korn@cory.Berkeley.EDU (Peter "Arrgh" Korn) (08/26/87)
There are not many mac-related companies that I feel qualify to be called
'slimey companies'. Relax Technologies, however, is fully deserving of
that title.
How are they slimey? Let me count the ways:
1) Their main mode of selling their product involves driving
around a $100,000.00 RV to dealers (blocking their parking
lots), and showing off their equiptment inside their networked,
air-conditioned motor/mac-home.
2) Their sales pitch to dealers can be roughly paraphrased as
follows: "so the other drives may be a few mili-seconds
faster--with our drives you can RELAX -- we'll support any
and all drives we sell; even guarantee a 2 day turnaround
time on drive repairs" (which they have shown they are
not able to meet). They then try to woo the computer
salesperson with promises of a night on the town in a limo
if that salesperson sales the most drives in that area. That's
followed up by the $1/megabyte spiff offer (but once a large
hard drive is sold, the salesperson finds out that that
spiff is only available on the smaller [20 Mbyte] drives).
3) After finding out that some computer stores sold the 80 Meg
Quantum drive (purchased via CMS) to customers coming in
off the street for *less* than Relax sold *the same drive*
to computer stores for resale, they immediately started
downplaying the quality of Quantum drives (after only the
week before touting the 80 Meg Quantum as their most reliable
drive). >>Then, the started to allude to a 'rumor' they
had heard that CMS had purchased Apple reject Quantum drives--
that being the way that CMS could undersell Relax<<
4) In the August issue of "The RelaxLetter", Relax has an
article called "Tips on Merchandising Hard Drives." To
quote a relavant section: "Saving the empty shipping
boxes will allow for an inexpensive pyramid that looks
like your store is stocking and selling lots of Hard
Drives. If you don't have boxes available we will be
happy to supply them at no charge....In our product line
we have the MiniMate as a promotional line and the
Hard Plus as our high end. You can use the MiniMate as
a loss leader and sell it as your advertised bargain.
The Hard lus on the other hand is a natural up sell..."
Shades of bait-and-switch here...
5) In the same issue of "The RelaxLetter", they have an
article on spiffs, and I quote "...One dollar per
megabyte for the first ninety days. Maybe that doesn't
sound like a lot but when you consider a $300 spiff for
a 300 megabyte drive..." Never mind that the article
doesn't agree with what the company says. Never mind
that if they didn't offer spiffs they could be more
competitive on pricing (and warranty). Never mind that...
With all of this crap going on, I refuse to sell Relax drives, and I
cannot recommend that anyone purchase a Relax Technologies drive, nor
any store carry Relax Technologies drives.
Peter "shit but I'm sick of slime" Korn
Disclaimer: The above are my opinions, and are not meant to in any way
libel the company--all the stores I cite are either from
direct conversation with Relax Technologies sales staff,
or from Relax Technologies publications.
--
Peter "Arrgh" Korn
korn@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU
{decvax,dual,hplabs,sdcsvax,ulysses}!ucbvax!kornolson@endor.harvard.edu (Eric Olson) (08/26/87)
I rented two Relax ("your hard disk doesn't work? Reeeelaaaxxxx. :-)") 20
Meg hard disks (the old kind: convection cooled, vertical stand-alone SCSI).
Both failed because the blue plastic DB-25 connectors on the drives wore
out. Since they were rented, I just returned them. Now we use Hyperdrive
FX20s, and they seem much more reliable.
-Eric
Eric K. Olson olson@endor.harvard.edu harvard!endor!olsoncramer%clem@Sun.COM (Sam Cramer) (08/26/87)
I believe that Relax was implicated in a bit of nastiness which involved
them buying and reselling "from the dumpster" reject Macintosh boards. I
don't recall the specifics, so I'm not sure how they represented these
refurbed Macs. I believe Relax stopped when Apple threatened their disposal
service with legal action for not destroying the motherboards, as their
contract required.
Sam Cramer {cbosgd,decwrl,hplabs,seismo,ucbvax}!sun!cramer cramer@sun.com