Mik, sorry, I am sure you mean well and you are excited about the product, so please don't take my comments personally. Everything you wrote would sound good if it was stated by one of the many small operators in the PV market. But Janty took a leap forward with the intention to become a different type of business. Packaging, eliquid quality control and safety, design of new devices, that is all part of serious branding effort. But the publicity you tried to create on this forum for Cameo doesn't match the brand you are tying to build, it is just amateurish.
Look at it this way. As a reason why you did/didn't reveal something you wrote: "i was asked not to by the team ... and i respect their opinion..." I am sorry, but in this case respecting someone is not the right reason. When you are launching a new product, what, when and how you communicate with the public is planned. It doesn't matter one bit if you respect the person who put the plan together or not.
The person or team putting together the communication plan will often tie this to the product development/launch milestones. This maps the announcements and events to the right stage: there are things that can be announced when the product design is signed off, but there are also events that should not take place until you have the first production unit in hand.
I would not have commented on this if it happened to a different company. Actually, if this didn't involve Janty I would just think "how cute". But in this case, I was too surprised because my perception of Janty didn't match what I was reading.
Anyway, it is all done. I hope Janty will do this type of events with better planning in the future. And good luck on the Cameo release. I am certainly looking forward to see it.
Only problem with what you write is that youre wrong.
this is a quote from the competition thread, that began it all:
"The competition will run from now and until September 1st, at 20:00 CET, at which point we will close it, look at the contestants, and those (if any) that are correct (or very darned close) will be put in a pool, and we will do an oldschool lottery style to determine the winner and 2 runner ups."
This says nothing about us promising to unveil it. It also says nothing about when its being launched. It promises nothing, and if anything at all , it only indicates that those who guesses correctly, wins something - once it comes.
Nobody guessed it, we still gave out prizes.
The fact that you, and others got hurt by this, i believe must be attributed to your expectations and the way you read other peoples posts, hereby including mine.
I have not promised anything i couldnt deliver, ive actually delivered more than i promised; I delivered prizes, even though noone won.
So - please, dont give me another 4 pages of how unfair you think it is, or how much you expect of Janty, cause even though i respect your opinion, its at a point now where i dont see the point in it.
The only thing i "promised" was in this thread, where i said i would reveal the cameo, - then quickly apologized when i was told i could not reveal it. And it does not matter if you are Chevrolet, or if you are Janty; If you have a product you have to not reveal because of something unexpected happening; in this case a severe problem that might delay the Cameo for some time, then you have to face the facts:
If we reveal the Cameo as its "planned" to be, and cant do what we promise, we will then be liars.
If we reveal the Cameo but we have problems sorting out the details, and have to postpone the release of it, we might face competitors stealing our concept - which blows our entire "shock" of - oh wow, this is cool.
So - ofcourse i respect their opinion, and ofcourse we are withholding the information based on valid grounds.
I still dont see it entitles God and his neighbours to give me, nor Janty "hell" for it by saying we are this and that; We did deliver prizes, We *are hurrying* - and in the end, all of this fuzz is about us GIVING FREE ITEMS AWAY IN A COMMUNITY WE TRY TO KEEP INFORMED AND "ENTERTAINED".
Think about it, please. As someone else said, the E-cigarettes are in their infancy at the moment, the equivalent of the Ford T (i believe) if we are to compare this to the automobile era. So ofcourse we have to draw a fine line between sharing, and keeping information - timing is the key. In this case, timing bit us in the .... - but not because of something we could foresee; we had checked that things worked, that we could deliver, that we could do it - unexpected stuff just happened ( which i cant go into ), that delayed this process majorly.
And, here i am again, still answering you - politely - telling you why, explaining myself; I could also have gone the route that Chevrolet would have done; Lawyer up, shut up, let it die.
But why would i? Its a community, not prison. I honestly believe that this situation if nothing else goes to prove that Janty often goes to lenghts and beyond to satisfy customers, to inform them, to actually integrate them in the process. Many of our products are direct results of us listening to our customers - and interacting with them.
And youre asking me to be more careful? To this, i can only say no - i will be as i always am, and so will Janty:
An e-cigarette manufacturer who wants to grow, while still being able to talk to the people who made us able to grow - as openly as we possibly can.
!!
