EDDIE BAUER THE TRUTH

[royalforest]

I will be posting over the next few days about my experience with Eddie Bauer.

[mizugori]

what is this, the national enquirer? you're seriously going to post a dramatic headline like that in all caps and then you don't even have anything to post yet...

[royalforest]

Eddie Bauer has been a major topic on this board. Now everyone will know the truth so they can make an intellegent decision if they would like to hire him to locate. I will have the post completed tonight at 8:00.

[TheBiz]

IMO if you read Eddie's old posts you can pretty much get an idea as to if you want to hire him or not.

[sherlock]

IMO if you read Eddie's old posts you can pretty much get an idea as to if you want to hire him or not.

By your reasoning, we should then stop posting our reviews/experiences with Northwestern, Oak, Vendstar, Kickstart, Dixie Narco, Brand, A&A, Sam's, and other topics already heavily posted about?

That's not good reasoning.

Everyone's experiences matter.

Especially when they are EXPERIENCES and not just opinions.

A lot of posts about locators and suppliers are from people that hardly, if ever, actually used them.

Speaking for myself, I find everyone's experiences with manufacturers/suppliers/locators helpful.

Even as a very satisfied Eddie Bauer customer, I will probably find some value in reading about royalforest's experience with Eddie.

And, though you may feel you've heard enough from Eddie, maybe some of us haven't heard enough from his customers.

[mizugori]

but do we really need the melodramatic nonsense??

"AND NOW - AT 8PM TONIGHT - THE MOMENT YOU'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR - THE TRUTH ABOUT EDDIE BAUER WILL BE REVEALED!!

[TheBiz]

By your reasoning, we should then stop posting our reviews/experiences with Northwestern, Oak, Vendstar, Kickstart, Dixie Narco, Brand, A&A, Sam's, and other topics already heavily posted about?

I didn't say experiences didn't matter. I did not say "there were other posts about Eddie in the past".

I said "Eddie's past posts".

There's a difference.

That doesn't mean that reviews aren't helpful but so are things that come straight from the horses mouth.

And yes...the title of this is probably why I even posted. It would have been different if it was "A review of Eddie's services" or something less dramatic.

[sherlock]

I didn't say experiences didn't matter. I did not say "there were other posts about Eddie in the past".

I said "Eddie's past posts".

There's a difference.

That doesn't mean that reviews aren't helpful but so are things that come straight from the horses mouth.

And yes...the title of this is probably why I even posted. It would have been different if it was "A review of Eddie's services" or something less dramatic.

This thread is a review of Eddie's services.

Which you and I agree should be valuable to have.

So what WAS the purpose of your post?

You dislike the drama of the title and refer to it's sensationalism as your purpose for posting in the first place.

But the title was never mentioned in your post.

[TheBiz]

This thread is a review of Eddie's services.

Which you and I agree should be valuable to have

Then let's stick to that and move on.

[mission vending]

I do hope that Royal puts all of it out here for all to see. He has shared some with me over the months and I look forward to seeing the whole story as well as Eddie's response.

[royalforest]

OK Here it is. I was a newbie in the business about a year ago. I started placing candy accounts. One of the locator's I used was Eddie Bauer. First of all, almost all the candy accounts Eddie located for me ended up beings losers. Before I found out they were losers, I explained to him I wanted to get into soda accounts. He said that he would  locate them for 150.00. He said the normal price from other locator's is 300.00, but he will only charge 150.00. He guaranteed that the locations would produce $50.00 a week or he would replace the location. I calculated at $50.00 a week times X amount of machines I can buy minus the cost of doing business, that this is very profitable. So I ordered 10 locations from Eddie. He was wonderful, just banging out the locations. Eddie then calls me and I end up ordering another 40 locations. I rented a 1100 square foot warehouse and packed it full of soda machines. Eddie started to locate them quick. I had to hire more staff in order to get them out in time to keep up with Eddie. Eddie has located about 10 from the new 40 order. He still has 30 locations to fill my order. He calls me and asks if I can purchase another 40 locations from him because he needs the cash flow to keep his telemarketers happy. I figured this is going great, Eddie is doing a great job, I will order another 40 locations to help him out which will put me at 90 locations. What do I care, at the pace he is moving, I should have the route up and running in a short period of time making strong returns. I now have ordered about 90 locations with about 20 filled. The day comes to collect. I was excited to see how much money I was making. The first collection day was one ugly day. We were collecting under $5.00 from many locations. Not one location was doing anything close to 50.00. I even think I broke a vending record of having a location with 1 employee and no foot traffic.

