Red Modifier Set from SP discussion

[litster]

And at $18 a set, there is already profit margin built into that price.  So the mark up is more than just $30 - $18 each set.   No need to pay jacked up prices and cover someone else's rent.  If you paid too much, you should ask for a refund.

Now you know how much it is marked up here by rag.

[demik]

but people will justify the increase because they are fools and kiss rag's ass no matter what.


so, rag, of the thousands you've made off geekhack/geekhackers.. how much have you donated to keep the site you make money off around?

[metalliqaz]

How much should Rag charge for creating the GB, collecting the orders, sorting the shipments, reshipping everything, dealing with mistakes, dealing with complaints?  How much exactly should that be worth?

[demik]

How much should Rag charge for creating the GB, collecting the orders, sorting the shipments, reshipping everything, dealing with mistakes, dealing with complaints?  How much exactly should that be worth?

you mean, doing what everybody else does without money being the main concern?

you want to make money off gh group buys? front the money yourself and take the risk. get a vendor forum. don't hide behind the group buy label and say you're doing it for the community when you already said "it's not worth my time if i can't pay my rent" then ***** about how certain people don't kiss your ass and disagree with your practices.

[metalliqaz]

Okay then, ban him from doing it.  I'd rather have the buys, though.

[sth]

you'd rather have the buys?
that's telling of the direction geekhack has been going for a while now, and it's really disappointing.

it sure sounds like you're not interested in keyboards, you're interested in buying keyboards.

[metalliqaz]

I'm interested in both.  If you think that GBs shouldn't happen, then lobby to have the marketplace forums closed.

However, it seems pretty obvious that you just want to rip on someone.  Fine, go ahead.  I'm not going to fight this battle.

[sth]

If you think that GBs shouldn't happen, then lobby to have the marketplace forums closed.

you don't get it at all do you

[metalliqaz]

you don't get it at all do you

[hashbaz]

Still need a tsangan kit plz.  Have we asked SP about that?

[Soarer]

And at $18 a set, there is already profit margin built into that price.  So the mark up is more than just $30 - $18 each set.

How do you know this?

1. SP could be selling them at a loss - it would be better than simply throwing them away.

2. Of course there's profit at $30 - but how much of that goes to SP?

If you're going to make accusations, you need to back them up with facts and figures!!

[zzAaron]

to be honest.. i bought a set from SP without posting on the rag post because i didnt feel like threadcrapping.

 i feel bad now.

Why do you feel bad?  You feel bad because you didn't threadcrap?

because i didnt realize how it was fked up to the community for not telling you guys earlier

[1stGenRex]

It's less than $1 a keycap, for DS keycaps, IDK that I would feel all that terrible about paying $30 for the set, if I'd bought it.

Especially considering that some people have sold CC keycaps (SINGLE keycaps) for more than 3x that price.

That being said though, some money SHOULD go back to GH, if there was indeed a lot of profit from this GB.

[OrangeJewce]

Personally I'm tired of the vendetta against Rag. It's pointless and achieves absolutely nothing. I despise the pejorative nature of calling the secondary run of red alert "fake alert", and the continued propagation of bs which surrounds anything to do with him or his group buys.

Let's not use the "Great Finds" forum as a place to beat a REALLY DEAD HORSE. People saying they "know" how out of proportion a mark up may or may not be need to actually get some credible sources for their information instead of heresay and relegate this type of behavior to the off topic forum. The mods should not be putting up with flaming of this nature.

Cheers,

[litster]

You guys are OK to pay 66% markup?

[OrangeJewce]

You guys are OK to pay 66% markup?

Markup from what, exactly? Do we have any real, concrete evidence that SP isn't selling these sets at a significant loss? Do we know exactly how much money was being made from the $30 price? We don't. This is a great find and we should just leave it at that.

Cheers,

[demik]

fake alert

[litster]

right, Rag could be buying these caps from SP at below the $18/set that SP is charging now.  Why don't we all ask Rag how much he is not making by selling these caps at $30 a set?

[mbc]

You guys know that the price for ds sp caps depends on quantity produced/ordered, do you?
Edit:
Lol you guys are raging over the price for production overhead, that cost them nothing in the first place

[Soarer]

right, Rag could be buying these caps from SP at below the $18/set that SP is charging now.  Why don't we all ask Rag how much he is not making by selling these caps at $30 a set?

Indeed, anything COULD be... Rag could be buying these caps from SP at over the $30/set that he is charging for them!

I'm just asking YOU... what FACTS do you have to back up your accusations?

[mkawa]

folks, we seem to have lost the thread in this thread.

most importantly, buying these sets from SP directly supports SP and the efforts they go through to fit our small orders into their production schedule. it also tells them that they can make money off of retail-style efforts and smaller production runs. we ask a lot of SP every time we order from them. SP has invested a lot of effort into interfacing with our small hobbyist community when frankly they could have completely ignored us and still be keeping on; i hope that folks realize that and considering ordering keys out of SP's inventory through their retail interface.

