European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - October 1, 1978, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 14 the stars and stripes sunday october 1, 1978 getting Auto parts from cafes i followed your series wheels this summer and after Reading the various double talk from the army and air Force extortion system i feel that another View should be presented. As a Middle ranking enlisted member i too must pay the High prices charged by cafes. I now know part of the reason for the prices and for the Lack of parts and or accessories. But before cafes wishes to say what i am about to present to you is garbage let me qualify myself. I have been in Ger Many for almost 10 years during which time i have been stationed at rather Small caverns. I was also an cafes employee in a position to make use of one of cafes parts operations. But enough of this line and Back to the Point at hand. Have you Ever walked into an cafes parts store looking for a particular item Only to find out the concessionaire has had the item on order for the last six months have you ordered a special part for your vehicle Only to find out it was t at the parts store on the Day it was promised have you seen accessories at one parts store maybe while you were temporary duty and said to yourself i m Gonna get me one of those when i get Only to find your Home store did t Stock it if the answer to any of the above questions is yes then Here is the probable cause. Concessionaires order merchandise according to cafes master listings. These lists contain the minimum quantities that can be ordered at one time. This is All Well and Fine for a Large Community but what about the Little Guy on a Small Post an example would be the heavy duty Tow rope. This item Sells for More than $12, but the minimum order cafes will ship is 12. In a Community of a couple of Hundred people How Many would want to spend that much for a Tow rope another Case is the poor Man who or dered two dash clocks and cafes sent two cases. The clocks sell for $6.98, so what is this Guy going to do with All these clocks when there Are Only 200 people living or working on the Post this same Man order a Case of Spray lubricant and again cafes sent him a car ton of 12 cases 144 cans of it. What s he going to do manufacture pencils with All that Graphite of sure cafes has been More than considerate in some cases. Like getting some parts that have been special ordered the St is and file 5�vuox european edition col. Billy e. Spangler Usa. Editor in chief it. Col. . Taylor Usan. Deputy editor in Uhtof Mert Proctor. Managing editor Elmer d. Frank. Production manager henrys. Epstein. Circulation manager this newspaper is an authorized unofficial publication for . Armed forces overseas. 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Circulation offices Germany Berlin civilian 8331846, Mil 6187 Bremer Haven Civ 85168, Mil 8119 Frankfurt Civ 692050 Kaiserslautern Civ 57617, Mil Vogel Weh 6050 Munich Civ 6901503 or 6901504, Mil 6556 Nuernberg Civ 712558, Mil 7256 North German Region Rhein Maln Mil 7103 or 6025 Stutt Gart Civ 814596, Mil 6030. Greece Athens Civ 9923390 and telex 216892. Italy Vincenza Civ 559346. Spain Madrid Civ 2057546 or Torrejon air base Mil 7546. Turkey Istanbul Civ 664372. United kingdom Greenham common Civ 44768, military 46263 ext. 209. To him in record time. Things like fenders batteries Oil and things like that. But again Good of cafes sees to it that the Drivers who Are supposed to deliver these things Don t get them there in one is he supposed to Tell a customer who ordered a fender when the fender comes in almost Bent in half what he nor Mally does is Tell the customer i m sorry but it did t come in on this by the Way cafes did you know Auto Mobile batteries Don t hold acid after they have been dropped six feet even if the customer is supposed to pay $50 for it it just does t hold acid. So Here we have my Friend running an cafes Auto parts store garage with All this excess and damaged merchandise not to mention the phased out items. When was the last time you had a Call for an 8-25 x 14 general tire tying up several thousand dollars and what can he do with it i expect a response from cafes to the effect he can turn it again this is a great idea but it just does t work. He has been trying to do just that for so Many years he forgot when he started. Just the other Day i was looking through his pile of cafes junk and found a nifty steering wheel spinner called out of Way i bet i have the Only vehicle in Usa eur with a steering wheel spinner i la save it for when i buy my 49 Ford. But now for the Benefit of All the Small cafes concessionaires How do we get rid of the merchandise and get our Money Back into circulation to sum it up in a nutshell the problem is. As follows 1. If a customer wants to have accessories the manager must order a minimum Quantity usually adjusted for a Large scale operation. 2. If a special order part or any part for that matter comes in damaged the Man letters to the editor Ager is stuck with it on his inventory and he has to re order the part. 3. If an item is phased out or pulled off the Market remember those old five Gal Lon Gas cans cafes or even those Little five quart Metal jobs the manager is stuck with them thereby tying up his or cafes Money. Well i be Given you part of the problem but How about some solutions try these cafes 1. Adapt your minimum order to the Community that you Are supposed to be serving instead of some warehouse employee who feels his Beer break would be Sepor died by a minute or two of work. 2. Have one of your employees of Good standing go to All the garages to talk with the managers and make arrangements to turn in All the excess merchandise without penalties to the managers for having the items on hand for such a Long time or or Dering so much at one time. You should have the personnel to do this with As anyone who has been passed by an official cafes car travelling