HCigar VT200

[BlueridgeDog]

I've said it before but it seems you people are smoking something. Apple doesn't involve itself into any sort of price fixing, get the facts straight. What it doesn't do is sell it's products at a huge discount to retailers, hence why you won't see huge discounts on its products.
Also, "think they're well made"? This argument might have been considered 15 years ago when Apple was a minority. When you have 100s of millions of customers, you're kind of starting to look the fool. Are you going to tell me that BMW customers have illusions about their quality of their products and that they're really just as good as a Fiat?

Here is a good overview of how apple products are priced:

How Apple sets its prices | Macworld

And the "think they are well made" is an open attempt to acknowledge that some do not and it is a normative judgement. I am in the well made camp at least as far as laptops go.

I am smoking Strawberry Peach at 22mg.

 

[yo han]

That means zero....(no offense)
Get the spreadsheet and if it shows the MOQ at 20, then I'll believe it.

So if somebody tells you something in person but you see it printed differently elsewhere you automatically assume the person was lying to you?
Could well be they only publish a higher MOQ because they hope people will assume that's final and order more than they actually intended to.

 

[Mad Scientist]

So if somebody tells you something in person but you see it printed differently elsewhere you automatically assume the person was lying to you?
Could well be they only publish a higher MOQ because they hope people will assume that's final and order more than they actually intended to.

Psst. I think you're being manipulated.

 

[soulseek]

Not true! There was a large electronics store chain here that wanted to sell them cheaper as their MSRP but Apple said no. So what they did was give you a coupon when you bought it (at MSRP price) and you could then go to the service desk and exchange the coupon for cash. All because they weren't allowed to advertise the items below MSRP. It would have been much easier for the store to set a lower price but they had to come up with this silly method because otherwise Apple would punish them. How's that not price fixing?

That sounds nice but retailers here in Europe often sell them with significant discounts, no coupons and it certainly doesn't void the warranty as I've seen it stated here before. I don't know what your electronics store has been telling you but it's certainly not the case here.

 

[soulseek]

Here is a good overview of how apple products are priced:

How Apple sets its prices | Macworld

And the "think they are well made" is an open attempt to acknowledge that some do not and it is a normative judgement. I am in the well made camp at least as far as laptops go.

I am smoking Strawberry Peach at 22mg.

From the article you linked:

With so many laws regulating competition among retailers, how does Apple pull off this amazing feat? It turns out that the company uses a fairly straightforward strategy, known as price maintenance, that takes advantage of the popularity of its products and exploits a quirk in the way retailers are allowed to advertise their merchandise.

Most products move from manufacturers to retailers through a network of distributors. Even though each product has a “manufacturer suggested retail price” (MSRP), each retailer is free to set its own sale price. Thus, a laptop with an MSRP of $500 might cost the retailer $250 to buy, and might carry a sticker price of $350, accompanied by a bold "30% Off!" announcement in the store’s weekly flyer. A different retailer might offer an even lower price to attract more store traffic, or conversely it finds itself in a weaker position due to lower sales volume and have to charge its customers more for the product.

All of this price variability is possible because of the large difference (commonly from 30 to 55 percent) between the wholesale price—what the retailer pays the distributor for each unit of the product—and the MSRP for each unit. That gap leaves enough room for each retailer to set its own policies and generate a sometimes significant range of market prices for a product.

Apple, however, extends only a tiny wholesale discount on its Macs and iPads to your retailer of choice. The actual numbers are a closely guarded secret, protected by confidentiality agreements between Cupertino and its resellers, but the difference probably amounts to only a few percentage points off the official price that you find at Apple’s own stores. With such a narrow gap to tinker with, most retailers can’t offer big discounts and still hope to turn a profit.

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

So if somebody tells you something in person but you see it printed differently elsewhere you automatically assume the person was lying to you?
Could well be they only publish a higher MOQ because they hope people will assume that's final and order more than they actually intended to.

Rather than trying to argue your point, get it in writing and prove it.

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

That sounds nice but retailers here in Europe often sell them with significant discounts, no coupons and it certainly doesn't void the warranty as I've seen it stated here before. I don't know what your electronics store has been telling you but it's certainly not the case here.

Hcigar's policy is the same as joyetech's once was....which is price-fixing.

Any vendor caught selling below their fixed price of $169 (VT200), warranties will be denied and supply will be cut off.

Joyetech attempted this themselves 4 years ago with all of their products and it failed miserably for them, they lost virtually all of their business in the USA and abroad for about 3 years. Only recently are they trying to make a comeback and without price-fixing.

Hcigar hasn't learned that hard lesson yet....

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

I'd like to know who you think gives a shi... whether you believe it. Just curious.

Found this !!!

See that yo han & mad scientist?

Toolbox875 got the spreadsheet...

