Being a fan of Hongwell 1/72 vehicles I naturally want to buy more. Hongwell HO is in Hong Kong and the factory in China where, as it happens I live. The problem is I can't find any retailer selling Hongwell in China! I did look at their web site and sent a message to their "Contact us" page but got no reply. As I was in Hong Kong last week I thought "If Mahomed won't go to the mountain then the mountain will just have to go to Mahomed (is that pc?). The website gives the address as 68 Mody Rd. quite close to where I was staying so off I go. They were not there and I was told that they had moved quite some time ago! I found out that they were now at 62 Mody Rd. so, try again. I rang the buzzer and a woman reluctantly let me in. I explained the problem and she said the salesman wasn't there but phoned him. I asked where I could buy Hongwell in China, he didnt know! I asked where I could buy Hongwell in HK as I had done the rounds of hobby shops and didn't see any. He said he thought there was a place near Star Ferries that might stock their buses but there was no call for them in HK. I said that I thought it strange as I had seen just about every other brand there. I asked if I could have a look around the showroom and the woman reluctantly said OK. There was a big pile of 2011 catalogs and I asked if I could have one....No!

Life can be frustrating at times can't it?

Yes, it can. Seems strange to me that in this worldwide economy slump that any business would be so reluctant to help a potential customer with finding and buying their product. I wonder if they are a re-package business, buying castings from wholesalers and putting them in their own boxes for resale. Ideas? Thoughts?

I had written a long 'essay' on this last night, but ended up deleting it, because it was all theory and guesswork - but just a very short recap:

Hongwell and other HK/China makers produce a large percentage of models sold by western brands. There's a lot of name switching going on - Joal/Hongwell, Hongwell/no-name, Hongwell/'local chinese brand', Norev/'local brand' and much more. I'm thinking that the models may very well have been available, but sold under a different name, possibly even unbranded?

That's the only explanation I can think of right now.

I know Hongwell do make models for others like the German Schuko. I doubt if they buy in castings as they have a big modern factory, I saw pictures of it. Very impressive. It is just a pity they have no idea about customer relations or marketing. I can understand that they may not want "end user" customers just dropping in all the time but I had a genuine question and it was the only way I could contact them since they didn't reply to my on line query.

It is a shame when places you want to contact do not reply to your quiry. In such cases I go look elsewhere and dis them where ever I can. like the current corgi site that I can not get answers on for certain parts I need and want. NO answer. S0 Corgi is in my bad books and I have no bones about dissing them on that fact. Get a Grip and answer your customers Corgi. Money in the pocket if you do. Idiots and in the current economy too. Wow

Also in some case I suspect it's all about sticking to sets of rules and procedures, even if they're badly flawed and clearly don't work as intended...

"If you want to buy or models, go to the stores"

"Yes, but what stores? I can't seem to find them"

"Not our problem. We're instructed to ask customers to go to the stores, sorrry. Goodbye"