[litster]

right, Rag bought them at $35 each from SP and sold them for $30 because he is a good guy. 

Yup, you are right I don't have the facts of the exact transaction between Rag and SP.  But I know these:

At 200 keycap tier, SP charges:
1x @ $0.95 each
1.25x 1.5x, 1.75x @ $1.24 each
2x @ $1.27 each
2.25x 2.75x @ $1.89 each

At 250 keycap tier, SP charges:
1x @ $0.71 each
1.25x 1.5x, 1.75x @ $1.14 each
2x @ $1.17 each
2.25x 2.75x @ $1.79 each

- These prices includes SP's COGs and production cost and profit margin
- In his Red Alert thread, he claimed that the modifier set only reached the 100 set tier. 
- At least 200 sets and possibly 250 sets of these red mods were made.
- He made up a story about how Melissa at SP made this mistake of making the red modifiers incorrectly and she may lose her job to get more people to buy the left over caps, but it was not true
- He said he is going to give the profit back to SP but has not said how much
- He said he is going to give the profit back to SP but has not said when
- SP is selling the same set for $18 that Rag has been selling them for $30
- Rag has said he makes enough money from group buys to pay for his rent

- You assert that at $18 is selling them below cost
- You assert that Rag could have bought them at more than $30/set and is selling them at a loss

- I assert that he bought them for around the same price that SP is selling them at $18, if not lower, and is selling them at $30/set
- I assert that he makes $12 profit or more for each set he sells
 
We can draw our own conclusion.
 

[Soarer]

I do not assert anything, I've been careful not to.

Except that you are asserting things that you do not have facts to back up.

Let's say it was 200 sets. Is it not true that these were made at two different times? And hence would be priced at the 100 keycap tier? How much does that add up to?

[litster]

no, they are the same batch.

[Soarer]

Not that it matters, since even at 250 keycap tier, it comes to over $30.

You posted all that and didn't even add it up?!

[metafour]

[litster]

I did add them up.  You asked for facts I gave it to you. 

What matter is how much SP is selling them, how much Rag bought them for from SP, and how much he is selling them for.

[Soarer]

I did add them up.  You asked for facts I gave it to you. 

What matter is how much SP is selling them, how much Rag bought them for from SP, and how much he is selling them for.

I don't call most of those facts, since mostly there are built upon assumptions. You say he 'claimed' that he only reached the 100 tier - there is no reason to doubt that - prove that he had more, and I'll listen.

It doesn't matter how much SP is selling them for... what people pay in a group buy is what they buy... if that's 100 sets, they pay 100 tier price. How is that not fair?

I'm sick of your personal vendetta against Rag, when really it's just the way SP's pricing works out that causes all these arguments. Buying 250 of something doesn't cost much more than 100. But it still costs more. There really is no way to run SP group buys with the 100% fairness you seem to demand.

Let's say that 120 people signed up.  And that the 100x price would be $30, total price from SP $3600. And that the 200x price would be $18, total $3600. Somehow $3600 has to go to SP, so do you really expect an organiser to drop the price for everyone to the $18, and pay $1440 themselves?

[litster]

My problem with rag has nothing to do with him making money, but that he lied to make money, and he uses GB as a screen to profit.  GB is supposed to be a a group of people pitching in to get a better buying power.  In Rag's GBs, he uses the group's money to fund his GB, and he makes the profit without fronting any money. 

Rag uses other people's money so he can buy up to cheaper tier pricing, without sharing the discount to the group.  He then buy up to the next tier to get additional discount *and* additional stock so he can sell them after the GB is closed.  Not only that, he sells the extra stock at even higher prices to make even more money.  He is taking advantage of the community.  While other people are doing it the fair way, they open up a vendor forum without hiding behind "Group Buys".  What is worse is he lied to the community how Melissa was going to get fired if he doesn't sell the wrong color keycaps.

[Soarer]

He didn't seriously say Melissa was going to get fired, so you can stop repeating that! It was hyperbole to express that she would be in trouble for making a mistake... and that is likely to be true.

Let's put the handling of that mistake to one side, since I think most of your beef is about the pricing regardless of that.

In the hypothetical situation I described, what would you do if you were the organizer? You've only got 120 orders, but that money will buy 200. Seriously, what would you do?

[litster]

He did say Melissa is going to be fired.  Read here if you haven't already http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=34434.90  And I am going to keep saying that he lied as long as he says he didn't lie when what he wrote is there for everyone to read. 

As I said I have no problem with people making money.  Just don't hide behind group buys and let everyone pay for his venture and lie about pricing and tiers and make up sob stories to get people buy the keycaps you didn't order.

