Climbing Frames Etc.

It is with great regret that I have to announce that as of last night I stopped taking any orders. I will be shutting off the shopping cart as soon as possible. For any further orders that come through between now and then the money will be refunded to customers in full, where payment has been made by a customer.

I have been selling these products for a number of years and had a reasonable amount of success. Customers have been happy with the goods that they received and I’ve got testimonials from customers to prove it. I’ve never needed to worry about anyone wishing to send anything back - until now!

In the past, my supplier (who is also the manufacturer) would accept returns, not that I needed to worry about this! However, at some point this policy changed. They will now not accept returns under any circumstances. As a retailer I am legally bound to adhere to the Distance Selling Regulations which allows the customer to return goods for any reason (under defined circumstances), but I can’t send them back to the supplier. That leaves me VERY exposed. I’m one guy, working from home. I don’t have offices, storage facilities etc. Being an internet retailer I do not carry any stock and the goods are delivered directly to my customers by the supplier/manufacturer. So, let me give you an example of what could, and did, happen…

Having never had a customer wish to return anything before, all of a sudden I had someone wishing to do just that. It was frustrating as I had gone to some lengths to provide the customer with extra information to help her and I felt her reason for wanting to return the item was based on a knee-jerk reaction to something that was very easily sorted out and what she was worrying about wasn’t actually a problem at all. Anyway, she wished to return the item and I contacted my supplier to get this sorted out. I was emailed back to say that they would not take it back and that this was mentioned in the current terms that I was purchasing under. I’ve always had good relations with them and never bothered to read all that stuff!

I tried to make them aware of the situation that left me in. A customer purchased a product from me for £1500. I paid them, the supplier, approximately £1250, and now I was going to have to refund the £1500 to the customer and also be out of pocket for the £1250 that I had paid to the supplier! It doesn’t take a mathematical genius to work out that this is a quick way to lose an awful lot of money. The margins on the products are low and quite honestly this sort of thing could wipe out any profits I had made from sales for almost the whole month.

The suppliers suggestion was to either ask the customer to sell the goods on Ebay (that would have gone down like a lead balloon!) or get them returned to me, at my expense, and then sell them on Ebay. However, the supplier said that they were convinced that when the goods were getting sent back they would almost certainly get damaged by the courier in transit!

I carry out my responsibilities as a retailer to the best of my abilities and there is no way that I would knowingly sell an item to anyone that I knew was faulty, whether on Ebay or not!

Basically, I’m expected to put up with a situation where I take 100% of the risk and all of the losses. The supplier firmly believes the goods will get damaged in transit on their way to me, yet are happy for me to end up with damaged goods that I cannot re-sell. That situation leaves me facing financial wipe-out. I have a wife and kids and I simply am not prepared to put everything at risk for the slim profits that I make, particularly when I’m the only one that is expected to take any risk!

This story has a happy ending (sort of). I rang the customer to tell her that due to my personal circumstances I would not be able to refund her money and explain the situation to her. She was out when I rang, but 10 minutes later I received an email from her to say that that they had taken another look at the product and decided that it would all be ok after all - phew! Boy was I relieved!

I’m sure this is probably just a one-off, but it’s made me realise how vulnerable my position is as a retailer and it’s been enough to put me out of business! There is no way I am willing to continue trading with the knowledge that if a customer asked for a refund then I would be unable to meet that request. And if I cannot meet my obligations then the only course of action is to cease trading.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the remaining orders that are already placed with my supplier go smoothly. With years of problem free selling there is no reason to expect there will be any problems, but I’ll tell you, it only takes one thing like this to really put the jitters up you! My email cancelling my trade account should be with my supplier tomorrow.

Thank you to all the loyal customers who have purchased from me over the past few years.

Chris

It’s that time of year again and this time there are tons more climbing frames being added to Climbing Frames Etc. In fact there are so many that it is taking FAR longer than expected to get them all added to the site !

There are a number of climbing frame models that are being dropped, or have been dropped, and where links are either out of date, or about to become out of date on this blog I have redirected them to a current climbing frame with the nearest price equivalent. That inevitably means that there are specification differences between the old play structure and the current one, as the main criteria was price and then features.

There are so many climbing frames on this site that there has got to be something to match the features you are after !

In addition to sorting out the product links I have also tidied up some of the old links on the blog to terms, contact pages, etc. These now point to the current pages on Climbing Frames Etc., rather than the old out of date ones.

I’ve been working on a major update to Climbing Frame Etc.  It’s taking a LOT longer than I imagined, mainly due to the fact that I’m trying to do the work on a live site.

