....When Direct To Avionics (Chelton exclusive experimental model distrubtor) went belly up and left customers all over the world with orders they had paid for but not received Stein personally made good his Chelton customers orders whereas everybody who had ordered direct were left holding the bag. I understand it cost Stein in the neighborhood of $100,000.00 out of his own pocket....
In the interest of fair reporting here, we aren't the only ones who took care of our customers at our own expense (which by the way was MUCH higher than $100K).
Aerotronics lost well over $100K as well...they took care of their customers 100%.
Avionics Systems also lost tons of $$'s....they also took care of their customers 100%.
We ate all of the $$'s on behalf of our customers.
Starks customers were left holding the bag.....
Lancair Customers were left holding 50% of the bag, they at 50%.
So, just understand that for all three of the companies I listed above (including myself) lost a LOT of money. This is NO trivial matter for the companies involved, as we aren't rich to begind with, and lord knows we're not wasting money on anything crazy this year. Some of us may be slow to respond, or to finish panels, or whatever, but there is a lot going on behind the scenes - Gary from Aerotronics and Dave from Avionics systems are people who I'm proud to consider colleagues of mine...and that respect has been earned, not given. Even though they are competitors, they run their business the same way - integrity and ethics come first.
With that in mind, you can pretty much be guaranteed that none of those three main companies will be as cheap as someone like Stark or Spruce on Avionics....but, you'll be more than assured that you'll be treated right if something should go wrong.
Just my 2 cents a usual!
Cheers,
Stein