Regardless, all this is orthogonal to what this thread is about.  SP is selling the set for $18 and Rag has been selling them for $30.  This is fact.  If you think it is OK for Rag to make $12 for each $18 set sold, or if you think Rag paid more than $30 each and still sell them at $30, then the more power to you.

[Soarer]

I know what he said - I'm saying you are deliberately taking at face value that which was clearly hyperbole.

Of course SP isn't going to go out of business over a $2000 mistake, and similarly no-one will be fired, but all the same it is damaging to both SP and Melissa.

You are not answering my question. How would you make the situation fair when you have 120 orders?

[litster]

what does it have anything to do with this thread?

Let me ask you a question.  How much wood would a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck would chuck wood?

[alaricljs]

The purpose of GBs is to benefit the community.  You get to a point where the same money can get 50% more kit or whatever and you buy 50% more and hold a lottery.  98% of that 50% goes to randomly selected buyers, 2% you keep and do wtf.

[OrangeJewce]

fake alert

I hate this terminology because it's clearly pejorative and prejudiced. Soarer, they have no real evidence. Only heresay, and it's stupid. I'm done here, moving along.

Addendum: at the time of writing the second page of this thread didn't exist.

Cheers,

[metafour]

what does it have anything to do with this thread?

Let me ask you a question.  How much wood would a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck would chuck wood?

If the wood was treated with arsenic probably not much.

[alaricljs]

I hate this terminology because it's clearly pejorative and prejudiced. Soarer, they have no real evidence. Only heresay, and it's stupid. I'm done here, moving along.

It is childish to choose those words, but the original red alert and rag's red alert are explicitly not the same thing.  And since 2.0 purports the idea of an upgrade which Rag's was not...

[Soarer]

what does it have anything to do with this thread?

It has EVERYTHING to do with this thread, and your complaint about profiteering.

So please, tell us how you would do it.

[litster]

Please tell me EVERYTHING that has to do with this thread and why.

[Soarer]

No need to pay jacked up prices and cover someone else's rent.  If you paid too much, you should ask for a refund.

Now you know how much it is marked up here by rag.

This is what I'm challenging. The attack. And your math.

Answering my question would tell us if you know how to run a fair group buy, given that SP's pricing structure is what it is.

[litster]

If a train is going west at 35 mph and the wind is going east at 12 mph, how challenging would Soarer be?

[Soarer]

If a train is going west at 35 mph and the wind is going east at 12 mph, how challenging would Soarer be?

QFT

You may as well just say you don't know. It's the only correct answer anyone could give.

[litster]

I fail to understand how a pricing decision has anything to do with marking these red modifiers from $18 to $30. 

[Soarer]

I fail to understand how a pricing decision has anything to do with marking these red modifiers from $18 to $30. 

That is exactly my point. Try to work out my question, and you will understand.

edit: You're complaining about a pricing decision, so I'm asking you to make a pricing decision.

[litster]

An your point is? 

[litster]

How does tiered pricing related to a set price of $18 a set from SP and $30 a set from Rag again? 

[Soarer]

An your point is? 

I think I've made my point.

[litster]

I think I've made my point.

My point exactly.

[Soarer]

I think I've made my point.

My point exactly.

Hardly. I've only given up on convincing you that you're wrong to attack Rag.

Everyone else can make their own minds up.

[litster]

Tiered pricing and profit markup by themselves have nothing to do with each other.  Since you are confused between them, attempted to ask me this totally unrelated question, pretending to know what you are talking about, and have not been able to explain how your random question is related to SP selling this red mod set for $18 while Rag has been selling them for $30, let me explain them to you.

Tiered pricing is about the more you buy, the bigger the discount.  SP have this tiered pricing because there is a fixed cost in setting up each run.  So if you order more, the same setup cost can be shared across all the keycaps that are made in that run.  That's why you don't get discount for making the same keycaps in the same profile, same legend, but different color, because different color is not consider the same run or setup.

Profit markup, in this case, is SP selling this set of red mod set, that were wrongly made, for $18 a set.  While Rag is selling them for $30.  Doesn't matter how many sets are purchased, it is the same price.  Rag sells them for $12 profit each set.

You argue that he could have bought them for more than $30 a set and sell them at a loss.  Anyone who has remotely been following how Rag has been running his so-called "group buys" would know that Rag would never do that.  Actually, who would?  Maybe Soarer would.

I would not be surprised if Rag bought them from SP for even cheaper than $18 a set.  Say if he bought at the same price, he is making $12 a set.  Question for you, Soarer, how much would you sell them for if you bought these sets from SP for $18 a set?  What's the right answer?  Now that is a relevant question to this thread, which is about selling a set of keycaps for $30 when the manufacturer sells them direct to customers at $18.