Topps Tiles -Love it or hate it?

[TilersTilingTiles]

Recently priced a job in a loft conversion. One bathroom and one ensuit shower room About 50m2 total with porceline floor tiles and ceramic wall tiles. The client asked me to provide a labour only quote and a seperate quote detailing the materials needed and how much I could supply it all for. Apparently topps tiles is doing a discount on materials if you buy your tiles through them too. Anyway it turned out that I could get the materials for just under half of what topps quoted even with the discount.

Topps tiles used to be our main supplier when i was an apprentice and when they used to have their own brands of adhesive were very reasonably priced.

Now some of my clients are paying £50 a bag for Bal rapid set flexi. How do they justify that!

Topps Tiles -Love it or hate it? for more...

Tile Forums @ tilerstilingtiles.co.uk

 

[LM Ceramics]

im in between with topps there alrite i now use tile clearing house or euxton tiles

 

[Grace'sDad]

Agreed - it is extortionate what they charge but if you can charge it and they the public will pay it - why not??? I charge as much as I can. I have a family to look after. They have shareholders to look after.

The whole Topps issue is very much dependant each store and it's staff and managers. Preston store is excellent in my opinion for trade and public.
Their hands are tied by Directors decisions a little too much in my opinion but I think the staff there are 1st rate.

 

[cornish_crofter]

Topps are Ok on the whole. They beat CTD's offer price for a Rubi TS 60 plus recently, and got it in for me in a few days. They also stock a few things that CTD in my area don't, and they have longer opening hours.

I tend to visit CTD when I go into Plymouth on Mondays, but I usually get there just before they close at 5.00. To be fair to the lads and lass at CTD they always give me damn good service, even if my turning up does stop them from going home on time.

As far as product knowledge and service goes I prefer CTD in Plymouth rather than the Topps branch. However Topps do tend to stock a larger range of materials. Topps and CTD will compete on price for a given product.

 

[monty]

I prefer TOPPS to CTD

 

[doug boardley]

my suppliers are independents,only been into topps once and was appalled at the price and the quality of the service from the sullen youth who served me.I like to pay my accounts as soon as I can,but sometimes circumstances dictate otherwise, my suppliers are always considerate and never hassle me if 30 days have lapsed,I wonder how the nationals would be in such a situation?:ninja:

 

[White Room]

The staff at my local one are brilliant:gettree:

 

[Daz]

Am I right in saying that Topps share price has plummeted and they are now planning to close at least 50 stores? Not sure what regions, but I believe they are experiencing financial difficulties.

 

[Perry]

i have just supplied a local tiler with bal adhesive and some tiles less than half the price topps wanted to charge him trade ete

 

[BDS]

The topps store in hull that i use are great,i have a laugh with a few of the guys in there. no other BAL stockist that i know of can come anywhere near there prices for BAL to me that is(trade),i pass a good bit of discount on to customer too,so i`m happy/customers happy/topps are happy well maybe not too much but tough...oh and just to add to that topps had some tiles sent to me via a different courier,i was needing tiles delivered there on site on the time and day i stated and i specifically said time and date (was promised by topps and courier),subsequantly they wasn`t so job stopped for day (no fault of topps) it was couriers fault,so friend,labourer and me was of job for a day which wasn`t good so i lost temper a bit with topps and courier(again wasn`t topps fault really)but long and short of it i was reinbursed for loss of earnings (all 3 of us) and a bit on top so a big thumbs up to topps for that.

 

[david campbell]

dont know what topps your using but glasgow(shawfield) are doing the bal rapid flexi for £24 to trade,tile prices are ok compared to other places and they will always price match other tile distributers,the staff are brand new and quite knowledgable compared to most places:8::8: big xmas cheer to chick and his staff

 

[Olz]

I find that the a topps near me isnt very good, and the staff arent too friendly, contrast this with the nearest CTD to me, which is about half an hours drive, where the staff are very friendly, always happy to help out and have a good chat.

Im more that happy to drive for half and hour (each way) to go to the CTD where i feel welcome as apose to the topps where i dont.

 

[david campbell]

I find that the a topps near me isnt very good, and the staff arent too friendly, contrast this with the nearest CTD to me, which is about half an hours drive, where the staff are very friendly, always happy to help out and have a good chat.

Im more that happy to drive for half and hour (each way) to go to the CTD where i feel welcome as apose to the topps where i dont.

i think the staff at my local topps have part time jobs in your local ctd:dizzy2:

 

[Perry]

but why do people put up with getting charged about 50% more than SRP ? i couldn't send a customer there knowing that they were going to get riped off anyway why don't they just send me their spare cash :lol:

 

[Billy Hunt]

Can't stand Topps myself,Products are good but the people selling them seem to have very little product knowledge.

Went in the other week for a bag of standard setting white wall adhesive,"we don't sell that" came the reply,"but we do sell this new on the market grey flexible fast setting adhesive"WTF.

Its not the first time either,popped in to price a tanking kit up and had to tell the assistant what a tanking kit actually was,I ended up having to show him one in the store he actually works at:conehead:.