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At 01:44 PM 8/26/2003, Greg House wrote: >--- Kim Flint <kflint@loopers-delight.com> wrote: > > At 09:41 AM 8/26/2003, Greg House wrote: > > >Kim wrote: > > > > >Whether poor people think it is expensive or not doesn't really > > > > >matter, because no matter what price it is they don't ever buy it > anyway. > > > > > >This sounds like a very cynical take on things. Getting things into >the > > >"impulse > > >purchase", or even the "minimal thought" price ranges certainly DO > increase > > >sales...especially for "take it or leave it" type specialty items. > > > > that's exactly what I said in my original message. I also pointed out >that > > the people making impulse buying decisions are not poor people. People > with > > money make impulse buys. The thread was about poor people complaining > about > > the prices of things they can't afford, and I pointed out that their > > complaints fall on deaf ears because they never buy anything anyway. >They > > don't. > >Yes, but there ARE people in the midline. People who have some, but not a >whole >lot, of disposable income. I think I fall into that category. I can >occasionally >come up with the cash for a $100-500 purchase, but not real often. I >think >there >are a lot of people in this type situation. I sure know a lot around here. Sure, and those the people who drive Hondas and not BMW's. They play DL-4's and not stereo echoplexes. That's life. If you want a high performance thing, it will cost you more money. If you don't have the money you don't get it and you settle for something lesser. That doesn't mean there is no market for high performance products at higher prices. It just means the market doesn't include you. All I'm trying to point out to you here is the primary customers for music gear are mostly people who have money. It's a different set of people from those who consider themselves musicians. $1000 may be expensive to you, but there really are a lot of people in the world for whom it isn't. Those are the people who buy music gear. That is why $6000 Les Pauls sell well also. Just because something is beyond your budget doesn't mean it doesn't sell well. The Echoplex price might be more than you can afford, yet at that price they sold every single one they were able to make. That makes it really difficult to understand how the price was too high. It's an easier argument to say it was too low. > > >I think this is the reason the Boomerang never really "took off". It > was about > > >$200 too expensive. > > > > the boomerang has stayed in production for a long time and seems to do > just > > fine. I see people with them all over the place. Where do you get the > > impression it hasn't done well? > >I base that on the ratio of people I hear talking about how cool the >thing >is and >how many actually have one. That's sort of anecdotal. Look at it this way. They put the product out in the mid-90's. The sales have been good enough to support the company to this day, as it is their only product. It's available in all the major catalogs, it's in stores, and advertised in guitar magazines. In the musical instrument industry, that's pretty successful. > As it is, the price alone relegates it to specialty market >status. They only cost about $450! That's near the low end of music gear pricing. It is a specialty product though, as any dedicated looping device would be. If anything, that justifies higher prices, not lower. Another way to look at these items is by their competition. The Boomerang, as a competitor, has a lot fewer features than the Echoplex. The Boomerang costs $450, the Echoplex costs $800, somewhat less than 2x higher. That makes sense. If you want more features you pay more, if you don't want them maybe the Boomerang is a better choice and you can save $350. The DL4 costs $250. It has less looping features than the Boomerang, and the construction isn't as rugged. If the extra features of the Boomerang are important to you, the additional $200 may be worth it. If not, well get a DL4. > > >Likewise with the EDP. The high entry price restricts it to > > >people who REALLY WANT it, and that means it'll never be a big seller. > > > > Every EDP that has been made was sold at about that price. The new > Echoplex > > Plus version seems to be selling fine. Clearly the market did not have >a > > problem with the price. > >But how many more could have been made and sold if the price was lower? Which part of "it sold out" isn't clear? They made all the ones they had capacity to make. They all got sold. 100% capacity used, 100% sold. Not many businesses can say that. Based on that they've now increased the capacity to build more. Those new units are now selling fine, even though the price is higher and they haven't really started their marketing campaign yet. Once they get the marketing in gear it will probably sell more units, by increasing awareness of it. >I can't >tell you how many times I've