in excess of 80 Mph can Tell you that cafes is in a hurry to Correct these problems. And now that i have shed some Light on this problem i wish to thank the readers i Hope that Means you too cafes for their time. Before you turn this column Over to cafes for a witty response i have two re quests for your readers one take a break before Reading any further and two when you come Back please be wearing your highest boots. Name withheld bad to la Buchwald Washington it is not generally known but one of the things the general services administration Gas does is train foreign bureaucrats in How to admin ister the housekeeping chores of their own governments. Now that the multimillion Dollar scandal is breaking in the Agency i keep wondering what some of these foreign government workers Learned. I take you to a Gas office where Amu Tiki has been assigned to study the latest methods used in servicing the . Govern ment. Now or. Tiki when you take charge of running the housekeeping of your govern ment you will have to lease buildings see that they Are kept up through paint and re pairs Purchase and dispense millions of dollars Worth of office equipment run hundreds of Supply stores handle govern ment transportation and provide All the services that will keep the bureaucracy running smoothly and it sounds like a lot of but it pays it does yes if you learn it right. Now let me give you an example. You walked through the Halls of this building before you came Here. Right what did you notice they needed of course they did. Now your Job would be to paint those Walls. How Many Coats of paint would you say they needed at least Good. Now what you would do is give out a contract to paint the Halls three times but the contractor would Only paint them what about the other two Coats of paint they would go into the pockets of you and your i Don t want paint in Rny not paint or. Tiki the Cost of the other two Coats of i see. One coat for the Walls one coat for the contractor and one coat for you learn fast. Now let s talk about furniture. You Don t happen to have a brother in Law in the office furniture Busi Ness do you no he grows Rice in his Well put him in the furniture business but where would i get the Money from your coat of paint Hee Hee. I forgot about , once he s in the furniture Busi Ness you will contract him for All your desks and my brother in Law loess t know How to make All the better. When it Falls apart you la have to order Why should i make my brother in Law Rich because you la be a silent partner in the furniture Hee Hee. I m going to like this All right Tiki. The next thing you have to do is open office Supply stores in your government buildings. If your government is like ours nobody knows How much paper it uses. You order twice the amount of paper that you think you la need. Then you sell what in t used to the private wait suppose somebody finds out then you give him some Money from your furniture company to keep his Mouth this is getting complicated. Can i take notes no notes never take any notes. If you want to be in your government s Gas you have to keep everything in your please forgive me for wanting to take Okay that s enough for today. Well talk about leasing space from private land lords tomorrow. Are there any questions if my president wants his Palace painted do i Only use one coat no dammit. Presidential palaces Al ways get three Coats of paint. The one thing you have to learn in this business is not to be c los Angeles editor s note col. Oran t. Hrncir director services div he cafes Europe replies first merchandise in Auto parts stores belongs to cafes not the concessionaire. He receives a fee on parts sold and there fore there is a human tendency for store operators to try to carry As Many lines of items As they can. If they sell parts or accessories they earn Money if items Don t sell there in t any penalty for the concessionaire because he in t carrying the Cost of the inventory investment. Most customers in Europe realize that common sense dictates every store Loca Tion can t sell or have available the entire Range of things sold by the Exchange. Store Stock structures have to be generally Tai lored to the size of locations serviced. There in t enough Money in the cafes system to do otherwise. Normal business and Supply practices Call for shipping items in multiples of Low est distribution units in the Case of the Tow ropes 12 does t appear to be an excessive number for a Community of sever Al Hundred people. They Don t go out of style or otherwise age. The $6.98 clocks buy the Way can be ordered individually. Certainly if a part comes in damaged it has to re ordered but the concessionaire should t be stuck with it. It can either be marked Down for Sale if still serviceable or written off if necessary. In an imperfect world cafes its distribution system and its concessionaires Are obviously not perfect. However there Are procedures established for purging old and dead stocks. It takes continuing emphasis and supervision to maintain a heal thy in Stock condition in cafes Auto parts stores and we Are devoting a lot of work to this $ he tried Regino i would like to know if an can play a record for me the song three times a lady Sun by the commodores. A girl i know has a birthday soon. I would like to know if you could please play this record with the following lines to re Gina Happy birthday love always poo. I also would like to know if you could play this around 6 30 . Pfc. Mark Cherrick Heilbronn Germany editor s note an an spokesman replies an regrets its inability to Honor your request for a musical dedication. The net work features a full hour of news sports and information from 6 to 7 ., and to interrupt for a song would sound strange. All of our local disc jockey shows Honor requests. They Are heard on All an stations at 6 10, 7 30 and 8 05 . And 12 15, 4 05 and 5 05 . If you would care to write the station in your area they would be Happy to respond during those
