Supplying Watercooling in South Africa Product Requests, Brands etc

[Critical_Star]

Good Morning, Carbies

I hope everyone is doing fantastic,

I have a request from all the Water cooling enthusiasts in the country. What brands and products do you think are most needed?

So we do have Bykski.co.za as a local supplier but if you (as the water cool people) could choose a brand and products what would it be? The problem is EKWB is difficult for many reasons however if the demand is great enough something can be done.

Bitspower and Alphacool are possible options but it depends if there is willingness to buy these brands.

Moreover!

Loads of people have ordered off Alibaba and other international sites....if we have a local distributor would you support them if they bring in what you want??( need to know what that is)

Basically, I have the opportunity to distribute some of these brands but if everyone is still going to just place their own individual orders from Alibaba there is no point in trying to make a local supplier.

I just want the people's opinion.... I love water cooling and i think it definitely has it's place in our country, so please help me to understand what people want.

 

[Snazzylicious]

It think pricing would be the biggest for people to buy locally

 

[Critical_Star]

Okay but Bykski would be the best bet on pricing then because it's affordable but I've noticed there are a lot of enthusiasts that are willing to pay top dollar for EKWB. This is my problem it seems like there is only 2 ways to go about it.

Very expensive or very cheap no middle ground

 

[Critical_Star]

My other issue is product predictions because Water Blocks are super specific to who is buying so stocking them is a nightmare trying to predict what people want.

Kinda why I'm trying to involve Carbies for advise.

Thanks all

 

[Oj0]

Bykski is also available through me, I just need to put the time/effort into getting the full range listed.

EKWB was here but failed due to poor sales. Bykski is probably enough for the entire SA market.

The biggest issue faced is that very few people have R 5-15k to spend on aesthetics. You can get similar temperatures and noise from air coolers these days, with better reliability to boot (if your pump fails, you're out of action - if a fan fails, your PC likely has enough airflow to keep temps more or less in check until you can replace the fan with whatever other 120/140mm fan you have available).

Now the big question as to whether I or any other retailer will touch whatever is brought in - what sort of financials does the proposed disti have? There are distis large enough that the vendor can fail completely and the distis will cover RMA costs out of their own pocket, and there are small distis that will say "warranty fell away when the vendor shut their doors, sorry." B2B doesn't have CPA protection, and the cost of crediting the item will fall solely on the retailer if the disti doesn't step up.

What sort of local stock-holding will there be? 3-4 of each unit isn't enough. Those could sell out in a week and then what happens should there be a warranty claim? I most certainly won't say to a customer "the disti is only placing another order in three months, until then just think happy thoughts."

I can think of 3-4 distis large enough to carry exclusive ranges without it being a concern. Tell me that one of our sub R 100m/year distis will be carrying it and I'll be wary AF.

Back to the biggest stumbling block, all of this becomes moot as basically every disti large or small has already come to the conclusion that there's no money to be made on custom liquid cooling in SA.

 

[TRINITRON]

It's not worth it bro

 

[Critical_Star]

Thank you all I appreciate the feedback

 

[ThatGuyJD]

Good Morning, Carbies

I hope everyone is doing fantastic,

I have a request from all the Water cooling enthusiasts in the country. What brands and products do you think are most needed?

So we do have Bykski.co.za as a local supplier but if you (as the water cool people) could choose a brand and products what would it be? The problem is EKWB is difficult for many reasons however if the demand is great enough something can be done.

Bitspower and Alphacool are possible options but it depends if there is willingness to buy these brands.

Moreover!

Loads of people have ordered off Alibaba and other international sites....if we have a local distributor would you support them if they bring in what you want??( need to know what that is)

Basically, I have the opportunity to distribute some of these brands but if everyone is still going to just place their own individual orders from Alibaba there is no point in trying to make a local supplier.

I just want the people's opinion.... I love water cooling and i think it definitely has it's place in our country, so please help me to understand what people want.

lol. Bykski is good quality and they're cheap and local but can get them and Barrow from Ali express with limited import tax... and not all that stuff is available locally.

EKWB blocks are overpriced trash. Their fittings are just overpriced. Their Pumps and Rads are the only products worth having well and ZMT.

Alphacool, Heatkiller and all the other European brands is great but expensive and shipping is crazy.

Then you have Optimus but dealing with them is an absolute nightmare.

 

[ThatGuyJD]

Bykski is also available through me, I just need to put the time/effort into getting the full range listed.

Goo thing that, means you haven't been able to see the full extent of how bad my purchasing history is.

 

[Oj0]

Goo thing that, means you haven't been able to see the full extent of how bad my purchasing history is.

There are 264 SKUs total, of which I think I've loaded about half a dozen so far xD

 

[ThatGuyJD]

There are 264 SKUs total, of which I think I've loaded about half a dozen so far xD

5 actually

 

[Oj0]

5 actually

Sounds about right. There are some Mayhems products as well.

 

[ThatGuyJD]

Sounds about right. There are some Mayhems products as well.

Yeah the premix coolant.

 

[Dodge Gee]

Barrow and Alphacool. And if the 120x120 Thermal Pads could be supplied, something like Gelid

 

[el_guapo3291]

Let's put it this way if Rectron couldn't pull it off with EKWB, it's going to be very difficult for you to do so independently. Anything you can import I can import myself and get it cheaper since there won't be any markup added...SA market for custom loops is just too small for any of the big disti's to invest the money into it and if you don't have that level of scale you simply will not be price competive enough in an already tough market segment... Just my opinion though, there is the possibility I'm completely wrong.

 

[stixx]

I would love to see EK and Bitspower in SA. But the market here is too small and I just end up importing all the watercooling stuff I need. I see Bykski now has official presence in SA and are at a decent price so any competitors will be really unprofitable.