FAQ: Second hand business, low price and potato market

Question:  We have got an offer to buy some cells very cheap. They are left over from some project. I send you the serial numbers and please tell me how old these cells are. Also, please let me know how to get warranty from you. You are the distributor of the manufacturer, you must help me.

Answer: GWL is happy to support all our customers who purchased the goods from our company. However we cannot support the second hand business done by some companies who are not battery distributors. That is why GWL cannot provide any information, support and warranty for products that were resold by some third parties without a prior arrangement with GWL. 

Unfortunately, some people keep selling the second hand, „left-over“ or partly used lithium cells. We strongly discourage our customers from such kind of deals. The lithium battery business is not the „potato business“. 

Potatoes usually last only few months, perhaps just over one winter. With batteries this is completely different. The batteries are designed to last many years, perhaps 20, 30 and more years. That is why buying lithium cells is not a one time „potato business“, it is a long time partnership that needs that the manufacturer and the supplier provide high quality products and make sure they are able to provide after sale service and support. 

The customers also need to be realistic in the expectation of the price for the lithium cells.  If somebody is selling the cells cheap, this always shows some problem. Like some second had goods: if the price is low, what is the origin of the goods?  Is the goods, the supplier and the origin of the goods reliable? 

Even for the new cells, GWL also does not support the idea of the “Kartoffelbörse” (potato market) to shout out some better and better prices. Perhaps some people shout some low price, even some factories sell directly to any customer at low prices, but sooner or later, these „shouters“ will quickly close their shops and disappear.  This is something to think about.   What was your supplier doing 2 years, ago, 3 year ago, 5 years ago or perhaps even 10 years ago? 

This is the simple lesson from the past:

Some people have big eyes, big plans and projects. They order cells from the factory directly in order to get the “best price”. However after some time, the project is not realized, so they end up with a huge overstock of cells that need to be sold at a very low price to get at least some money back. This situation damages the battery business for all parties, because these people resell some old cells with no support for the warranty from the manufacturer.  This way some customers get cheated. Also it brings a bad reputation for the manufacturer, because it shows the manufacturer is not able to manage the sales channel. In the long time run when this situation repeats, customers will start loosing trust in this kind of product.

If any customer needs the support and want to make a serious business together with GWL, we will be happy to work with them and provide the best services and advice.  However we do not plan to make some low price offers just to push the price down.

We are not selling potatoes, we are selling lithium cells!