CE28N

ya, Jeff at speedtech confirmed that for me too. That is since I walked into the store AND SAW ONE ON THE SHELVES. (I did call beforehand however ) On top of that, he had a box full of freshly delivered Kyosho parts that he didn't put on the shelves yet. SCORE! RB5 + more Kyosho parts you can't find at Ultimate.

haulin79

I went to Ultimate hobbies twice and both time left thinking I did something wrong: the guy that helped me in the back with the parts was great but the guy at the cash register needs more customer service training.

So I guess it's nice to hear that it wasn't just me that had bad experiences there.

My experiences there were so bad that I would rather buy online for the same price and wait for 5 day ground shipping than buy from them 20 minutes away.

All I can say is that I hope they improve because I used to love their service 20 years ago when they were in the Target center. I think that the son is no longer running the business, he is likely working on another project or job right now.

ruf

iTrader: (3)

Having owned and run a hobby shop in a past life, I know it can be tough to shoot sunshine out your butt every day (especially through a hangover...)

That being said, the dudes at OCRC are top notch. Looks like I'll have to check out SpeedTech as well.

As for the overseas e-tailers, I've never had issues with Stella or RCMart/Dinball, but I can NOT recommend Toyeast.

Duster_360

iTrader: (21)

Sure hate to hear about this, especially about how internet orders have been handled. Guess I'll be looking elsewhere. They used to have some really great sales too!

tom_chang79

iTrader: (13)

I can vouch for two overseas seller, Stella and RC-Mall. I highly recommend Stella, she is faaaaaaaaaaaaast with shipping!

Yeah, Ultimate is a so-so hobby store, it kinda reminds me of Fry's Electronics, you get in and get out. It's not really a browsing friendly place.

I do most of the retail shopping at Rob's, Hobby Warehouse (although their selection has gone down as well), and mostly at Gyro's (since I break my car next door at OCRC )

The problem is, the sales people at Ultimate only knows about the cars that they themselves are into. They're not very interested in the cars that are stocked up and need to move. Also, Ultimate used to stock a lot of parts of the cars they sell, now they just move kits and do not seem to care to stock parts for those kits to support the guys that buy those kits...

The guys at Gyro in OCRC are really good people. I've had good experience there... Plus, it's more convenient to be able to buy the parts at the track when you need them, then stocking up on parts and becoming your own distributor

For internet orders, Tower can't be beat. Their Tamiya kits are a bit pricey so I stay away from them. Sure, after the saving, Tower price isn't lower then Ultimate, but I learned that paying the 7.75% Orange County tax sucks on items over $100...

I would be willing to buy Losi kits from Horizon, but for some reason, Horizon always have the highest prices for Losi kits (strange since they own them, you'd think they would have less mark-up and overhead). Perhaps Horizon is being careful not to compete against their hobby-shop customers?

ruf

iTrader: (3)

They've learned something from Great Planes/Tower Hobbies. No one wants you as a distributor if you keep undercutting them on your retail website. I remember there would be times I could order stuff from Tower Hobbies cheaper than Great Planes dealer cost...

teamc5

iTrader: (1)

tom which hobby people did you go to because every time i go to the one in lakewood i get great service. hobby warehouse is worse then ultimate hobbies the owner there makes you feel like an idiot if you dont know what your talking about

tom_chang79

iTrader: (13)

I go to the one in Lakewood. Must be a hit-or-miss kinda of a deal with these two shops... The WORST one was the one up in Camarillo, CA (I used to live near there). The extremist guy with a gazillion piercing used to make me feel that I, the customer, had to appease him in order to get parts. That particular branch had too many ding dongs. I would ask the guys in the car department there to get me "this" and "that" behind the counter, and they would say they didn't carry it. I would then have to nicely convince them that it was right behind him.

The one in Lakewood used to be real bad, maybe they have a better staff now, but they used to have attitudes that were akin to some of the employees at Ultimate... Hobby People's prices aren't that great anymore (they used to be, before they converted to "People" from "Shack"), but they seem to be the only ones left to carry Airtronics radios (which are my favorite).

Also, Hobby People are the only ones that are serious about XTM stuff, which in my opinion is better then Duratrax goods in the low-end RC market...

teamc5

iTrader: (1)

well at the lakewood store they were having problems with one of the employees there. the reason the stock so much XTM is because they own it and the same with airtronics.

sickboy

iTrader: (75)

Speedtech is by far the best shop. I give them first shot at all of my business. If you go to Ultimate, make sure you ask for Paul or Gary. Most of the other guys are completely useless.
As far as some employees not being familiar with your brand, think about how many different rc companys are out there. Nobody is going to know everything about every product.
If you are on this site, you obviously have a computer. Do yourself and evryone else a favor and look up the part numbers that you need before you head down to your local spot.

tom_chang79

iTrader: (13)

Do you know exactly what was wrong with that particular guy? Was he just not "customer service" friendly?

I'm not expecting them to know everything about my brand or product I want. I would expect them to at least know that it exists, if not, at least make the attempt to look for it before telling me that it doesn't.

For god sakes, these are retail businesses. If you are having a bad day and you can't be professional about facing your customers, you really should go home. If I owned a retail store, that's what I would tell my employee if I ever noticed him/her giving a customer an attitude.

How would this activity be doing a favor for everyone else? Usually during a sale, it's between me and the seller. Everyone else is not really involved in it... Besides, part numbers are only useful if the parts rack are organized by part numbers. Sometimes they are, sometimes they're not. Again, a little familiarity with the products that you're supposedly hired to sell would not be asking for much is it?

teamc5

iTrader: (1)

yeah didnt like to help people out but the rest of the guys do

tboned_2002

iTrader: (4)

Ultimate sucks, plain and simple. Its like walking onto a used car lot in Santa Ana. All the help their sucks. I made this decision a while back when I bought the wrong $6 wheels for my B4, tried to return for exchange only to spend more $$ but my reciept was about 14 days late for even exhange or return. The manager on duty didnt have the balls to say ok, we will do this one time for you but please understand I was in the wrong for being past the 30 days.

Bottom line is that Ultimate lacks, customer service and customer retention.

Seven1Four

iTrader: (41)

I just have to give my .02 about this f#@king place, I sent one of my co-workers there to buy a Slash for his son for christmas, the whole package.... batt, charger, etc. First off, I told him he should shop at OCRC or try Robs RC, He decided to go to Ulticrap because he lives right down the street from them. After the "service" he didn't get, He said he will NEVER go back to that F#CkIN place again, the people are "TOO BUSY" to give you the time of day, and the idiot at the front counter can sit on my middle finger. They think they know it all.......THEY DON'T KNOW SHIT!

A few years back, Ulticrap had some cool cats that worked there, but now they are a bunch of KNOBS!

BTW......Happy Thanksgiving.

jk racing

iTrader: (20)

+1000

Send your buddy to "cough, cough" Hobby People on Friday, slash is 159. I plan on getting one for my son. Let him go elsewhere for batteries/charger. But you cant beat that "one day only" price with a stick.