Ahhh. That's what's up with that! Hmm. So it's literally all the parts and you build it up? Tempting....
It looks like ordering 3-4 at a time gets the shipping down to $70-ish each...puts the total ~$256 per saw assuming there isn't some surprise tariff/duty to pay...
I've ordered some reflectors for my aquarium, direct from China a few years ago I don't recall any stupid tariff or duties. I'll have to look through my files to see how that went.
I also thought about a group buy. I see 2 problems with it. Once the saws get in the US it is going to cost $30 each to ship them to the buyer. So at todays shipping price of $52 plus $30 to ship in the US we would be right back where we started. The other problem is, if someone orders 20 saws then sells them to $19 FHC members, what is the government going to think about that? Would someone get stuck with taxes/ duties. The only way it would work is if we could get a group together and let them Hutzl ship the saws to each person that wants one. I wish they had a kit for a MS880.
I read that thread when it was a couple days old but haven't since then. I thought it was a little weird because they kept mentioning a converstation/pm. So it was like half of the info was in the conversation.
I've seen group buys like that. From Europe at least on shocks for motorcycles. Reach shock went to each forum member that wanted one. Now at a former employer, I bought lots of parts from China. Now, these were not for the end user, so no issues with taxes that I can recall. I try to forget that time as the company was horrible. Horrible boss too, so I may be forgetting something. But I dealt directly with Chinese companies, and then with the freight forwarder to get the items imported to Wisconsin.
Ya come to the GTG to pick up/build 'em I seen a 105cc stihl knockoff with 36" bar on fleabay for $435 shipped (they called it a MS070)
All you can do is ask. If you had 5-10 or more people buying them, they'd probably be willing to do that.
I don't know how the import, export stuff works. I'm assuming the order comes over on a boat and Huztl has a U.S.A. presence here in the states?
Yes. That's exactly how it works of hutzl USA is where you buy it from. So that makes it easier. Hutzl USA takes care of all the added tariff/ duties and rolls that into the costs. So, think of hutzl as the harbor freight of chain saws. Except that there's not hutzl stores scattered around like HF stores are, so you have to have them ship.