Mouser Decline?

[SilverSolder]

By the late 19th century, there were between six and twelve mail deliveries per day in London, permitting correspondents to exchange multiple letters within a single day...   we have gone backwards in many respects.

Really? How many timers per day can you exchange texts?

OK make it a small trinket of some kind - a little PCB perhaps?

[NorthGuy]

By the late 19th century, there were between six and twelve mail deliveries per day in London, permitting correspondents to exchange multiple letters within a single day...   we have gone backwards in many respects.

Really? How many timers per day can you exchange texts?

OK make it a small trinket of some kind - a little PCB perhaps?

There were no PCBs in 19-th century

[TimFox]

The city of Paris had a pneumatic tube network in service from 1866 to 1984 (although some government office connections lasted until 2004).   It was operated in a similar manner as the telegraph agency and lasted longer than pneumatic systems in other major cities.
Maybe 30 years ago, I read a calculation of the data rate in a private pneumatic system in New York between major banks that carried magnetic media.

[SilverSolder]

Imagine how Covid would spread via that vector...

[TimFox]

Only with improper data handling.

[MadScientist]

You guys aren't giving modern couriers nearly enough credit. FedEx can get a package from me in Vancouver to Hong Kong in ~72 hours, across the Pacific, and at an average speed of ~88mph. Or across the country to Toronto in a little over 12 hours for ~140mph. Sure, it's expensive as hell, but so was Pony Express.

I'd also wager that the cheap postal service is also an order of magnitude faster today than in the 1800s.

By the late 19th century, there were between six and twelve mail deliveries per day in London, permitting correspondents to exchange multiple letters within a single day...   we have gone backwards in many respects.

Indeed, I have a picture of the offices of the LNWR ( London North Western railway ) in my birth town in Ireland , from 1912, etched onto the beautiful glass windows was " Items received will be in London the next day ", Today couriers are taking 2-3 days

!!!

[SilverSolder]

You guys aren't giving modern couriers nearly enough credit. FedEx can get a package from me in Vancouver to Hong Kong in ~72 hours, across the Pacific, and at an average speed of ~88mph. Or across the country to Toronto in a little over 12 hours for ~140mph. Sure, it's expensive as hell, but so was Pony Express.

I'd also wager that the cheap postal service is also an order of magnitude faster today than in the 1800s.

By the late 19th century, there were between six and twelve mail deliveries per day in London, permitting correspondents to exchange multiple letters within a single day...   we have gone backwards in many respects.

Indeed, I have a picture of the offices of the LNWR ( London North Western railway ) in my birth town in Ireland , from 1912, etched onto the beautiful glass windows was " Items received will be in London the next day ", Today couriers are taking 2-3 days

!!!

I'm pretty sure they intentionally delay "normal" parcels, just so they can charge a premium for the "express" ones.

[phil from seattle]

I'm pretty sure they intentionally delay "normal" parcels, just so they can charge a premium for the "express" ones.

Or perhaps they simply prioritize filling express orders first because the customer paid more for shipping and thus indicated a need to have it sooner.  I know it nets out to the same observed effect but sounds like a reasonable way to do business. When you pay for a lesser class of shipping you are telling them you don't need it fast. In the face of an overwhelmed fulfillment system, prioritizing by shipping rate makes complete sense.

No sane company would intentionally delay a package. It gives them no benefit if the warehouse is not busy. I can not imagine a company doing that. As a small business selling and shipping products I have learned that you don't make much, if any, money on shipping. I'd be willing to bet the Mouser and Digikey MBAs have metrics that measure their order fulfillment system. Pretty sure the goal is to minimize the time between order and handing package to the shipper, regardless of shipping class.

[SilverSolder]

I'm pretty sure they intentionally delay "normal" parcels, just so they can charge a premium for the "express" ones.

Or perhaps they simply prioritize filling express orders first because the customer paid more for shipping and thus indicated a need to have it sooner.  I know it nets out to the same observed effect but sounds like a reasonable way to do business. When you pay for a lesser class of shipping you are telling them you don't need it fast. In the face of an overwhelmed fulfillment system, prioritizing by shipping rate makes complete sense.

No sane company would intentionally delay a package. It gives them no benefit if the warehouse is not busy. I can not imagine a company doing that. As a small business selling and shipping products I have learned that you don't make much, if any, money on shipping. I'd be willing to bet the Mouser and Digikey MBAs have metrics that measure their order fulfillment system. Pretty sure the goal is to minimize the time between order and handing package to the shipper, regardless of shipping class.

