SB:
Nope. I rely on field trips and contacts across the industry.
I've been doing this for many years now, and the contact base is fairly broad.
Generally speaking, anybody can do it and in fact, I encourage investors to do just that. It's also fun and you get to meet lots of great people. I've done enough of it over the years that I know that what you learn by visiting a dozen retailers across a broad cross section of local economic real estate can be extrapolated to the country, especially with a commodity product like the PC.
I prefer to talk to the sales people, the technical support troops and the people who deal with inventories (managers tend to spout the company party line, so I don't really go after them).
In the end, a company must sell its product and at a profit. The place to find out whether something is selling is in the stores and distributors, and the people who know the sales situation best are those who make their living by selling.
This process has served me well. I use these findings as a filter to suggest places to dig.
Best, Earlie
P.S. The two big sources of PC sales info are Dataquest and IDC. Both are eternally optimistic, which makes sense when you know who pays their bills. I am not exaggerating when I say that I have not seen one report from either of them that was accurate and many of their reports are outright nonsense and guess work.
Best, Earlie |
