I've been having an extended discussion with an ARF manufacturer about hardware. Here are the facts:
*In order to cover R+D, importing, duty, advertising, warranty claims and have a little left over to buy groceries and pay the rent, the distributor has to charge about three times factory cost for a typical ARF.
*The metric hardware included in most 120 size ARF costs the factory about $1.50. That means you're paying close to $5 for the "crappy" hardware.
*To include the Du-bro, Sullivan and rocket City stuff everyone would like to have would cost the factory about $15, adding about $45 to the price of the kit. (The retail price of the name brand hardware if you bought it separately would be about $25.)

Poll:

Assuming the current street price is $350, would you prefer to receive the good stuff in the kit (price $390), receive no hardware and let you buy what you want (aggregate price $370) or leave the metric hardware in the kit so you can pick and choose what you want to use (aggregate price somewhere between $350 and $375)?