Its OUR fault - Not MCLARENFANATICs
Hi All,
Thank you all for the kind words. However, in this case, MACLARENFANATIC is fine to complain. He certainly did put an order in on April 4th. Our website said 2 weeks delivery for the Start Button surround. Unfortunately, we won't have his delivered until next week. So we certainly did miss the 2 weeks that the website referenced. Our apologies to MACLARENFANATIC for the aggravation that this has caused him.
I'll get to our reasons for the delay later but this points out two weaknesses our company needs to address. One is the need for more accurate estimates on the site for made-to-order (or brand new) or out of stock parts. Second is that we need to do a better job communicating with customers who are waiting for delivery of said parts. Certainly 2 weeks was an overly optimistic estimate (seemed good at the time after making the first one!) for the new start button surround. We've now changed that to a more generic statement. We try to keep the stock status updated every day but certainly mistakes creep in. How we can communicate better with the waiting list is a tough nut to crack. We've tried weekly updates and email blasts but have often resorted to the "squeaky wheel" method - which means the customer usually asks for an update. This is not the best way to run things as pointed out. we're still struggling with the best method but this thread will certainly give some urgency to coming up with a solution.
As for the delay in question...
We've been trying to transition this new part from a single mold made as a one-off for a customer to a production piece where we can crank out a number at a time. That's taken longer than expected. Also, getting the right color has proven difficult - we had to scrap two this week (one of which was for MACFAN) as they came out too dark. Add to that the popularity of the part, and we've got a backlog that we didn't expect.
There were some other parts MACLARENFANATIC ordered which were out of stock - which we did deliver after a decent sized delay. The demand for certain parts has far exceeded our expectations and we've been caught a little short. We've had trouble getting parts from MCL as we've soaked up much of their spares stock. MCL Corporate called our parts source and asked why they were buying so many airvents... they were the only dealer in the enitre world that had even ordered one! And the core return from customers on the MCL parts has not been to the level that it is with other brands. Which has left us reliant on getting new parts from MCL... who doesn't have any.
It also gets back to the fact this is small volume manufacturing using artisanal methods. Its not as fast as we're all used to. Plus we try to make everything as perfect as we can. Which can add delays in itself. Luckily, we're not making transmissions or anything actually needed for the car to be drivable!
But again, all of this is our problem. I should have been conveyed this informaiton to MACLARENFANATIC more regularly to keep him in the loop. My apologies again to him. I encourage anyone to give us a call or send an email with any concerns you may have.