I was talking about couriers and mail services - for those companies, there is an obvious commercial interest in making sure there is product differentiation between $100 Express and $20 Normal service, no matter how busy or not busy they are.   All you have to do is make sure you make more money on that, than you lose in warehousing costs.   

You would't even have to warehouse that much either.  All you have to do is make the slower service "unreliable"...   i.e. you would deliver faster if your warehouse levels begin to rise too fast, and slow down again when things are less busy...

You can see I am in the wrong career, right? 

[phil from seattle]

I'm pretty sure they intentionally delay "normal" parcels, just so they can charge a premium for the "express" ones.

Or perhaps they simply prioritize filling express orders first because the customer paid more for shipping and thus indicated a need to have it sooner.  I know it nets out to the same observed effect but sounds like a reasonable way to do business. When you pay for a lesser class of shipping you are telling them you don't need it fast. In the face of an overwhelmed fulfillment system, prioritizing by shipping rate makes complete sense.

No sane company would intentionally delay a package. It gives them no benefit if the warehouse is not busy. I can not imagine a company doing that. As a small business selling and shipping products I have learned that you don't make much, if any, money on shipping. I'd be willing to bet the Mouser and Digikey MBAs have metrics that measure their order fulfillment system. Pretty sure the goal is to minimize the time between order and handing package to the shipper, regardless of shipping class.

I was talking about couriers and mail services - for those companies, there is an obvious commercial interest in making sure there is product differentiation between $100 Express and $20 Normal service, no matter how busy or not busy they are.   All you have to do is make sure you make more money on that, than you lose in warehousing costs.   

You would't even have to warehouse that much either.  All you have to do is make the slower service "unreliable"...   i.e. you would deliver faster if your warehouse levels begin to rise too fast, and slow down again when things are less busy...

You can see I am in the wrong career, right? 

OK, maybe the couriers do that though I think it is the same logic. The faster (and more expensive) delivery services get priority over the cheaper ones. If you paid for 5 day delivery, you get it in 5 days and someone who paid for faster gets theirs sooner, how is that bad?  Still not seeing any bad behavior here.

But, the discussion has been about an order sitting in the "processing" state, prior to shipping. I don't think anyone was complaining about USPS, UPS or FedEx in this thread.

[SilverSolder]

[...] If you paid for 5 day delivery, you get it in 5 days and someone who paid for faster gets theirs sooner, how is that bad?  [...]

I didn't say it was bad -  I said the way they implement it might not necessarily be shipping via different methods behind the scenes, it might simply be an intentional delay on the lower priced package.  You get what you pay for, but the delay can (and I believe, probably is) intentional in at least some scenarios at the couriers.

But, the discussion has been about an order sitting in the "processing" state, prior to shipping. I don't think anyone was complaining about USPS, UPS or FedEx in this thread.

Yes, sure, I'm wandering off topic.  The situation at Mouser/Digikey et al is obviously not intentional or "artificial delay" in any way, and they have absolutely nothing to gain by intentionally waiting for anything, as you said.

[phil from seattle]

You keep saying intentional delays.  I seriously doubt that.  If there is capacity to fulfill or ship, they will use it.  If there are too many orders to process, they probably prioritize based on shipping priority.  It is just that simple.  There are no intentional delays. I just don't that happening.  Why would they not use capacity that is available?

[nigelwright7557]

 I have a few suppliers.
I usually go for best price including shipping.
I try to buy higher volumes where possible to keep the price down.

Some of the search engines are dire, I tried to buy a wall wart off CPC and took about 5 minutes to even find wall warts !
Its a shame because CPC are often cheapest. I wanted some MJ15003 and they were half the price at CPC than elsewhere.

However RS do free shipping for trade accounts and mostly next day delivery if order is made before 8pm.

[Enliten Audio]

Bye Bye same day shipment which was still happening at the peak of the pandemic here in the US. We order gazillions and now consistently get 2-4 day fulfillments. Mouser used to be our best disty - we worked with them for 10+ years since the baby Mouser days. A call to our rep gives us the company line but I'm not sure the excuse really fits as things are calming down here in US COVID-wise. I think it's loss of people during pandemic (work vs stay home and get paid anyway) or it's just a way to reduce costs /  increase Mouser $$$ IMHO. A sad thing in either case... we loved Mouser!   

[floobydust]

Mouser is short staffed, they're hiring 34 positions right now. So I think it's bottleneck with people and hopefully it gets better.