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That's great news. I surmised from your earlier posts that it was more touch and go than that. My feelings are, the more loopers, the merrier. Mark On Tuesday, October 16, 2001, at 09:46 PM, Kim Flint wrote: > At 02:41 PM 10/16/2001, you wrote: >> OK. Sure. Don't come to me when Gibson decides (again) that the EDP >> isn't worth >> manufacturing. > > actually, Gibson never made such a decision before. Rather the > opposite, they've kept the echoplex around even when divisions > collapsed around it. They've even very recently devoted substantial > effort and money to keeping it going, making improvements to it, and > bettering the manufacturing process. That is why they are currently > easily available. Gibson has believed in looping for a lot longer than > just about any other company that's touched the idea. > >> My guess is not only will there not be an EDP 2, but within a >> year, there probably won't be an EDP at all. > > It is impossible to know for sure what the future holds, but I don't > see that. As Tom pointed out, we are about to release a major new > software generation for it, allowing us an opportunity to reintroduce > it to the market and get new attention for all of the new > functionality. In any case, what Gibson decides to do isn't the same as > what Aurisis decides to do. If they don't want to do the EDP anymore, > we find some alternative. At the current time though, they seem to be > pretty enthusiastic. > > >> The reason I don't own one is >> because it didn't exist when I was in the market for one, and when it >> did, there >> was a better alternative. Because Electrix is aiming at a broader >> audience, >> they'll win. If you don't think it's a numbers game, you're asleep. >> I'm >> suggesting (and offering my services for free, BTW) a logo redesign >> because I >> don't want to see the EDP go away, even though I'm glad I went to the >> Repeater. >> There will be a big change soon, and Trace-Elliot should be worried. > > Actually, they had more to be worried about when Electrix was > constantly delayed in releasing the Repeater. A lot of people delayed > buying decisions until Repeater was out, so they could compare. The > longer Repeater was delayed, the longer that lasted. Now that Repeater > is out and people have looked at it, I've noticed more people buying > echoplexes again. I don't have sales data yet to know for sure, just a > guess from comments people have made to me in the past month or so. > Decisions go both ways, depending on what people want. People other > than Mark seem to find quite a bit of difference between the two. Some > find the repeater is what they want, some find the EDP was what they > wanted after all. Probably some are buying the RC-20 or the boomerang > or dl-4 or Cycloops. The fact that there are quite a bit of differences > among all of these gives sales people something to talk about to > differentiate and sell their thing. This has resulted in much less > worry, not more, because the real situation is clear. > > >> I can say no >> more. There are more DJs than there are looping musicians, and >> Electrix is >> hitting both bases. > > I'm sorry, but I don't see many DJ's talking about the Repeater. Where > do you see that? I see a lot more discussion among dj's about the > Cycloops, which is a cool new looper well aimed at that market. In > fact, I've noticed that after the initial excitement, discussion of the > Repeater has died down a lot. Impossible to say if that means less > sales. But I would guess there was a sizable group of people built up > over a year of waiting, who all bought right at the beginning. After > that big wave, sales are going to come from new people coming into the > idea, which will be necessarily much slower than the initial rush. > Timing for Electrix probably couldn't be worse, given world events and > economic situations. But NAMM is coming so probably they can get a > boost out of that. > > >> If what Kim says about EDP sales is true, there aren't many >> EDP sales in a year. Barely enough to make it worth making, if I'm >> reading him >> correctly. If Electrix takes a chunk of their sales (as they did with >> me) this >> conversation will be moot. > > No, what I'm saying is there are not many Looper sales in a year of any > kind. This message comes from all different manufacturers. Lexicon said > this after the jamman was a major money-loser for them. Their execs > considered looping a joke after that and laughed members of their staff > out of the office for suggesting a jamman 2. Line-6 has just said this, > when they indicated it wasn't worth it to them to hire one programmer > to work on the looper functions of the echo pro. TC says this in > regards to their delays. We see this in our own numbers. Etc. > > It is a tiny market, and you organize your resources accordingly to be > successful in it. I think it is a growing market with a lot of > potential, but it is still very small. Principles that are true for > high-volume consumer goods are not true here. Yet the engineering > effort required is very high, as high as it would be for any consumer > electronics product. Loopers are very complex devices, much more so > than the average effects processor. You have to make smart choices > based on what you can really do with the money available and the > expected ROI, and a mistake will quickly put you out of business. Just > because the market is small does not mean that you cannot do well with > it, you just have to operate on a scale related to the actual market, > and make rational decisions accordingly. That is the message I am > sending. > > Electrix actually helps the EDP, because they bring more attention to > the whole idea of looping just by existing. When there is only one > product, people think it is a niche and many stay away. When there is > more than one, people see a market with choices, and they get > interested just for that. More choices makes it seem bigger, even if it > isn't. Significant growth in sales of loopers does not happen by > stealing customers back and forth from one manufacturer to the other. > That pool of existing loopers is too tiny and not worth fighting over. > Bringing new people into the pool is how it grows. Electrix is a new > entity doing marketing about looping. If Electrix draws new attention > to looping, many of those people will want to make some comparisons > before they buy. Some of them will choose to buy something different > from the Repeater. No matter what, it is a new customer for looping > products, which is ultimately good for everybody. Who knows, maybe that > customer will buy a second looper next year, which will be a sale for > somebody else. > > kim > > > ______________________________________________________________________ > Kim Flint | Looper's Delight > kflint@loopers-delight.com | http://www.loopers-delight.com >