Too big for their shoes

[ebscreen]

I haven't yet.

Once I got ahold of my rep (didn't think to call them first for some reason?)
UPS got their act together reallllll quick.

I'll take a look now though!

[3Deep]

Tonypep glad you know how to work with a control headache...just to many chiefs in that deal

Darryl

[Dottonedan]

I happen to know the buyer for ESPN unless he's been reassigned from last year. (They move you around every two years). This guy is somewhat of scatterbrained as a buyer but is smart and a nice guy. Married to another buyer who was promoted to Manager of the softline buyers. So, he's got "a little security".  As a buyer, he's a last minute guy. Partially his fault and partially the garment blanks provider. This example is nothing new to them on events. Happens every time. To work with them, you have to be ready to deal with it. I am surprised to see they are even using Gildan at all.  For one, Disney has a contract with Hanes ( except for ESPN). But ESPN has or had a contract with Champion. So I would figure Disney would carry the Hanes over to ESPN if The Champion contract is up.

In the mean time, if you ever get caught up in a haggle with them, give me a call and I will drop names and give you direct phone numbers that will help straighten those buyers up. Going over there head will not get you anywhere as those over there head don't want to deal with that. The effective part is that when the buyers hear of the call, they will not push you around anymore. They will be your "partner". I would love to startle them a bit.  LOL.

[Chadwick]

Corporate bullsh*t will never make you money..
in fact, after the smoke clears, it will have cost you money.

Funny how that works.

[Dottonedan]

I believe that Chadwick,

That's why, if they came to me with an order, I'd not take it from them. They work in such a way that you need to already be a large profitable shop in order to deal with them so you can obsorb the losses easily and accept that as part of the business with them. One day they are your partner and tomorrow they make a decision without blinking an eye that shuts you down. Seen it happen. How do they feel about that guy losing his business?  Nothing. They move on. Just collateral damage. Next day, they deal with a new vendor doing the same thing.

There is a risk involved in doing business with  them. It can be a major one. Like the sharks say, "I'm out".

[Homer]

ok, stupid question - why don't these large companies have their own print shop? If Disney owns ESPN, and ESPN needs an order of 20k pieces, wouldn't it be in their benefit to run them throught Disney's print shop? Or does it not work that way?

[Dottonedan]

Funny you should ask, That helps segue into my being able to gripe more.


It can work that way and has. I'm sure one day they will re-invent the wheel and do it again. THey really should, but at that time, they ran into a major snag and wanted to abandoned the snag that was married to the Print shop. They said they wanted to focus on being a Theme Park and not a Vendor, but I know the real truth behind that story.


About the same time I started at Disney's Park Printing facility, it was in existence for 15 years prior. Since 1983. In Dec. of they 1999 closed it and sold to another vendor of Disney's (Fortune Fashions) who was #1 for years in Impressions top 100 volume printers.  For years, they printed there own traditional and best selling pose, The Standing Mickey as seen below.  When they sold to Fortune, It came with a contract for 7 years. The catch to that, was that Disney had another...well...I digress. I probably should not post (all the details) for legal reasons. I can say this, ... Well,  I have more stories, that well, lets just say "It is indeed a small world after all". Anyways,


Later, a few years before I came, they were delving into more difficult printing. They were starting sim process and were not doing as good as there other vendors. It had it's ups and downs, but for them, mostly there were downs. They were apparently ready to sell (because of the "snag" that a major head of that division had committed to and working on the plans to sell at the same times I was hired to improve the print production quality. Why they would hire me specifically to improve the quality at the same time they were building plans to sell, I can only assume that they wanted to make the print shop look more like a major competitor to the outside vendors. Something that they would want to get out of the road maybe. I don't know. Thats really speculation. It gets deeper than that, but it's a long but interesting story. One that adds to the "issues of working with Disney as a vendor".


So, yes, they had a print shop. It's not the first. They also had a paper printing facility...that they also sold to another local vendor just a few years before I got there. That shop I think it called Moran Printing.


It would take someone  intelligent with an interest in screen printing that works there to finally go back and look into the numbers and prove that it is more feasible for them to print it themselves and to get the big heads to buy into it.


As I said, They announced the reason they closed as "to focus on being a Theme Park". but like any good story, there is more.

[Sbrem]

why do you think we told Coke to go fly a kite?  They were shocked we would say no to them.

My old shop told Coke to take a flying leap too, after a 150K order, back around '80. They paid like crap, and expected us to continue to produce very small quantities for the same price, $0.125 (yes, twelve and a half cents). I still drink it though...

Steve

[Frog]

I would think that one reason that the really big boys don't print their own stuff is that it actually takes away from their ability to absolutely dictate price.
Until they can figure out a way to get employees to work for free, they will always hit a plateau of cost cutting.

Some outside vendors, on the other hand, will still bite and give in to ridiculous demands, and poor margins.

[ZooCity]

I wonder if Frog nailed Homer's question?  Maybe these big guys realize they are often asking for pricing and service that is not profitable for whoever is doing it.  Let someone else, the printer, run the non-profitable part of getting this product manufactured.