MOQ = 50 ($111.00/ea)

Prices decrease as volume increases.

(I didn't believe the 20 quote because I already had the facts)

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

Brand image??

Their claimed reason is for fairness for all vendors so that a large distributor cannot undercut a small one. All have an equally fair chance of making a profit without having to induce a "competition war".

When in reality...they're expecting it, especially here. It allows them to deny supply to vendors that disobey their selling rules AND deny the end user a warranty.

But in reality, Hcigar is only damaging themselves...they just haven't realized it yet.

An excellent example of why Hcigar uses price-fixing to THEIR advantage, is what Gearbest tried to pull (and clearly are getting away with it). They advertised $117.04 for the VT200 in a pre-order without first having the actual set price. So Gearbest essentially cornered the market by advertising a LIE and attracting almost 1000 peeps globally, having links thru many other sites advertising the the price for them.

This price would severely under-cut any small retailer that would only be buying a small amount, but since they'd be paying substantially more money for theirs....then Gearbest would have a significant upper-hand and would be able to offer them for much less (because their pre-order LIE attracted 1000 peeps worldwide).

Gearbest never intended on following thru with their advertised price of $117.04 for the VT200. It was an advertising ploy to attract global attention...because they are already an Hcigar supplier.

But Hcigar's policy doesn't include advertising lies, it only states "selling price".

So Gearbest has 1000 peeps standing at their door waiting to buy a fixed-price mod for $174 ($169 + $5 shipping).

 

[xtwosm0kesx]

From the article you linked:

Apple, however, extends only a tiny wholesale discount on its Macs and iPads to your retailer of choice. The actual numbers are a closely guarded secret, protected by confidentiality agreements between Cupertino and its resellers, but the difference probably amounts to only a few percentage points off the official price that you find at Apple’s own stores. With such a narrow gap to tinker with, most retailers can’t offer big discounts and still hope to turn a profit.

This is accurate.

A close friend runs the advertising dept for a major furniture/electronics store (Berkshire owned, has a Midwestern state in its name).

They sold something like $17 million dollars worth of Apple products last year and made ZERO profit on it.

Why do they do it?

They'd rather have customers come in and possibly buy accessories (where the real margins are at) or other stuff while they're there than not have ANY chance at a sale whatsoever.

Crazy but true.

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

Crazy but true.

Correct.

There are MANY major retail chains that do the very same thing!

A recent article was published about CostCo (and many others) about rotisserie chickens being sold for $5/ea.

These chickens are being sold at a direct LOSS, but as many other retail chains discovered (the first being Cub Foods/Golden Plump), this marketing campaign increased sales by over 1500%.

Peeps come in for the $5 family dinner chicken, but then pick up everything else that they might need for that dinner as well as whatever else catches their eye.

 

[soulseek]

This is accurate.

A close friend runs the advertising dept for a major furniture/electronics store (Berkshire owned, has a Midwestern state in its name).

They sold something like $17 million dollars worth of Apple products last year and made ZERO profit on it.

Why do they do it?

They'd rather have customers come in and possibly buy accessories (where the real margins are at) or other stuff while they're there than not have ANY chance at a sale whatsoever.

Crazy but true.

Yes exactly. You see it all the time. Apple customers have a higher engagement with the platform at that leads to extra revenue for anyone related to it. That could mean ad revenue or revenue from selling accessories.

You can apply the same ideology to the ecig industry. A website selling expensive mods like the opus200 is more likely to see associated revenue from various accessories. Not so much from someone buying a cheap China clone.

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

Evolv sells the Fullymax Lipo also
Here's another option, there is a lot of info posted with this one Not 117.00 but still reasonably priced for an authentic DNA200 mod. Pretty Slick looking also
$159.00 Original VapeCige VTBox200 1800mAh TC VW Variable Wattage APV Mod - 1-200W / 200-600'F / aviation aluminum / white at FastTech - Worldwide Free Shipping

Gearbest has the same box for $160...

But here's the sucky part about this one, it's weight....300 grams.

Not to mention it's size, it's a lunker!

DEPTH 32 mm
HEIGHT 99 mm
WIDTH 55 mm
PRODUCT WEIGHT 300 g

May as well be a lead brick...


>>>>>

 

[jseah]

Not true! There was a large electronics store chain here that wanted to sell them cheaper as their MSRP but Apple said no. So what they did was give you a coupon when you bought it (at MSRP price) and you could then go to the service desk and exchange the coupon for cash. All because they weren't allowed to advertise the items below MSRP. It would have been much easier for the store to set a lower price but they had to come up with this silly method because otherwise Apple would punish them. How's that not price fixing?

I remember several years ago, a lot of retailers put the iPod Touch as their Black Friday specials. However, rather than lowering the price, they still sold for the regular price, but you got $30 and $50 gift cards with the purchase (depending on the size of the memory).

