Court Opinion

ID: 9861347
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 23:55:17.3301+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:28:14.029290
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE STEIGMANN, dissenting: I respectfully dissent. Although the majority opinion does a fine job of constructing an argument that the agreement between Greenview and Yetter required Greenview “to maintain an inventory,” I believe in the final analysis that argument falls short. The question that I think must be answered before we can affirm this judgment is the following: If Greenview had unexpectedly sold all of the 40,000 pounds of rotary hoes that it ordered from Yetter, would it have been contractually obligated to purchase more in order “to maintain an inventory?” Because I think the answer clearly is no, I believe we must reverse the trial court, finding that section 3 of the Fair Dealership Law does not apply to this case. In my 'view, the statute in question is really a “showroom statute.” It is designed to address a situation in which a manufacturer requires a dealer to keep the manufacturer’s product in the dealer’s showroom so that prospective purchasers can see it, touch it, and “kick the tires” (so to speak), as opposed to merely looking at a photograph of the product. The statute was designed to protect the dealer whose contract with the manufacturer required the dealer “to maintain an inventory,” so that the manufacturer would be required to buy back the inventory the manufacturer contractually required the dealer “to maintain.” All that happened in the present case is that Yetter Manufacturing offered Greenview a good deal on a large volume of Yetter’s product, namely, a quasi-exclusive sales arrangement plus a 10% discount on the purchase price. After the fact, Greenview comes to the courts, arguing the commercial-law-equivalent of, “Stop me before I kill again.” Greenview really is arguing that the courts need to protect it from a deal it voluntarily entered into. We should decline and leave free market forces alone. No one held a gun to Greenview’s head to get it to make this deal with Yetter, and Greenview should be stuck with the deal it made.