I then called Eddie to find out what the hell is going on. We would fight at different times because he said I had give it some time, that it takes time to work. I listened but was skeptic at this time. Eddie continues to locate, but now I start turning down locations after learning that one to 3 employee accounts with no foot traffic are not going to make 50.00 a week. He was furious, calling me up and telling me he seen the smallest accounts make the biggest money and vice verse. Now he is trying to force the accounts on me. Still not one account has made the 50.00 a week. Money is flying out the door trying to get these installed. At this point I start to panic and feel I am on my way out of business so I start picking and choosing what I install. The cost to reinstall to different locations is very expensive because not only do you have to pay again for the delivery you are losing out because you can be collecting money from placed machines.  Eddie slows down the locating for me realizing I was not going to fall for his tricks. So as Eddie started to halt locating for me. I was fighting him because I have to get these machines out of my warehouse that is costing me 875.00 a month in rent. Eddie refused to locate for me so I kindly asked for a refund on the ones that were not filled. Let me tell you it was a dog fight. He would not give me a refund for the ones still owed to me. We fought for a few months. He thought if I filed a lawsuit it would be expensive and take a long time that I would have a long struggle. What I did instead is I used the lawyers through my debit card to fight for my money back.

I then started to go over expenses in my business and where I need to cut in order to survive. Ended up letting 2 of the 3 employees go. As I was reviewing my paypal statement, I recognised a charge that was unfamiliar to me. As I looked into it closer I realized after I put the first order of 40 for 6000.00 with Eddie and he called me up to purchase a second 40 which I agreed, then he even charged me for a 3rd 40 which I did not authorize to put me at 130 locations total. I was in shock that he would charge my debit card with my authorization. When I called him and asked why he charged my account, he said I placed the order. Why would I place a 3rd order of 40 when the first 40 was not completed. He deceived me by sending another invoice that was identical to the one I approved a few days before. Never the less he would not refund the money. I ended up winning the money back from Eddie. He does claim in an old post that he has given big refunds back. They were not refunds he was demanded to give the money back. All in all I am down about $75000.00 and I am struggling to stay alive.

Rich

[Agapevending]

Eddie has done a great job for me.  At least now my machines are getting out . I think you should leave him a lone. it takes time to  locate.

He knows what he is doing.  So just let him do it.

[Agapevending]

YES I READ IT LET THE MAN DO HIS JOB

[G-Vending]

Eddie is doing good for me right now..  

The question i have is what kind of drugs you on paying for 80 locations upfront in the first place..

I like eddie but would never pay him or anyone else for 80 locations upfront..  

You live and learn..  

[whaletail116]

Sorry to hear about your troubles, Forest, and hopefully you took away a few valuable lessons. 

[royalforest]

The rate he was going 90 would of been complete within a month. It was my fault for making all the orders. So far the  debit card attorney recovered $12000.00 for me. $6000.00 recovered was for 40 not placed and the other $6000.00 was for the order that Eddie placed on my debit card without my authorization.

[royalforest]

G vending Its not about if Eddie is doing good for you. It is about the type of person he is. He is a liar, a cheater and a thief.

[mission vending]

YES I READ IT LET THE MAN DO HIS JOB

Royal has the right to relate his experiences with Eddie, just like everyone else around here. If you don't like it, that's understandable but Eddie's a big boy and he should be the one to respond and bring his side of the story into the equation.

