Bad news for us Graupner fans.
GRAUPNER RE-STRUCTURING AND CLOSURE OF USA OFFICES
Posted by Sales and Marketing on 2/10/2020 to FROM GRAUPNER
Graupner USA will be closing shop and hand over the business to a yet to be named distributor who will be handling all Graupner affairs which includes sales and support.
At this point we have no information about any distributor for either Europe or the Americas. Our mother company in Korea is negotiating with several parties. As demand is high for Graupner products we are confident that they will find the best possible solution that ensures the best care for Graupner products, brand and customers.
This is part of the restructuring by the Korean mother company. The closure of the China factory and German offices are part of this, and the USA is unfortunately not in a different position.
We have been working with the Korean management team to resolve this to ensure the continuation of the US operations under a different legal structure. Unfortunately, we decided last week against this as there were too many things stacked up against us in the USA.
A formal statement should come soon from Korea.
Last month our team visited the Korean HQ where we have seen plenty of inventory ready to be shipped. Manufacturing of receivers has already started but shortage of products will remain until they can catch up. Apparently moving a factory out of a country like China is not an easy feat due to laws and legal practices which made a process that should have taken a few weeks last over six months.
Our US offices will remain open until February 25th where we will continue to handle any sales or support requests.
For faster response we advise you to use our CRM system accessible through your Graupner account or from our contact page.
The RC industry has seen lately too many obstacles caused by excessive regulations, trade wars, decline of interest and unfair competition from counterfeit products which makes running a small operation like ours very challenging. The move towards large distributors will hopefully address some of those challenges.
We would like to thank you our wonderful customers who have been with us for all these years.
Most of you we have met in person which was always refreshing as the information and suggestions given helped us making better products and improve our services. For this we are grateful!
We do apologize for the inconvenience this may have caused to some of you. Graupner Co. is committed to its products and brand and we do hope that this will be resolved shortly.
Thanks again and we wish you all the best!
The Graupner USA Team
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