I fear this is a negative for CEF, they claim to be a trade body yet staff are instructed now that the catalogue prices are across the board be you a walk in customer or a trade person, they have some kind of 3 month system in place that if you recently got it at discount you can retain that discount which expire post 3month, they kinda just pushed away a lot of there established customer base in my honest opinion, they seem to be ignorant of the fact many companies make almost half there profit from the discount they get as trade customers, but now it seems CEF is no longer going to distinguish them from a random walk in when it comes to buying item that are in the catalogue, that is the catalogue which is been heavily pushed and promoted.
It appears they are trying to follow the B&Q/Screwfix etc model at the sacrifice of their loyal trade customers... the gamble is, it may not work and the hardest part would be to claw back the trade customers they turned their back on, it takes decades to build up a loyal base of customers, it takes one wrong move to lose them instantly for good.
PS - this is my opinion as a customer of CEF and I can only sympathise of the unfortunate position staff has been put in in that they are now telling trade customer that much of their range is no longer subject to discount, a position I find myself in thus I am now looking at other alternatives.