talked to people about loopers and stuff, >described >the EDP to 'em and watched their face fall when they hear the price. It's >like >those guys Mark talked to recently. Yes, I felt the same way when I saw how much a 911 GT2 cost. But seriously, if $800 is a lot to them, then they aren't a customer for a high end looper. > > What happened to you is the market priced you out of the picture. I >guess > > your fellow loopers have more money than you, as plenty of them are > willing > > to pay more than you've got. Sorry if that makes you feel bad, but >that is > > a problem for you and not the Echoplex. > >I suppose it is. But really, I'd love to see the EDP have more broad >market >appeal, and I don't think it ever can at the price it sells at. I guess I'm baffled how you reach that conclusion. Look at the prices of other gear. Mid-range synths and samplers cost much more than the Echoplex. High end gear in other categories costs WAY more. So here you have what many people consider a high-end looper in the echoplex. The best there is in many people's eyes, and it costs $800. Alright, fine, you have to get two for stereo, but that also gives you some nice multi-loop functions. That's $1600 for a high-end stereo looper. Let's compare to street prices of other top gear: Eventide Eclipse: $2000 Eventide Orville: $5000 Eventide DSP7000: $3400 Korg Triton 88key: $3400 Korg Triton rack: $1450 Korg D16XD: $2000 Yamaha dig piano: $3500 Yamaha 9000: $3200 Yamaha Motif 88key: $2800 Yamaha AW2816: $1800 Yamaha RS7000: $1400 TC finalizer: $2400 TC fireworx: $1760 TC G-Force: $1440 TC M3000: $1500 Gibson Les Paul Custom: $3200 Access Virus C $1500 Nord Modular: $1450 Roland VS2480 $3800 roland V-Synth $2300 roland Fantom s88: $2900 roland xv-5080 $2000 roland mc-909: $1500 Kurzweil K2661: $2400 Lexicon PCM-81: $2000 Lexicon MPXG2: $1450 You see? It sits right in there pretty well. None of that stuff is affordable for you, yet it all sells well. > > In fact, Electrix would have sold the same number of Repeaters if their > > price had been higher. > >Probably, given that their marketing was so incredibly poor. They >designed >a box >for DJs, only half marketed it there, and then found that DJs didn't want >the >box. Other musicians wanted the box, but most never knew it existed. It was advertised in Guitar player and keyboard for about a year before it came out, and reviewed in all those magazines. I think everybody had a chance to learn about it. Just not that many were interested in getting a looper. The market size is finite, yet growing slowly. > > I still would have bought two, and somebody else > > would have bought yours. They might still be here if they had done >that. > > They essentially gave money away with each one they sold. > >They scrapped their entire product line in favor of this one nitch market >product. It seems poor planning to toss out the bread and butter before >your >flagship product is doing really well, much less before it was even >released. it sounded like desperation to me. Liquidate everything in a last ditch effort to get cash. One major mistake they made, related to another thread, is not realizing just how hard it is to develop a functional looper. They had no idea what they were getting into and didn't devote enough resources or time to it. So it was a year late, and they ran out of money. > My >observation from talking to people is that a lot of them really like the >idea of >an advanced looper until they hear the price. At that point they say >something >like "I think I can probably be happy enough with my DL4" or something >like that. if that is all the functions they need and they just want to dabble in looping a bit, then they are right. They would be happy with the DL4 and that is what they should buy. Why should they start out with the high-end product? As they learn more about looping they may start wanting a higher end product with more features. Then the price of an echoplex might be worth it to them. > > >That doesn't mean I like it that way. It's just sad to me that more > people > > >don't see the point, to where it could sell enough to be a > > >good selling item. > > > > I don't know where you guys get this "poor selling" impression. It >sells > > great, given the size of the market. I certainly wouldn't mind if 100 > times > > more units got sold. Then I could get my car. But that requires >expanding > > the market, not lowering the price. Better visibility and wider > interest in > > looping would do that. Hopefully those things will come. > >One mechanism for expanding your market, if there's public interest, is in >pricing a product where your customers can afford it. Well, that's what I've been trying to point out. It is priced where the customers can afford it. That's why they keep selling all of them. kim ______________________________________________________________________ Kim Flint | Looper's Delight kflint@loopers-delight.com | http://www.loopers-delight.com