RBS and DMAP/RMAP

I spoke to one of my friends at RBS (yes, I have a friend at RBS, believe it or not), and we starting talking about named accounts, and down the street accounts in general. I then asked him if he was privy to any of the RMAP or DMAP info from Ricoh Americas Corporation or even info from Aficio League, he stated he is not and I believe him. I then asked how do you get your named accounts? Are they handed down to you from management or is it stuff you find in the field or is it a combo of both? He stated that named accounts are given to him, however in his eight or nine years there he has been with RBS he never seen a named account come down that stated the customer already had Ricoh products.

However, what he did state is that there are now 5 RBS reps working the same geographic area, and when someone digs up a lead from a named account, the rep from the named account has to prove that he has been in contact with that named account. If he has, then he keeps it and if not he loses it.

In my county there are also 4-5 RBS covering what I cover for my dealer, with this type of "feet on the street" they are stumbling over my accounts on a frequent basis. I guess I need to "educate" my customers ahead of time, kinda like what the Association of Oil Heating does, and why it is better to business with the Authorized Dealer instead of the Authorized Direct Branch. Plus with RBS why are they giving incentives for new business when they are taking existing Ricoh Business, here there should be no extra incentives, incentives should be for taking down Xerox, Kyocera, OCE, Canon, Sharp, Toshiba and the rest of them!

I have many thoughts on why Ricoh Americas Corporation is letting RBS do this. Here's a few for you:

Top Ricoh Management (this includes Sam, Tom & Larry) have no clue what is happening in the street, they are so far removed from the day to day occurrences and no one has the gumption to tell them what is going on.

Top Ricoh Management does not care, all they care about is the bottom line on how much revenue and boxes are on the street and whatever it takes to get there!

Someone has brain washed Top Ricoh Management into believing what RBS is doing is a good thing! I wonder if that someone is the guy who is in charge of all the Direct Branches.

This is probably the most far-fetched rational I have of the whole situation. The plan was put in place months ago to have the Ricoh boxes to be sold by Ricoh Direct only. Slowly over time dealers who were sick and tired would change brands (drop Ricoh), and then down the road Ricoh would then call the smaller and mid sized dealers on the carpet and tell them they are not meeting their quotas and they would then be dropped, however you could become a Lanier or a Savin Dealer. Thus at the end of a few years you would only have a few Mega Ricoh Dealers and RBS. RBS would then be able to raise prices after they have eliminated the other Ricoh Dealers in their area.

Yea, I know the last one is pretty far fetched and is out there, however the million-dollar question is "why" are they letting this happen to their own dealers. Ask your self why and the answer is almost always the almighty buck.

Just my two cents!

In my private life I tend to not agree with conspiracy theories and with all due respect to Art (and there is a tremendous amount due) I don't adhere to this one either. We all know that those in the ivory tower at Ricoh (and ALL other manufacturers for that matter) want to maximize distributiuon. Those of us in the dealer community disagree with the definition of maximize and feel they have gone beyond but that is still the nuts and bolts of the situation.
At the street level, there are salesreps and managers with numbers to hit without regard to how they do it...pretty much just as it is with us.
One of the differences between RBS and independent reps is that the RBS reps probably have direct access to all of the promotions and programs that Ricoh offers where pretty much everyone on P4P only has access to those things passed down by their ownership. I guarantee that many here would not even know about DMAP6 cost for non-profits and local govt's because of US Communities if it weren't for P4P. What about the Chamber of Commerce program? What about the print-for-pay program? The medical program? What about the HPG, Broadlane and Triad Hospital contracts? Then there is the contracts with Remax, the National Church Purchasing Contract (NCPG), etc.
How many independent reps know that Ricoh has offered free GelSprinters with every MFP? It takes some commitments from the Dealer that my dealership isn't willing to do so we aren't participating but RBS probably is running with it as we speak.
There are so many programs that I don't even pass many of them down to the rep because there are so many of them and so much potential for screw-ups that the dealership would end up having to foot the bill for.
I am also sure that RBS has set up some programs for themselves that we don't have the privilage of doing as well but that is to be expected.
Don't get me wrong...I don't doubt that they are getting special pricing and that is not right. I'm just saying that they probably also do a better job of utilizing the programs that Ricoh offers to all of us.

Glory, I agree. Fortunatly I work for a dealer who is willing to pass along any discount he can get, unfortunatly, a lot of the "promo's" that RBS has, we can't match from a dealership standpoint. It would cost too much if targets weren't hit and we already sold at the promotional price.

We are also fortunate enough to have the ability to sell off state Costars contract to SLG, NCPG for churches, ReMax and other contracts that are known.

I think a lot of the problems with dealerships is the same problem that has always existed, too many gready owners. RBS doesn't have this problem. They are being funded by a much larger organization and aren't worried about overhead.

I also can't believe that RBS isn't using the DMAP registered accounts in their own lists. I used to work for CBS, most of my named accounts were given to me by top management. I always wondered where they got the information from, especially since 90% of them already had Canon equipment from a competitor. As a dealer, we try to protect ourselves as much as possible, we don't submit client info for aficio league.

This is a battle that is going to move to a war very quickly. I work in a marketplace where RBS isn't authorized (yet). Dealerships across the board are going to need to transform into a solutions provider or they will end up with shrinking revenues and profits once the directs are in full swing.

I have worked for both RBS and a dealer. I can assure you that RBS reps are not running around with lists of DMAP customers. While at RBS, I have never seen a list of DMAP accounts or any of the Aficio league information.

Jrlz,

Do you currently work for RBS?

Lets not be naive here why else would they ask for all the stuff on aficio league. One day soon we will see it and the DMAP contracts too!

Yes I do work for RBS. I have never seen any information being fed from Aficio league or DMAP info from dealers, nor have I ever heard of it happening. I do understand your concerns however. I use "fictitious" info when I register my sales.

So you believe Ricoh is making a huge database too.

We are smart for aligning ourselves with RBS...I believe that they will cut off the smaller indpendant dealers and for a while there will be only large dealers and manufacturers. How long have you been with RBS...I have been here just over a year.

Well how do you get your leads from your RBS? A few of the older guys here said ricoh used to have hot leads that they would get from corporate and they brought stuff over from previous dealerships. We also get call ins that come from corporate which i am told are now what the hot leads used to be but I bet they are slowly funneling leads over.