I know much of the story from Royal's perspective and have no reason to doubt him, but still, I'd like to read what Eddie has to say and to get his side of the story.

Where are you Eddie?

[T BIRD]

IMO...........Vendiscuss should not advertise this guy's services on here.

[bigtay6187]

Im in the market for a locator right now and I talked with both Eddie and Kickstart today. Needless to say I will for sure be going with Kickstart.

There is no reason why ANYONE should ever double charge a card like that, I have been in retail for many years now and had access to tons of peoples credit cards, SSNs etc. Never in my wildest dreams would I imagine stealing someones money like that.....WOW.

[mission vending]

IMO...........Vendiscuss should not advertise this guy's services on here.

The is no question that Eddie has been and will continue to be a controversial personality on this board. He can and has provided services as agreed for a number of people. On the other hand he has also left a number of people less than satisfied.

Only by putting this type of info out here, that is what VendDiscuss was intended for, can we make our own informed decisions about using him or not. If the negative outweighs the positive then his business will dry up and advertising here won't be cost effective for him any more.

Besides this is a privately owned board and Steve gets to make that judgement call.

Again, I'd like to hear Eddie's side but I guess he's out skiing or something and can't be bothered right now.

[sherlock]

I'm sorry to hear about your situation RoyalForest.

That really blows.

I've often said, and remain convinced, that working with locators is the worst part of the vending business.

Eddie has done well by me.

But my personal experience with locators IN GENERAL is that nearly all of them LIE.

I hope you weather this storm RF.

It's so much more than your issue with EB that makes me shake my head.

Your business is in jeopardy, too.

I wish you the best.

[kai1836]

Royal,

  Also verry sorry to hear this has happened to you. Hope things get better

[eddiebauervending]

Blue Moose knows about this guy and I never even had access to his card. He requested invoice,I sent them,and he paid.

EVERYTHING was done through paypal and I NEVER  had his card number or any sorta of access to it.Again...HE requested invoice for us to continue finding locations...I would send when we were wrapping up an order and he paid...acknowledging the previous order complete...period.

I have LOTS of clients now that trust me with that information now that I have opend a merchant account and not one would tell you of any unauthorized use NOT ONE.

There is so much to this story I will not go end to the details. We were sending him 10-20 locations a week. Our agreement was all would be placed and we would go back and move the poorer performers after a 90 day run.

THEN it came to our attention from his assistant  that he was moving machines from locations that we found and into new locations we were giving him and instructing  her to tell us the location was turning him away. I never QC-ed any of these until I heard that. After the 6th location We found that he said he was turned away from(not he turned them down that was not allowed per our agreement) and they had machines there with his number on it i realized it was true and we sopped. I confronted Rich and this only made things worse. Was I supposed to just keep sending this guy locations ...forever...NO

This is then end part.

I added up that we had secured 167 locations and he had paid for 150.

he owes me 2550.00

I have a lawsuit being filed against him and my attorney said these were the only details I could give on here and so I will be unable to respond any further to this thread.

Blue moose could prob shed some light on this guy...he ambushed her when she was trying help him out of the mess he got HIMSELF INTO. embezling from the  300k loan the bank gave him probably didn't help either.

I've washed my hands of this guy until court...he is a crooked crook

[royalforest]

Now that I see there is no remorse and you are posting lies I will think about following through with my prior intentions to recover the 75,000.00 plus loss. Thanks for helping me along. First of all you never completed an order before receiving new money. I will be interested to see Bevs response. Also, I did not borrow or embezzle from a bank. I never told you I was turned away from locations and then placed the machine. I only have about 40 placed. The reason the attorney from the bank was able to recover the $12,000.00 was because you had no defense to what you did so they forced you to pay. That must of been a real shocker for you when you saw you had 12,000.00 less in your bank. The victory of my money back proves what you did so I don't think what you say will hold that much weight.