Originally posted by clackers No distributor likes to carry stock, Roaming. They would rather respond to an order by making the customer wait than have unsold product ready to go ... dollars sit on a shelf not appreciating in value and they can be burnt by currency movements.
It's similar to the retail stores. They don't have Pentax in their shop but truth is any of them can order one in for you from Pentax Australia. They simply can't purchase a shop model 645Z and have it sit there for a year without a buyer.
This is nothing against you personally it's just business.
But this does make me wonder about the reason why the distributors and retailers are still in between? Taking a margin whilst providing hardly any added value at all. Couldn't pentax go for direct distribution and then contract repair centers (which they already have contracted because at least in the Netherlands no camera shop can even do service itself) for service etc? Given that they rely mostly on word of mouth and direct advertising, it makes good sense to cut out the middlemen and split that savings between the producer and the consumer.
That being said: I haven't seen a single other pentaxian in the Netherlands. The camera store I go to does stock Pentax, but tucked away in a dark corner, nothing even remotely like the way the other brands are displayed.