Honda online pricing ??

[chickenminer]

I am in need of a new Honda WH15X water pump. Lost my old one in a flood last summer .
What is up with Honda and online sales/pricing ?! Anytime I see a Honda product is says "call for pricing" .
Well for those of us without a phone that is a dang nusiance !!

[Steve Herschbach]

Hi Dick,

Almost all manufactures restrict online advertising in some way. Some allow no price to be displayed. Some allow prices, but dictate a "Minimum Advertised Price" or MAP. So if you shop metal detectors online, every has a discount but it is always the same.

This is not price fixing as I can sell anything I want for any price I want. But I have to engage someone in the actual buying process to reveal that price. Amazon interprets this to mean that if you hit the buy button on their website and put the item in your "shopping cart" you've indicated a desire to buy, and at that point they reveal the actual selling price. But at that point you can "empty" your cart and not buy. So it is all just a annoying game.

The theory is someone will set up a big warehouse in Kansas with minimum wage workers, advertise mail order at prices no actual walk-in store can match. Which benefits people for awhile, until all the stores go under, and you need your Honda serviced, and the nearest dealer is the warehouse in Kansas. And of course once they corner the market, they are then free to raise prices as much as they want.

So in general if items are buy and throw away types of things, like books, then you will see prices advertised all over the place. But if it is an item for which a manufacturer wants to maintain a network of servicing dealers, they get more restrictive. Further, if you look, many large items on my website state that they are not for sale outside Alaska. So not only is the advertised price restricted, but so is the area in which it can be sold by any one dealer.

I'll contact you about the pump! Be Monday though when I'm back in the shop and can check my cost.