Mr. Deepeeka

cristofre fortescu · Post by **cristofre fortescu** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 3:45 pm

My wife had the chance to meet and socialize with Mr. Deepeeka (I think she said Sam was his first name, but I can't remember) at the Pompeii exhibit, demo in Moblie Alabama this past weekend. She said he was just a totally neat and fun guy. She was thoroughly impressed by him. And I thought the name Deepeeka was just a business name.

Anyway, thought I would share.

C

Wolf · Post by **Wolf** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 3:54 pm

umm it is, deepeeka is made up of a few family names put togther. i'll have to ask Gagen on the Rat forum if he was in the usa

cristofre fortescu · Post by **cristofre fortescu** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 5:36 pm

He is the owner, or one of the owners of Deepeeka, the Roman supplier folks if that helps.

Chris

Lienhart Fischer · Post by **Lienhart Fischer** » Wed Feb 07, 2007 9:24 am

wasn't deepeeka named after Gagen's dad DP?

InsaneIrish · Post by **InsaneIrish** » Wed Feb 07, 2007 12:19 pm

Anyone ask him why they advertise products that no one seems to be able to sell? :shock:

Wolf · Post by **Wolf** » Thu Feb 08, 2007 9:43 pm

like what irish? theres a lot in europe that the us cant seem to get cause it goes to fast i think

InsaneIrish · Post by **InsaneIrish** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 9:08 am

Wolf wrote:like what irish? theres a lot in europe that the us cant seem to get cause it goes to fast i think

Well, I know that quite a few Roman re-enactors have been wanting the roman plumata that Deepeeka sells.

And wasn't there a super long thread about small scales that deepeeka sells a while back? It ended up that they had to go out and have them made locally, because NO ONE from deepeeka would return calls/emails/contact...

Winterfell · Post by **Winterfell** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 12:23 pm

InsaneIrish wrote:Anyone ask him why they advertise products that no one seems to be able to sell?

That is a fundemental problem I have had with my direct business dealings with them.
A little background first. I have a direct sales liscense with Deepeeka and access to their North American distribution warehouse. I have dealt with them on several occasions, directly and have talked with them at length about their products and their business.

The North American Warehouse (the location of which all of their products are housed before being sent out to American and Canadian dealers is relatively small (something like 50 by 100 feet).
The vast majority of the stuff in the warehouse is the shiny crap swords and armour bits. Mostly American civil war stuff or generic swords. The keep that stuff in stock in the hundreds, probably 75% of their stock is that crap.
The rest; arrow heads, scales, certain Roman armour, etc, is only stocked between 1 to 5 pieces of each item. Now remember this warehouse is the only distribution center for all of North America. They also predominantly get orders for their generic crap stuff. When I asked them about this the reasons they gave me was this:
1. They do not have the room or the demand to keep large quantities of their higher end stuff.
2. "Americans by the shiny crap more." (direct quote and absolutely true)

A custom order that I placed, totaling some $3,500 took 8 months to fill. The reason behind this is two fold:
First, all of the armour and weapons are made by local groups. All of the small groups are not exclusive to Deepeeka. These are the same groups that make stuff for Musuem Replicas, Van Sussen, etc. Also all the small time companies are scattered around the country. It would be like having all of the SCA armourers who live in Texas making all of the swords and armour for all of the companies in Europe.
Second, all of their inventory is shipped here. By ship. From India. A voyage that takes several months. (You all know the expression "A slow boat to China, right?)

The reason that I do not do a lot of business with them is because this is not my main job. I do not have the capital to build an inventory that I would be sitting on for a long time. Nor is it really cost effective to by a helmet here, a pole axe there. As such, even though I pay wholesale, I do not get the bulk rate. People who have come to me want single items.
So while I can go down and QA what they have at any time, unless I make a huge investment (around 10 grand easily) I won't have the good items to carry in a timely manner.
Now if I had the time, money, etc. I would review their inventory catalog, of which I have the latest versions. Select the good stuff. Place several massive orders that I can QA when it arrives, allowing me to refuse items without stocking charges. (that is a plus). I would sell items in pieces or in full or have them modified for certain requirements. (Which would drive the price up though) And then market it online.
But unless I am convinced otherwise the market is not enough to support it.

Matthew Amt · Post by **Matthew Amt** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 12:28 pm

Oh, you mean why they advertise stuff that the vendors never seem to be able to have in stock? Yeah, that's always a frustration! Part of it is apparently that some vendors don't want to stock some new expensive item if they don't know that it's going to sell. Deepeeka won't make and ship just 2 or 3 of something, it has to be 10 or 20. And there are always shipping issues, like stuff getting stuck in Customs for weeks on end.

As I understand it, Gagan is the boss back in India, and Sam runs their central warehouse here in the US. Gagan is active on the Roman Army Talk list, getting advice from all us Romans.

Valete,

Matthew

Winterfell · Post by **Winterfell** » Fri Feb 09, 2007 12:39 pm

Sam does not run the day to day operations of the warehouse. Whenever I had a problem with the warehouse manager I would just call Sam directly.