 

[Jeremy Schreiber]

I remember several years ago, a lot of retailers put the iPod Touch as their Black Friday specials. However, rather than lowering the price, they still sold for the regular price, but you got $30 and $50 gift cards with the purchase (depending on the size of the memory).

I recall working at a Best Buy many, many years ago and remembering that they made practically zero profit on computers and some other products. They made their money by charging 30 dollars for an accessory that they would get for 2 dollars (know this because my with my discount of Best Buy cost plus 15% the cost would be around 2.50 with tax). Really interesting how that works and explains why the sales people get so upset when you don't buy one of their crap extended warranties that they never back but that is a separate topic.

While this is off topic: In my opinion, I think this overall situation shows that spending some more money and getting a product from a reputable manufacturer and a vendor is worth it compared to to a product at a too good to be true price from an overseas vendor (which I would refuse to on something like a DNA200 mod). I absolutely understand the opposite position, however, that is just not a route I would go.

Sad, because this mod was one I was seriously considering.

 

[Shekinahsgroom]

While this is off topic: In my opinion, I think this overall situation shows that spending some more money and getting a product from a reputable manufacturer and a vendor is worth it compared to to a product at a too good to be true price from an overseas vendor (which I would refuse to on something like a DNA200 mod). I absolutely understand the opposite position, however, that is just not a route I would go.

Sad, because this mod was one I was seriously considering.

I just want to add to your post ...what I believe to be the reason why the lies are/were being advertised. Because it wasn't just 1 vendor, it was several and not all are Chinese sites.

VT DNA 200 200W TC Box Mod by Hcigar PREORDER | Vape Street

Since Hcigar isn't punishing sellers for advertising lies, then it shouldn't surprise anyone that these kinds of offers are being used to attract attention.

Many sellers will do almost anything to compete, even though in this case non-competition is the whole purpose of price-fixing according to the claims of this particular manufacturer. China is positively notorious for stating untruths, some of which could be language barriers while others could be mis-information from superiors and still others could be just blatant deceptions.

The Chinese "think" differently than other societies and many don't feel the same moral obligations as other nations, so they have no problem advertising a price (or an MOQ) that just isn't true....to attract attention. Some may just be completely ignorant while others may be intentional, sometime it can be difficult if not impossible to tell otherwise. Sales people in general are the LEAST informed and they only repeat what they're told which is usually as little as possible.

There's a valid reason why China is the counterfeit capital of the world = no moral obligations.

But if you stop and analyze ...say...what Gearbest did, it's just another form of competition. Alebit dishonest and lowly, it is what it is and they gained massive exposure and a huge amount of attention on many different sites. Had they advertised a pre-order for $174, they wouldn't have 1/25th of the response that they received.

There's a saying in Hollywood, "There's no such thing as bad press"....another "place" which has little or no moral obligations.

 

[Mad Scientist]

I just want to add to your post ...what I believe to be the reason why the lies are/were being advertised. Because it wasn't just 1 vendor, it was several and not all are Chinese sites.

VT DNA 200 200W TC Box Mod by Hcigar PREORDER | Vape Street

Since Hcigar isn't punishing sellers for advertising lies, then it shouldn't surprise anyone that these kinds of offers are being used to attract attention.

Many sellers will do almost anything to compete, even though in this case non-competition is the whole purpose of price-fixing according to the claims of this particular manufacturer. China is positively notorious for stating untruths, some of which could be language barriers while others could be mis-information from superiors and still others could be just blatant deceptions.

The Chinese "think" differently than other societies and many don't feel the same moral obligations as other nations, so they have no problem advertising a price (or an MOQ) that just isn't true....to attract attention. Some may just be completely ignorant while others may be intentional, sometime it can be difficult if not impossible to tell otherwise. Sales people in general are the LEAST informed and they only repeat what they're told which is usually as little as possible.

There's a valid reason why China is the counterfeit capital of the world = no moral obligations.

But if you stop and analyze ...say...what Gearbest did, it's just another form of competition. Alebit dishonest and lowly, it is what it is and they gained massive exposure and a huge amount of attention on many different sites. Had they advertised a pre-order for $174, they wouldn't have 1/25th of the response that they received.

There's a saying in Hollywood, "There's no such thing as bad press"....another "place" which has little or no moral obligations.

What is your affiliation with or financial or other interest in Hcigar or any Ecig product manufacturer or vendor?

You seem to have some agenda here so let's get that on the table.

 

[Troll from behind]

Boy, it would be nice to read something 'bout VT200, just saying since we are in device thread.
Though the current flow of derail is intresting it could possibly serve its purpouse better elsewhere?


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[smokewell]

Please discuss price fixing on a different thread.
Every time I see an update I come in here looking for VT200 info and all I get is money talk.

 

[yo han]

Agreed