The game for the printer would be to try and beat that trap- take their work and actually profit.  Tony seems to have figured out how to do that (and stay sane) pretty well.   Or, conversely, avoid that work during times when it's market price makes the jobs not profitable or during times when your operation is not geared to handle it.

It could also be that they want to focus on what they do, whether it's selling cans of pop or sports news advertising, and not on imprinting garments.

[tonypep]

I take it with sort of a wink and a nod. We get it.
BTW Dan I worked for  Fred at Fortress Fashions (our term) You want to talk about knife throwing? Some stories there but better left untold unfortunately.
Well maybe a few. Each department had to wear a diffferent colored embbroidered polo. If you were a red (screenprint) person spotted in a blue (embroidery) department then you were subjected to questioning. We had a full time temp agency occupying a double wide trailer outside the building with 24/7 security. The "Roach Coach" was actually a full blown portable restaurant and was quite good actually.
 I'll save the backstabbing stories for when I retire.

[Dottonedan]

Ha,  I hear ya.  When I think about it, I have enough stories that should go in a book. I know plenty of people that worked there that did well on writing books about the kingdom. Some tell all stories.  One good one is called "Storming the Kingdom".   That one is more about the almost hostile take over in the 80's.  It's a good read. I recommend it to any business minded person interested in potentially working with Disney. Give a good history of the Co and mind set. On another note, somehow, when negative stuff pops up in books about the Co. you can see them disappear soon. I think they are being bought out most often. They do a good bit of public relations reputation control.


Over all, the idea behind Disney is a great one. It's just a business today. You have the facade of the Happiest place on earth and then you have the business that goes on behind it. It can be both pleasant and brutal for vendors and even pleasant and brutal for employees er "cast members". Much of the day to day motto's, creeds, and slogans are only faceless words.


I'm by no means a disgruntle employee. Well, I was at the way they were operating and taking the dream away from cast members, but like I said, the idea behind Disney made it great to work there. As time passed, the writing was on the wall (for those who had worked at other large company's before and went through layoffs and downturns. 7 years before my layoff, I predicted what they would do with our department in the next five years, but it took 7. It came true down to every step. As a business decision, it was what they should do (financially) and they did it. They took our creative department, cut it in half and made the remainder a style guide and approval department. For people that loved (and dreamed to work at Disney), it was a shock and a life changer. For me, I was mentally prepared.


I was one of 20 that was laid off and that doesn't look as bad as if I were the only one, but I would have been the one to volunteer to be if they were to ask for only one. We were laid off in 2009. We had another layoff is 2005 I think it was. At that time, they laid off a large majority of hourly employees (and that hurt the parks) on the front end and was not the best move. In addition, they also took volunteers. About 5 from our department took the vol package in 2005. If you volunteered, you got a nice package. Those Vols were all salary. They had a goal of laying off 5000 total people both salary and hourly company wide at that time and got it. They paid salary members a flat amount right off the bat and then another couple k for every year served up to a cap. Some left with 25k in their pocket and started businesses or banked it or blew it.


Next time around (my turn), they did it differently. The amount was not the same of course and then, they paid it out each pay as if you were still working there till the set amount ran out so you did not get one lump sum. That was unfortunate for me, since I had hoped for the lump sum so I could start my business.


I've been taking the long route ever since but I'm happier. If they were to offer me another job, I'd not. A few of the 20 laid off went back to work about a year or two later in other positions and some freelance for them. I'd not even freelance for them. Just not my cup of tee shirts. ')

[tonypep]

That pretty much mirrors what went on with Nike. At one point they were operating two facitlites on the east coast  because they felt that would have better control of their products but after a decade or so the bean counters figured out it was smarter to outsource. Which it was.

[3Deep]

We had a chance to contract print for Russell and they took us on a tour of there plant and outlined everything they would want us to do, sounded great but on the back side we would give up all our customer base due to the fact we would have so much work to do for them, in the end we said no.  Now I still can't wrap my head around 12.5 cents and most likly never will, I was telling my wife that the other day when she gave a customer a price of 5.99 I hate the 99, anything but the ninty nine..now on thet half a cent who gets it?, how does it work, to me it just causes more math headaches.

Darryl

[screenprintguy]

Disney is awful,we did 1 order through a vendor of those, all weekend on stand by with labor on hand as hour by hour, play by play the orders were being sent via blackberry during a weekend festival. Simple 1 color front and back, but it was ridiculous. They didn't want to commit to running the whole order, held up everything till the weekend of the event, we paid 6 people to be on hand plus we had ourselves, by end of day Sunday printed everything they had sent here, only to have the vendor who coordinated the whole deal come back tearing in his eyes that someone in Disney's media dept. sent out the wrong graphic, even though mocks were approved through several people. We got stiffed on the whole thing, the vendor went belly up as it was not the first time they did this to him, they demanded every single shirt, even miss prints, we didn't get paid a dime. NEVER AGAIN, people who, in Central Fl salivate at the chance to print for an organization like that need to realize it's a pipe dream dangling a gold and diamond mine in front of you that you'll never get. Almost like a smaller shop like us was targeted for this type of situation. No wonder why the bigger places who normally print for them wouldn't do the job. Ya live and learn.