It's really a simple matter of alignment. Any site you visit will have or have had in the past several vocal, strong individuals who align in favor of certain products. Garden Web for example has a strong following of 2 stroke Lawn Boy folks on the mower forum. Yet Lawn Boys are virtually non existent in Nevada and particularly Las Vegas.

In reference to Husqvarna it may not matter what others outside of Kalifornia think when you are in Kalifornia. If you go to Huskys web site and look at the models they have, over half are not available in Kalifornia and many that are not are considered the preferred models by folks who are high on Husky.

Echo has always pretty much played the middle road when it comes to selling at service dealers and box stores. They've always had one of the better product lines and for the most part their line is universally available.

Stihl upsets some by not having non service dealer availability amoung folks who won't buy from service shops. Husky dumped on service dealers by selling out to box stores. They also have a stigma of having a green product line that is considered by many as junk and that this green product quality creeps into their orange product.

Echo has always been above average stuff and open to sell through any source. When they came into the market later then some of the others in the late 70's they had ground to make up. Service dealers were a bit slow to pick them up even though the product was service shop quality. Models like the hand held PB-200 blowers were priced well and the worlds first hand held gas blowers. Box stores were selling them off the shelves and getting rave reviews. The service shops couldn't ignore where Echo was going and most adopted them into their line up. Since Echo hadn't abandend them the way Husky would and their quaility never went in the dumper, servide shops tend to look at Echo in a neutral manner and you hear little grumbling that is initiated by service shop people like Husky.

Alignments also come regionally based on distributor backing, support and promotion. Some areas simply have good or bad distribution centers and create their own environment as a result.

Alignments on web sites have their own reasons and origins so if you hop around different sites you need to take it for what it's worth.

I think Nevada did a pretty good job summing things up with the exception of this statement, " Husky.........They also have a stigma of having a green product line that is considered by many as junk and that this green product quality creeps into their orange product."

The only Husky products related to the green products if we are to assume green means Poulan are the 137 and 142 chainsaws and it is pretty much universally accepted that those saws aren`t anything special and most dealers won`t even carry them. The 340 on up are made in Sweden and are completely different from the Poulans. Stihl dealers do however like to perpetuate certain misconceptions. It`s probably innocent enough, they probably just don`t know any better than what corporate Stihl tells them.

The Husky statement is just another matter of alignment. In my area we see none of the commercial level Poulans that are accepted by pro's as quality stuff. What we see are consumer grade green Huskys.

Hi Bob, what do you mean about Husky's green product line? I am new, I don't know a lot of the history. Does Husky 326LX and 324LX consider green stuff that is second rated? That's pretty much what we can get in Kalifornia.....Do you know we cannot get any RedMax trimmer, most of the 2 strokes that is over 27cc here. May be I should drive to Navada to buy one!!
You think some people trash Stihl because they refuse to sell to big box? I am still taking my time on buying a trimmer, a store nearby told me they will be having a sale in January. BTW one store have Stihl FS110R on sale for $329. Do you think it is a good deal and do you have anything bad to say about FS110R and FS130R both are the 31cc and 36cc 4 MIX trimmers.
Have a nice day.

Nevada_Walrus,

Are you referring to the Poulan Pro saws or are you euphemistically calling all Huskies "commercial level Poulans"? If the later, sorry I can`t help you because that is a mindset, if the prior then I don`t think you will see any new Poulan Pros, I think that pipeline dried up.

BTW, the Pros were yellow in my experience and were Partner models rebadged. Quality is way above that of the current Poulans.

I've been reading this forum for a long while and can't say people "trash" stihl. The concencouse seems to be of the "best" brands it falls a bit short of Echo and shiwinda. But that is not trash talk.

Well I gotta say that if the concensus here says that Stihl pro saws fall short of Echo or Shindaiwa, it`s not a well educated concensus.

I think people just have a lot stronger feeling about Stihl. The other forum someone actually question whether the dealer have better profit margin so they push a lot harder on Stihl!!! Please don't jump on me, I am just quoting.

That is the reason I am sitting tight on buying a trimmer. I like the Stihl FS110 or FS130, but everytime I almost decided to put my money out, I read something negative. It is not like Shindaiwa or Echo, people generally have positive words, not strong and raving, just nice words. I just bought a Shindaiwa C4 blower and I want to get a different brand on the trimmer just for the fun of it and Echo only have 2 cycle that runs loud and smell. Honda trimmer use timing belt which bugs me from experience of cars. The engine is only 2 years old and not quite proven yet. Robin has no dealer in our area period.