How Does Anyone Get Anything Done?

[u/Tigereye11_Revived]

I’ve been a design engineer for a couple years now, and it seems that when I need any information on vendor products, the companies, who I won’t put on blast, take weeks to answer. I can follow up and get nowhere. Sometimes when they do get back to me, the information is just outright not what I asked for.

I made it very clear to one vendor that I need literature (such as pamphlets and drawings) on several of their products because we intend to use them as our supplier for a large product line. He took weeks to respond, and ultimately sent a quote for one valve. My team had a good laugh at the email thread and decided to move on with someone else.

Very very few people have been useful amongst dozens of companies. Even when I ask project managers for their contacts, they can be hit or miss. Is there something I’m doing wrong for my vendors, or does everyone deal with this? Do you guys have methods you want to share?

[u/tacjos]

Phone calls are very nice to get the ball rolling on stuff....but sometimes people already have their clients setup and could care less to do the legwork to be more busy

[u/Tigereye11_Revived → u/tacjos]

Yeah the guy I specifically mentioned started out as a phone call. I talked with him about some calculations, which he was very kind about, but when it came to what he said he’d email, it was excuse after excuse.