Daily Archives: June 26, 2013

Sir Tools 9012 Interchangeable screwdriver bit set.

Insulated Screwdriver Set

Sir Tools manufactured a handy set of insulated screwdriver bits that may be of interest to people who work on electrical or for a utility, the Sir Tools ST 9012 Interchangeable IEC Screwdriver Blade Kit. This screwdriver set is insulated for 10,000 volts and conforms to DIN EN 609000.

This interchangeable set gives the end user quite a bit of diversity, since it changes into seven different sizes. The part that is changed out is not just a tip. This isn’t like a bit driver – on this set you swap out the handle, so you have a nice, long and stable screwdriver bit to work with.

The cushion grip handles are great, because if you need to put some torque on these, you won’t hurt your hands. The set comes in a convenient roll-up storage pouch that will easily fit into your set of tools.

Construction Market Improving in California

The California construction market has seen an uptick in 2013 that has Californians hopeful that things will begin to roll again with the economy. Construction crews are beginning to get work again after a number of years of little or no projects available to them. Many building contractors and construction workers in California either found other lines of work, got on disability, or retired out during the recession that really got rolling in 2008.

Skyway Tool Center owner Sherry Gillis has seen a trend among the construction workers and other tool buyers this spring and summer. Most construction workers and contractors bought professional level tools in order to have reliable tools to work with on their building projects. Today, many professional end users are buying the rot gut cheapest tools they can find, because they have been off work for so long that they simply cannot afford to spend that extra amount needed to purchase a professional level tool. They either go to the low end tool store with throwaway tools – or they buy used tools.

It will be interesting to see whether this uptick in construction continues to progress in California in the next few years, but for now, there is a little bit of work. Lets hope the trend continues.

Automotive Tool Market Today

The automotive tool market is really changing these days due to the recession in the United States. Automotive tool manufacturers and distributors have streamlined their product lines to better position themselves in the market and have cut many products from their lines. Tool manufacturers cannot afford to produce items that don’t move off of the shelves, so they have stopped manufacturing the slow movers.

Owner Doug Gillis at Skyway Tool Center in Chico, Calfornia has customers calling his store regularly looking for tools that used to be standard, but are now no longer made. For example, he had an online customer looking for a lighted circuit tester a few months ago and quickly discovered that the item is no longer available. His staff searched out suppliers throughout the US to find one, but nobody had that tool in stock. Later they discovered it was a tool that is no longer made, so they then focused on finding a tool that was similar, but it turned out nobody makes an inexpensive, lighted circuit tester anymore. It is not something that is commonly used, so the manufacturer just stopped making it as the result of the recession.

Another trend in the tool industry is that tool stores are fading out of the landscape of American towns. Recently a tool store in Chico, California, Northern California Tool & Supply, went out of business after 75 years. It was a family run business and sadly had to close it’s doors because of the stiff competition in the tool industry. Small tool stores can no longer compete with large retailers like Home Depot, Sears, Lowes and the many tool trucks that drive around and sell directly to the mechanics. Before the recession tool sales were brisk and there was enough business to go around for any reasonably operated tool store, but now it has gotten so cut throat that most tool stores have gone under.

The latest trend is that large online retailers like Amazon, Ebay, Sears and Walmart are acting as storefronts for the manufacturers of tools to sell directly to the public at wholesale prices, which is now cutting the throats of tool businesses and hardware stores nationwide. These online retailers have placed tool manufacturers and tool suppliers in the United States in direct competition with their own customers, the tool and hardware stores. There is no way for the tool and hardware businesses to compete when their pricing structure is higher than the price the manufacturers are charging the public. In other words, it costs as much or more for the local tool retailer to purchase products from the manufacturer today as it does for the public to purchase the exact same item from the manufacturer online.

Tool manufacturers have upset the supply chain nationally by going direct to the public. In the earlier days of the internet the manufacturers and tool suppliers treaded lightly when it came to competing with their own supply chain, but in recent years that has changed. Today’s tool manufacturers leave little to the imagination by selling out of Amazon and competing with the stores that had formerly kept the manufacturers in business for decades. The public love it because they can now buy tools for the same price that the tool or hardware store can, but will there be any downside to this?

