Discussion Ideas for increasing GWS' presence on market at minimum cost

[GWS CHEN]

Originally Posted by hilbilly

I think many of the "mods" such as firewall motor mounts and re-inforced LG mounting can be accomplished with simple addendums to already existing kits - so no need to re-engineer the entire thing just ADD what is needed with a small sheet of additional instructions. USE some of the feedback you get from your customers to your advantage to IMPROVE your kits that are already on the market.

Hillbille

Yes, very true. We'll try to do that like what we did on the new dihedral brace of Slow Stick. Thank you

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Originally Posted by woodsy

The freight costs are way over the top, i've imported from GuanLi, SAPAC and Hawkwere and there freight cost is aproximatly 60% of what GWS quoted.

While i do understand that packing multiple $500 or $1000 orders is not as eficient as packing a 20' container this is what GWS should do UNLESS they apoint 1 Australian importer and give them decent suport and pricing, none of us small guys can afford to spend many thousands of $$$$ on stock.

Set up a GWS importer in Australia and support them financialy and with consignment stock (i'll do it )

I would have only 3 levels of model available PNP (Assemble, drop in an RX and away you go), ARF (with a decent brushelss motor included), Basic (everything but no electrics)

cut down on the amount of servo's, motors, batteries, ESC's, etc in the GWS range, there is just way to much competition out of China available over the net these days.

While i know EDF seems to be the flavour of the month at the moment for i would go back to GWS basics and look at prop models, May be start a few era or type 'sets' some of them you already have in the GWS line up eg:
WW1 set, WW2 set, Air racing set, Burt Rutan set, etc, etc

Thank you for these great ideas, I'd have to discuss these with my colleagues and Boss. I agree that shipping a 20' container is the right way to go, like what JP applied in UK. Would you let me know if you really want to be the distributor in Australia by sending your mail to service@gws.com.tw Thank you.

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Originally Posted by Michael in Toronto

1. Reduce your product line. Eliminate all models that are your poorest sellers.

2. Identify weaknesses with your most popular kits, and improve them; example: brushless motors only.

3. Offer discounts on large quantities to importers/distributors who pay on delivery.

4. Offer "Plug-n-Play" versions of your best selling models; complete ready to fly except transmitter and receiver.

5. Do not announce new models until they are fully ready for sale; if you announce models while they are still in development, customers will wait before spending money.

Thank you very much for these great suggestions. The third one has been applied on our price lists for dealers. I'll discuss the rest four ones with my colleagues and Boss. Thank you again.

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Originally Posted by WTFLYR

The Wright Stick slow flyer with Slow Stick parts. Only needs laser cut wood parts to complete the kit. You could get those parts cheap, as no tooling is needed.
Look at the link inside this post Chen:
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showp...&postcount=827

Thank you, it's a great idea for making the main parts of Slow Stick more profitable. I'll certainly treat this as one of subjects for the meetings.

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Originally Posted by bleary

Forget about brushed motors with your kits.Try to have a motor mount setup and battery space setup that will allow us to use what we allready have(small brushless and lipos) it gets a bit tiresome to have to hack at a new kit.
Oh...the point is moot as I forgot what a gws kit looks like though I would BUY one if it was available.
Planes is your strength...maybe not EDF so much,but planes....never mind the rest.
Bleary.

Thank you, yes, the new and the latest birds were all designed to be powered by brushless setup, and the brushless powered version kits as well, but the old ones might still be with brushed verion kits, NPS & SG kits. We've been discussing the brushless version on most older birds. This should include the motor mount setup and battery space setup. Probably we have to further discuss a brushless setup alone for those brushed birds held/owned by users. Thank you

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Originally Posted by FresnoJay

I would like to say that GWS is making the strides in some areas to get the share back. Good case in point is the new GWS EDF-50's with the brushless motors. If the quality is good enough on these units you will get more of the market on the micro stuff than you have before as you will no longer need to buy the 50's then upgrade. This way you get waht you want off the bat.

