I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I think it falls right into the TBoB principle.
Crap !: I sent a copy of the book of to a small company who market baking equipment to (mainly) home bakers – I’m not naming names but there aren’t that many about – to ask if they would stock it and what their terms would be. Couple of weeks later, having heard nothing, phoned them up for a response. Was met with what seemed to be great embarrassment. Probed around for a while and eventually the proprietor said “The book says, ‘You don’t need any special equipment to start making bread.’ and our business is selling baking equipment.”
Sorry, guys, I lied to you. You really need lots of specialist equipment to start making bread and it is only available from XXXXX.
Crap 2: This is what you have to expect from suppliers. Ordered up 3 x 25k of Dove’s Strong White Biobake + one 5lt tin Olive Oil from my regular wholesaler. Wagon turns up on Thursday with the olive oil but 3 sacks wholemeal. Refuse the flour, phone the wholesaler who promises to send the correct flour by courier by Monday and I really need it for a mix on Tuesday. Courier arrives Monday – 2 out of the 3 sacks are split.
This is the company that just sent me a customer survey which starts out like this:
Q1: XXXX is a name you can trust
Q2: We Value our customers
Q3: We are passionate about what we do and how we service our customers
Q4: We are an innovative company
Q5: We are a helpful company
Q5: XXXX is a respected brand in the marketplace
Blah, blah blah. Haven’t found the split sack question yet.
The previous company was worse. When I commented on the number of damaged flour sacks the driver said, “The problem is this bit that sticks out on my sack truck …….”
The PArtisan Baker 
I take it you have made XXXX aware that their delivery firm are crap!? Do you use Shipton at all?
These people are impervious to criticism. I’ve had blazing rows, threatened to report them to Environmental Health and the Organic authorities. At the end of the day you can just refuse to accept split bags and make them send replacements.
I tried to buy flour from Shiptons. They kept saying “You’ll have to talk to Clive – he’ll give you a good price”. But he never phoned back after repeated calls so I just said Fuck It.