So I emailed Landon Hicks directly one week ago, asking specifically if Beach is still in business. No response.
I'd love to know what happened. GH Metals were the manufacturer of the Gray Pro line for Gray Tools. Gray Tools is a Canadian hard-line manufacturer for the non-Canadians here, not Grey tools which are Asian. . Gray changed this line to Gray + which now is a different colour, has ball bearing slides, a different locking mechanism, and is now made in Asia. s
This was confirmed by Gray Tools directly as I emailed them about the change to Pro + when I started looking at getting a second set.
Landon Hicks confirmed my Gray boxes were made by them. I assume when Gray Tools switched to an Asian manufacturer then GH Metals thought they could restart the Beach name and keep making the same boxes. They did add a ball bearing slide option as this wasn't available under the Gray name.
But what could have made them start up as Beach then close down in less than one year?
My thoughts are they should have done factory-direct sales right from the get-go. The traditional factory-to-wholesaler-to-retailer model may have worked in the past but this is the 21st century. I wanted to buy their product but got terrible communication from the "distributor" Beach directed me to. I called two local tool dealers who knew nothing about the new Beach, and wouldn't order me anything. Eventually I saw that specific "distributor" disappear from Beach's website when they started direct sales. I know no manufacturer wants to screw up stable business relationships. If a local dealer sold Beach they would direct you to them, but offer direct sales if you had no local dealer. This seems to be a win-win situation. Did it simply take them too long to get to this stage?
Navel-gazing aside, I'm glad I was able to get two sets of Canadian made toolboxes that will last my lifetime. But I'm very sad to see another Canadian manufacturer disappear.