Point being is brushless is where it is at and GWS you are heading that way. Keep at it with the ideas others have posted and you will start re-claiming your position in the market.

On a side note I too wish GWS made some good retracts. Especially to put in thier models I do buy. Rotating or otherwise, that is another area you could get a foothold in if time was invested and quality controlled enough.

Jason

Thank you for your kind words, there'll be EDF50 and EDF40 powered by the new 12mm inrunner motors. The rotating retracts sounds great, I'll certainly discuss it with R&D people and Boss. Thank you

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Hi Roger, Nsg & Jim,

Thank you very much ! I've kept Boss informed of all your nice ideas. We'll certainly discuss more on them.

Chen

[sebsoupe]

Originally Posted by GWS CHEN

I agree that shipping a 20' container is the right way to go, like what JP applied in UK.

Chen

Hello!
I can't afford to order from GWS a 20' container full of kits and stuff, but if GWS send it to me with "consignment" I will sell all those goods in France with no delay/problem...
Bye
sebsoupe

[jingjingjing]

I have been big fan of GWS since I bought my first beaver back in 2004. But after I got addicted to Micro models (parkzone cessna, plantraco micro scout...) I never had chance to look back on the GWS.

I think Micro (13" - 16" wingspan) is a growing market. I think ARF kit made for vapor or cessna gears will open another market. It will take quite a big amount of time and money to develope micro control systems, but if you just provide airframes for existing control systems, many people will buy your products.

I apologize if this idea is in the 'new kit' category. Scaling down existing kit may bring the development cost down.

[woodsy]

Originally Posted by GWS CHEN

Thank you for these great ideas, I'd have to discuss these with my colleagues and Boss. I agree that shipping a 20' container is the right way to go, like what JP applied in UK. Would you let me know if you really want to be the distributor in Australia by sending your mail to service@gws.com.tw Thank you.

Chen

Yes i will send you e-mail to service@gws.com.tw BUT the only way i would be interested is to be ONLY importer with GWS suport so then i can sell to local retail.

[GWS CHEN]

Hi Sebsoupe,

Thank you for your good intention but it might NOT be easy to get the positive answer from BOSS. May be we have to find a better way between "Consignment" and the current selling way.

Chen

[GWS CHEN]

Hi Jingjingjing,

Yes, we discussed these Micro ones, RTF micro R/C birds, internally in last December. The micro bird is safer and normally cheaper, and might be cost effective for people who have no idea about R/C airplane. This might also be welcome by kids' parents. But this needs another budget. Thank you

Chen

[sebsoupe]

Originally Posted by GWS CHEN

Hi Jingjingjing,

Yes, we discussed these Micro ones, RTF micro R/C birds, internally in last December. The micro bird is safer and normally cheaper, and might be cost effective for people who have no idea about R/C airplane. This might also be welcome by kids' parents. But this needs another budget. Thank you

Chen

why not making a "Baby Gull" RC version???
GWS should find all the stuffs for it, no? (Rx, servo, ESC, ...)

[GWS CHEN]

Yes, the double sized "Baby Gull" might be OK with 2 Pico servos+R4PII+ESC15A+2S Lipo, we're discussing internally and on another thread as well for this flat foamy Me-163, http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1027342

There's a smaller P-51D available, made by UNION, a famous but former Japanese model company, can be converted into R/C one without too much modification. We stock some hundreds of this electrical free-flight model. It's a painted kit, looks very great. http://www.gwsus.com/english/product/airfly/el03.htm

Chen

[jingjingjing]

Originally Posted by GWS CHEN

Hi Jingjingjing,

Yes, we discussed these Micro ones, RTF micro R/C birds, internally in last December. The micro bird is safer and normally cheaper, and might be cost effective for people who have no idea about R/C airplane. This might also be welcome by kids' parents. But this needs another budget. Thank you

Chen

I agree with what you said, but kids always look for bigger stuff rather than small models. People fly micro models because of the convenience of flying them in a small space. If GWS ever develop a micro models with the prejudice of 'inferior version of a real RC', there won't be a success