It’s actually a pretty stupid thing to do.

At the moment the site is all hand coded, but with the huge increase in the number of products that I want to list this is really not practical anymore.  What I’m doing is implementing a new shopping cart which will also act as a content management system, enabling me to list products in a much easier manner.

The shopping cart looks like a great product, but despite my best efforts I have been unable to get it working.  I’m trying to implement it in the background on the live site and at the same time trying to ensure that none of the existing live and working site gets impacted in any way.  It just isn’t working, and like I said, it’s a pretty stupid thing to do.

I think the problem is the .htaccess file, which I’ve got doing all sorts of stuff at the moment.  It also needs to be altered for the shopping cart, and this seems to be the straw that broke the camels back.  There is no way to experiment with this in the live environment.  So, I’ve purchased another copy of the cart software and will be doing all my testing on a completely separate domain.

I’m hoping this will enable me to pinpoint exactly where the problem is and will definitely allow my to test things in a far safer manner.

More updates on Climbing Frames Etc. new look coming soon. BTW – it’s not just a new look.  There will be a range of swimming pools and outdoor toys being added to the site as well.

If you are running a pub, restaurant, nursery, school, or anywhere that will be allowing public use of play equipment then you NEED to be aware of the fact that there is a big difference between residential and commercial play equipment. They are certified to different safety standards for a start. Also, if a child is injured, or you need to make a claim against your insurance then you will soon find out about the difference between the two, as you probably won’t be covered if you are using residential equipment for public use.

I regularly get schools and other bodies contacting me about purchasing residential play equipment that they want to use public or commercial use. What I have done is set up a site where a commercial climbing frame and swing set can be purchased. So now there is no excuse !

Visit http://www.commercial-climbing-frames.com for more information.

Please be aware that there is a limited stock situation with some of the climbing frames that are on offer on Climbing Frames Etc.

Not all the climbing frames and play structures are affected, only those from Plum Products. One item - the Cedar Gables II (on this page http://www.climbing-frames-etc.co.uk/climbing-frame-cedargables-plum.html ) is now permanently out of stock.

Products that are available for next day delivery are not affected. For other products it is best to phone before placing your order to find if your play structure is in stock.

I’m in the process of updating the Climbing Frames Etc. link directory. So if you are interested in becoming a link partner then please fill in the form on the following page :

http://www.climbing-frames-etc.co.uk/linkto-climbing-frames-etc.html

PLEASE NOTE - I am only interested in exchanging links with sites that are related to mine. For example, outdoor toys, play equipment, gardening, childrens parties, etc.

Do not waste your time and mine by submitting sites that are NOT related.

I am considering offering a range of swimming pools to compliment the range of climbing frames, play structures, and swing sets that I currently stock. I’m not certain that this site is the right place to be be selling them. The alternative is to build a brand new site. The problem with doing that is that it can easily be 8 months before it goes into Google’s results, and there is TONS of hard work to get it decent ranking.

So, adding them here would be the easy option. I’ve yet to decide. If anyone has any thoughts then feel free to let me know.

I’ve had a few calls from customers recently, asking me why there is a difference in prices between my Climbing Frames site and my other site, Garden Playground Equipment.

The reason is that delivery is that Garden Playground Equipment deals with a single manufacturer.  So, I show the prices excluding delivery.  Climbing Frames Etc. deals with a number of different suppliers, each of whom have different delivery charges and delivery timescales.  So, on this site I show the prices including delivery so that you, the customer, can make side-by-side comparisons of the products without having to worry if one product really is cheaper than another once delivery is added.  The price you see is the price you pay, so it makes it easy to compare products.

At the moment on the Climbing Frames Etc main menu there is an option for ‘Accessories’.  The problem I have is that there are minimum order values and/or minimum delivery costs from the different companies that I deal with.  For example, one manufacturer of play structures requires a minimum order value of £100.  If all you want is a new swing seat then there is a big difference to get to the £100 mark.  Similarly, nobody wants to buy an £8 swing seat and be faced with £20 delivery costs.

I tried to make it clear on the climbing frames accessories page that they would only be for sale with the purchase of a climbing frame or other play structure, so as to ensure that there would be no issues over minimum order values or delivery costs.  However, I don’t think that is working.  It doesn’t matter where I put the text, how big, bold, and noticeable I make it, the problem is that people simply are not reading it !

The only way around the issue is to remove the climbing frames accessories option from the menu.  What I plan to do is to replace that menu option with one for a FAQ.  I hope that I can answer a lot of the questions that people often phone me up about, but I can’t help worrying that if people won’t read something important in big, bold, red text, then I might be wasting my time ! 

