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Aerospace Purchasing

DanH

Legacy Member
Mentor
Got a question for the airline and corporate MRO guys.

Sometimes when shopping for products, I run into what seems like a purchasing firewall. The manufacturer won't quote a price or deliver product, just tech information, and only after interrogation.

Then they request documents certifying I'm not a foreign spy, and demanding restrictions no one is actually going to comply with given the product of interest (see below). We're not talking computer chips or exotic alloys. Most recently I'm searching sources of sealants and insulation materials.

Then I get referred to a distributor list, so I call them, and get told "We don't stock that, but I can contact the manufacturer and get a quote. But before I do, you'll need to apply for an account with us." Or "We can only sell to a company, not an individual."

Why does the aerospace sales system operate as it does? I understand the reasons a manufacturer might use a distributor, and I don't expect every source to be like Amazon or Aircraft Spruce. That said, aerospace sales seems to be the land of lunatics who are not very interested in selling product. Is there something I'm missing?
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Dan,

I don't know about aerospace purchasing, but in the electronics industry which I work it is similar. We wouldn't normally buy directly from the manufacturer unless we were buying huge quantities. Distributors are used by the manufacturers because they don't want to have to deal with all of the smaller purchases. In electronics there is also a hobby market which allows some access but some of the bigger distributors don't even want to be bothered by the small $ of hobbyist.
 
EAR99, which is the notice they gave you, basically just means the items are not ITAR, doesn't require a license, and are not controlled. ALL items by default are EAR99. The notice is scary, but the actual regulations it references basically says you can't send the item to an embargoed country like Cuba or North Korea. Everything Walmart sells is technically EAR99.

As for why the system works the way it does, the airline I work for treats $15k parts as expendable, that's why. They don't want to waste a sales rep to deal with an individual when they could be selling 5000 kits to an airline each valued at $3k (literally the invoice on my desk) with about the same time investment as selling $100 to an end consumer.

From the small business side, some distributors or manufacturers may not know how to deal with small quantity orders. They don't have an account with Fedex or UPS and daily pickups scheduled. All their orders go out on pallets or truckload to other companies, so to fill your order, somebody would have to pack it into a shipping box that they may or may not have on hand and then run it down to the local post office or Fedex/UPS location. Much cheaper to just not deal with that.
 
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That's been my experience as well. Most aerospace suppliers are setup as business to business sales. Everything is done on net30 or net60 terms with a PO, no credit card sales, which drives the need for accounts with each distributor. When I was at Lockheed, it would sometimes take over a year to get fully setup with a new distributor. Legal has to review the account terms, and you have to have the distributor review and sign the Lockheed terms and conditions. As an individual, you've got to find that one distributor that decided they would handle the business to consumer sales.
 
EAR99, which is the notice they gave you, basically just means the items are not ITAR, doesn't require a license, and are not controlled.

ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) is the State Department's area, and they have the defense articles list. EAR (Export Administration Regulations) is the Commerce Department's, which uses the Commerce Control List.

US companies have to abide by *both*, and the penalties for violating them (particularly ITAR) can be very severe. For aerospace companies (well, ANY company, actually, but we're focused here on aerospace), it can mean debarment, which for a company reliant on USG contracts can mean bankruptcy.

So in many cases, it's not worth the risk to deal with someone or a company that they don't have a relationship with and know to be in compliance with these laws.
 
Sales Tax

And on top of all of the above remember that someone has to collect State Sales Tax on what you buy unless you’re a business and plan to resell to a retail customer. So either you provide them a Tax ID # and they set up a business account as Dan has already mentioned or they have to collect sales tax from you, account for the taxes collected, and send those $$ to the state you live in usually quarterly. Any wonder why they have no interest in selling one or two items at a time to customers in the 50 states?
 
Welcome to my world Dan!

42 years in Heavy Jet, Airline and MRO, currently Military MRO. EVERYTHING is pain when you have to order it. Fortunately we have in house purchasing specialists that do the misery for most of us and I just send them my needs list and wait. I deal with ITAR items mostly since I'm military , and vendors must be ITAR also for us to "talk". Supply chain sales recourses have to be vetted and added to an approved list before we can even buy from them. If we find a product someone has that we need, but they aren't on our list, we often go through a 3rd party handler that is on our list. All about certs and keeping things out of the bad guys hands... I'm pretty sure Rotax didn't intend to put engines in bad guys drones. Like you, I try to find the end of Gaggle Search sometimes just to find a starting point when we are looking for obscure odd materials. If you have some particulars your digging at, let me know particulars, as I may have a lead for you...if they aren't ITAR sensitive!
 
Despite all the ITAR regs, plenty of sensitive parts find their way to unfriendlies as we see in the latest conflict.

These progress through multiple parties and countries usually before arriving at the final destination.

We had some questionable folks trying to buy our stuff from 3 different places within a couple months a few years back. Background checks showed companies which didn't exist or addresses showing up on rural farmland... They were very persistent but not so clever.

Now why sealants should be so hard to obtain, that's a bit hard to figure out outside of a sheer low volume explanation. Certainly makes it a pain for legit buyers like Dan.
 
Now why sealants should be so hard to obtain, that's a bit hard to figure out outside of a sheer low volume explanation. Certainly makes it a pain for legit buyers like Dan.

RAM (radar absorbent material, the top coat of "paint" for all stealth aircraft) counts as a sealant and is ITAR restricted. Some stuff like fire barrier shouldn't be an issue, but just because it comes in a squeeze tube with no software doesn't mean it's free of restrictions.
 
Purchasing

Worked for an Airline, Distributor and PMA manufacture.
Airlines don't want to add new suppliers unless they get a big discount. Manufacture's don't want to sell to individuals due to all the problems already mentioned. That leaves the Distributors the job of selling the product.

For consumable's I use BAC out of Illinois. They have a good line of sealants.

https://www.bac-online.com/
 
Dan, I would say the situation you are in is quite common. I have run into that on many items. Just recently I was trying to buy a particular light-diffusing acrylic. Only distributors I could find required an account and only give accounts to businesses (my application was rejected).

As for the export compliance. USG has been cracking down, I work in the defense industry and export compliance has been at the forefront of issues the last few years.
 
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