Not sure how many people this affects, but I just heard that McMaster will now ship to anyone in Canada, not just accounts that were established before their export violation sanctions.
Why were the sanctions lifted?
They got fined for selling stuff to some Middle Eastern countries as a result of laws that require US based companies to disclose sales to any country boycotting another country’s products. I believe it was related to these countries boycotting Israel. They were not prohibited from selling to Canadians (or anyone else), they just decided that it was easier to not take on any new customers outside of the US. It appears that recently they decided to allow Canadians to place orders.
I know that stuff, I was wondering why the sudden change in heart for McMaster.
I’m not sure how many FRC teams this will affect. From what I recall, if the order was shipped directly to a school, the order would go through, anyway. Never placed any orders however, so I can’t comment on the validity of that statement.
That being said, this may prove useful for other companies that are not related to FRC, or community teams.
This is great. I know a number of teams in Canada have had very mixed success when ordering with out a 3rd party involved.
This is good news for all Canadian teams! McMaster Carr is the greatest supplier ever. They have just about everything, and their website is very well organized, making it easy to find things. We use them extensively for our tech design courses, robotics team, and general shop supplies.
How is McMaster’s shipping to Canada? (price,speed)
Next day for all in stock items, with very reasonable rates.