I’ve got a load of new products that still need adding to the site.  One of those was an adult swing set.  I was contacted by a customer today whose kids are 8 and 12 years old.  Most, if not all, of the swing sets that I had listed on the site are for ages 3 – 12.  The problem is what do you do when your kids are at the age when they still want to play on the swing sets but are physically getting too big ?

The answer of course is to go for the Adult Swing Set. It is designed for kids of all ages from 8 years old upwards.  I’m glad that he called because it gave me the kick I needed to finally get this listed with the other swing sets.

If you think your kids might be a bit big for the ordinary swing sets then why not take a look at the adult swing set ?

I’ve altered the product navigation menu on Climbing Frames Etc. As I’ve been gradually adding more and more products to the site the old menu structure was starting to get a little unwieldy. The problem I face is how to categorise the products when there is so much cross-over in their functionality. For example, where does a climbing frame end and a play structure begin ? What is the difference between some of the kids fort play systems and some of the play structures ?

What I’ve done is to take the products from one manufacturer where the products can be expanded by adding extra kids forts and categorising them into the two sizes that they produce. These are the standard sized kids forts and the compact sized kids forts.

The rest of the products under the Kids Forts option are from a different manufacturer, and again I have tried to group these as logically as possible. With the exception of one product, which clearly fitted in with the Climbing Frames section, I have placed all of the play structures from Plum Products under the category called ‘Play Structures’.

I hope that none of this has left anyone confused or unable to find a play structure that they are interested in. If there is something you are looking for and can’t find it then please feel free to contact me.

A new kids fort model has been added to Climbing Frames Etc.  This is the Compact Kids Fort.  It is not yet available from the Climbing Frames Etc. menu as this is undergoing a restructure.

This model is being sold with an 8ft wave slide, but it can also be purchased without the slide for anyone who wants to build their own custom play structure.  The option to purchase this fort is not yet available on Climbing Frames Etc. but in the meantime if anyone wants to buy this play equipment without the slide then you can do so on my other site, Garden Playground Equipment.

Please be aware that delivery of this play structure can only be made to mainland England and Wales.

The newly added swing set models from Plum Products had been displaying a ‘picture coming soon’ message for the last few days.  I’ve now added the pictures for all of the swing sets so that people can actually see what it is they are buying !

The pictures for the play equipment that has been added to Climbing Frames Etc. over the last few days are now ready.  I am in the process of uploading these at the moment.

There will be a restructuring of the Climbing Frames Etc. site navigation as there are now so many products that I need to find a better way of grouping them. More on this later.

This is big ! It contains just about everything your kids could ever want from a play structure.  It’s even got two towers with a bridge to connect them AND two slides.  This really has to be seen to be believed.

You’ve got to have a look at the Cedar Gables play structure.

The Saratoga from Plum Products has been added to Climbing Frames Etc.  It offers similar features to the Outlook climbing frame, but adds a spiral slide and wooden roof to the fort to give this a unique touch.

The rest of the feature set is similar to the Outlook climbing frame and you can see the Saratoga climbing frame / play structure here.

The Outlook from Plum Products is the latest addition to Climbing Frames Etc.  It has a large play deck,  and other features that set it apart are the built in picnic table, sand pit, rope ladder, glider swing and 10ft zoom slide.  It comes with the features that you would expect such as a great swing set, climbing frame, and climbing wall.

Take a look at the Outlook climbing frame / play structure.

The Madison is another climbing frame / play structure from Plum Products that has just been added to Climbing Frames Etc.

This model has a substantial kids fort as well as a sand pit, climbing wall, monkey bars, 8ft wave slide, and a glider swing.

Of course all of this comes with free delivery.

Have a look at the Madison climbing frame / play structure .

Another new climbing frame / play structure from has been added to Climbing Frames Etc.  This model is the ‘Eldorado’.  It is a slightly different style play structure in terms of looks, and offers a swing set comprising of two swings and a glider swing.  It also comes with a sand pit which is under the platform of the kids fort tower, an 8ft wave slide and a climbing wall .

You can find the Eldorado climbing frame here.

I’ve added a new climbing frame model to Climbing Frames Etc.  This is the ‘Chestnut’ climbing frame.  It’s the big brother to the Avondale climbing frame that was added yesterday.

So what is different ?  Well the Chestnut climbing frame has a larger play deck which is similar to some of the kids forts that you will find in Climbing Frames Etc.  It also adds a rope ladder and sand pit.  As with other main products in Climbing Frames Etc. delivery is free.

Take a look at the Chestnut climbing frame