The downside is that we have millions of people out of work now, because this is happening in every sector – not just the tool business. In every sector of retail trade, manufacturers have put the businesses out that had kept their products moving for decades. So one of the downsides is that we now have many unemployed workers who can’t afford to buy retail items, even if they are coming directly from the manufacturer and are being sold on the cheap. Another downside is that as the manufacturers increasingly take on the load of supplying the public directly, the buying public will receive less and less service.

Right now a guy can go into a local tool store, look over a tool, hold it, try it out, discuss it with the store employee, then go to Amazon and buy it directly from the manufacturer. Essentially the local tool store has gone to all of the trouble and expense of paying rent on the store, paying for the utilities and a staff to represent the tools, they have purchased thousands of items to display to the public, have spent money on advertising so you know they are around, paid taxes and insurance and everything else that goes with retailing to the public – then the public use them as a free resource. Pretty good idea, isn’t it? The manufacturers don’t even have to provide an ounce of service for their products, because when the thing breaks down, the public will bring it to their local tool store.

Unfortunately, local tool stores are not going to be able to provide the customer service for tools that break or otherwise don’t work that they would have if the customer had made the purchase in the store. If a customer buys an item online directly from the tool manufacturer, they need to be aware that the manufacturers are not set up to provide assistance with problems – thats what they had tool stores for in the past. The regular little retailer provided customer service all across the country, but now will have to send the Amazon customer back to the internet if they need help with the product they purchased online.

Eventually the retail trade will go the way of many other businesses – like the gasoline business. It used to be that there were many local gas stations across our country that were unaffiliated with any particular gasoline wholesaler. They were mom and pop dealers. Today you only have the choice of a few brands of gasoline and you don’t have anyone to wash your windshield, check the air in your tires, check your oil level, or pump that gas when it is pouring down rain or snowing. You have to provide all of that service for yourself and the gas is horribly expensive – it never came down in price as we lost all service.

The sad part about the way the tool manufacturers and suppliers have operated in the last few years is the way they scurried around behind the scenes and cut the throats of the very people that put them in their positions of power and wealth. They set up dummy websites and went on retail sites like Amazon to sell directly to the public, then sent their reps out to sell the stuff they couldn’t move out of their warehouses to their retailers, doubling up their efforts to ruin their customers. The only hope for any tool retailer these days is to find products that are not being hawked by their manufacturers directly to the public – and that is an almost impossible task.

Buying American Made Air Tools

SkywayTools.com has been selling pneumatic tools online since 1995. We also sell air tools in our walk-in store, which is located in Chico, California. We sell Ingersoll Rand, Chicago Pneumatic, Astro Pneumatic, and ATD Tools brands of air tools both in our store and online. We also carry a full line of air accessories, air hose, air filters, blow guns, air inserts, air chucks and many other types of supplies for our customers’ pneumatic tool projects.

It is important to purchase quality air tools and air accessories for several reasons. The tool buying customer may pay quite a bit more to purchase the right product, but over the long haul it will save both money and work problems to get the right tool for the jobs you may have on your slate in the future. The same is true of tool accessories and supplies. American made air accessories are stronger and hold up on the job for many years more than cheap air accessories. AmFlo and Milton make really solid air tool accessories that will stand up to the beatings an air tool may take over time.

V8 3001 Industrial Hose Cutter Set

We got Vickie to make a video about the V8 3001 Radiator Hose Cutter Sets, which are also great for industrial hose cutting use. We think a STAR has been BORN!

Actually, we’ve been selling these for about seven years now. We get them from the manufacturer, with whom we have had a business relationship for over 25 years. We have never had one of these industrial hose cutters returned to us, since they work so well. Our customers have raved about them since we first began carrying them.

We sold them for a number of years before we got a call one day from a large industrial client. An employee was severely injured on the job because he pulled out his pocket knife and used that to cut the industrial strength hose from a big rig and wound up cutting off a finger. The company called us and asked if we had anything they could use to safely cut the industrial radiator hoses and we told them about the V8 3001. They purchased about 500 of the radiator hose cutter sets, which included the radiator hose cutter, a blade, and the mounting bracket, which can be mounted on a shop bench or service truck. Out of the 500 sets we sold to them, none were returned and we had not one complaint about the quality of the tool.