Canadian parts pricing?

[benrk]

Hi,

I'm a German immigrant to Canada & ever since I came here I wondered about the high prices of car parts, now that I figured out how & where to buy parts in the US, I'm even more surprised about the obvious rip off that's going on at least here in MB & why people put up with it, a few quick examples: My 850 needed a steering rack, autopartsway.ca $500, rockauto.com $150, put it in, took it for an alignment, missed slight play at one controlarm bushing, quote from KalTire $185 for the part, looked it up, Dorman @autopartsway $115, Dorman @rockauto $36, told the service guy, his comment "we only make $40 on it, we're buying it for $145"
WTF is wrong here? The standard supplier here for Euro imports is Altrom, I guess that's where KalTire would have ordered, how do they stay in business charging more wholesale than online retail is? Why is online retail CDN 3.5x online retail US???
I like supporting the local economy & the prices are all + shipping + taxes charged @ import + receiving @ the parcel service @ the border + going to the border to pick it up, so if I could buy @ local retail for 2x the US online price & have it immediately & take it back & slap it in their face if it's wrong, defective etc, I'd do it, but 3-5x US online price?

Some Canadian on here please help me, I'm at a loss, what's wrong with Canadian retail?


Thx, Ben