used to quote you a price. They also consider how much after delivery service you’ll want. They will come and try to correct problems on systems they design and install. Equipment that doesn’t nedd all that service added, still changes in cost quickly and a quote is good for a short period of time. Trying to keep a web site with all prices correct is alot of work. Talking to a person at the company they will be able to tell you the best products for the use, and know of thing you don’t. Much of the equipment needs details added to finish it off for a customer also.
It is common for specialty suppliers to refuse to list prices. The reasons are numerous but they aren’t a grocery store. They probably want to understand the customers exact needs and work on a custom solution that works best. They may also have different types of customers with different types of pricing. That is common for certain wholesalers and it means they can’t just hand out price lists to people.
Most small scale factories buy that stuff at auction after a plant closes. It still costs several thousand to make it work in your plant (or a really good plant operations man), but almost no one buys new.
This type of stuff like it or not is all custom work. Much of it is pretty modular so the comapnies that deal with it and install it can do some pretty cool stuff but there is rarely any kind of “standard” equipement to any type of materials handling solution.
Another factor that may be at play is that it may be illegal to distill liquor for personal use in many places, and the process of distilling alcohol is controlled by federal and state laws.
Depending on what you get, you can save half a million on some equipment. The manufacture reps come out and help you get the stuff working too. They know you’ll be buying parts from them for the set up and maintance.
I’ve worked for a company that refused to put prices on some standard, fixed price items, under the philosophy that “If you would ever buy, you don’t care that there’s a price listed, but by making you call us for a quote we can use our BA degrees in sales and hook you in”. If you ask me, the most retarded policy ever and the company shortly went bankrupt, partly because of it’s utter inability to get anybody to call.
It’s the same type of reasoning that makes people put a for sale sign on a car with a phone number only. If you refuse to put a price on, you just lost a sale to me.
Industrial equipment isn’t the same as a car, though. It’s probably impossible to price a conveyor system without knowing the specifics. A customer who knows what they want will be able to tell vendors pretty much exactly what they need, and will be able to get competing bids based on that. No one is going to have a listing like the following:
conczepts1 apple conveyor system: $5
No, conczepts1 is going to have to contact the vendor and say: I need to convey 5,000 lbs of apples per hour a distance of 3,000 ft and up 35 ft, food service grade and including all supports and controls, and I have 460 V 3 phase power available. And that’s just to start. In any event, conczepts1 is going to have to provide that information, plus much more, in order to get an accurate price.
The vast majority of suppliers won’t sell complete systems to end users, because there’s no such thing as a complete system that a supplier can sell you, unless that supplier is also a systems integrator. Suppliers that aren’t systems integrators need to hire out systems integration work, or they sell directly to systems integrators. Some end users (big, biG, BIG ones) do their own systems integration, but those types of customers aren’t looking for prices on public websites, but rather they have their own system to procure prices from potential suppliers.
What you want to buy is a conveyance system; not merely a conveyor.
I would just like to add that I’m not totally sure what the OP has in mind with this particular equipment, but I think that I would like to sample the finished product.
If the OP is interested in fermenting equipment instead of distilling equipment any good brewery supplier should be able to point you in the right direction. Northern Brewer sells stainless steel equipment like conical fermenters and such. If the OP’s needs are on a more micro-brewery scale they at least might be able to direct you to the right place.
That, or go find a brew pub and ask them where they got their stuff.
Again, distillation is illegal, fermentation for personal consumption is not (within x hundred gallons per year normally).