Haven't heard any reaction to the new dealer search feature added last week to www.HarbourLights.com.

Anybody used that? is it better than the old static list by state?

At the request of a few users, I've added the ability to search by Area Code and partial Zip codes. So if you're heading into an area away from home, you could find all the dealers in the same area code as your destination.

Harbour Lights has also added product information so you can see which dealers carry Harbour Lights, Anchor Bay or Only GLOWs. etc.

How have YOU used this new feature? What else should you be able to do with the dealer search?

We will be adding links to dealer web sites once they have all been reviewed.

www.HarbourLights.com/search/search.htm

My vote is a positive one. This is a great service. Not only for the traveler who is trying to find the HL buy of a lifetime, but for the newbies who are trying to get their collection going.

I have used it already for several dealers. I also thank you for adding the ability to search by AC and ZC. What should we do if the map isn't in the same state as the dealer?

After I have used it more, I will let you know if I think of anything to add.

Thanks John,

Derith

There are a few reasons the map might not appear.

1. The street address of the dealer record is the name of a shopping center or mall. It would have to be a pretty BIG mall for the mapping service to know it by name.

2. The street address is hard to decipher. For example 1824 G Allstate Ave. (The system looks for "G Allstate"). We're correcting those to read as "1824G" and it works OK.

The full address with city, state, zip is sent to ExpediaMaps and even if it finds an exact match, it sometimes finds other addresses that might match. If you see the address in the left top panel, check to make sure it's a match to the store address.

Sometimes the map finds an address with the wrong zip code or wrong address. Please verify. And if you find map links that don't work, please send me an email with the name and state of the dealer.

Happy Hunting!

John

John,

I liked having the old state-by-state website list at my disposal, and never had a thought about modifying it.

Then I got a hold of the new search form and used it both when preparing for our recent VA Beach/Outer Banks trip and (by bringing along my laptop) a couple of times during the trip as well. The new search features came in *very* handy while on the road. Whenever we had a few extra hours at our disposal we could easily enter the area code or town we found ourselves in and have a custom list pop up.

As a quality professional, one thing I always strive for is to delight the customer with unexpected pleasant surprises. Here you have delivered something I never imagined I needed, and I love it. This is far more versatile than the dead tree edition lists we get in the mail from HL (I still carry those in my brief case for those times when I'm unplugged).

Those paper lists also tend to become obsolete quickly. The next value-adding trick will be to keep the database up to date. Perhaps a feedback form by which users can report changes to the webmaster (or one of his elves -- you *do* have elves, don't you?) would help keep it up to date. Timely reporting of changes in the official retailer list by HL to the webmaster is also important to me as a user. I'd hate to spend 20 minutes or more looking for a store only to find that they no longer carry the line. I guess I could call ahead, but what fun would that be?

Now that you have me thinking about this, an overview map of a specified area code showing all the retailers there on a single map would be a tremendous help in planning a route for HLing. Do you think you can pull *that* one off? Tough to do, I think, but it would be really useful.

Now if only we could get a substantial roving pack of wackos to invest in GPS receivers and confirm precise longitude & latitude of each store (not to mention real lighthouses), imagine where that could take us!

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-Art

Art, Delorme has one of those GPS receivers that easily attaches to your laptop and works with their map program. Does a pretty good job, and the cost wasn't outrageous at all. We like to take a lot of backroads and use it when the atlas or state map doesn't give us enough detail. Sure would work for HL dealers, too.


Kathy

[This message has been edited by Al and Kathy (edited 06-14-99).]