Dell Cheating on the Direct-Sales Model?

capt turnpike writes "Despite its CEO saying that the direct model is the company's 'religion', according to eWEEK.com, Dell seems to be moving away from direct sales and working with value-added resellers." From the article: "Still, 'they'll never admit it or make [the channel] a formal program,' said one analyst who asked not to be identified. 'If you look at Dell's stock versus HP's, part of the difference has to do with Dell's reputation for owning the customer. There's a sense they own the entire margin and have higher profits because they sell directly. It makes them appear more valuable to Wall Street.'"

Comments

We just bought a bunch of dell from Zones

[Anonymous Coward]

They even beat Dell's direct sales price. Even espite the fact that Dell was cutting the price some for us because we were buying a lot of stuff.

Silicon Valley Business Model is Dead

[Anonymous Coward]

The Dell model based on the "all capital gains, no dividends" business practice pioneered in the 1980s in Silicon Valley is 0xDEADBEEF.

Companies like HP, IBM and Microsoft survive because they offer dividends to their investors. People get real returns: real money back quarterly that they do what they want with. Silicon Valley investors, on the other hand, are playing musical chairs and the winners are the managers of the companies who can time their exits exquisitely and dump their stock on the hapless, casual E-trade luser.

here's the problem

[scronline]

When you base a company's "value" on their stock price and not on the product(s) they produce and the service/support they give said products you're making a HUGE mistake and you will probably end up getting fleeced sooner or later.

Nothing more to really say, I'm sure everyone reading this has had trouble with Dell support by this time.