[stimpee]

Go to Vortech, or Rotrex, or ASA, or Opcon, and ask them to give you a price for 10 blowers at a time, or perhaps 100 a year.

Then ask them to give you pricing for 100 at a time, or 1000 a year.

Go to your local machine shop, and get them to give you a quotation on a bracket for 10 at a time, or 100 per year. Then ask them to give you pricing for 100 at a time or 1000 per year.

Go through all of the other components in the kit and do the same thing. Make sure you also account for differences in the kits, and the level of "completeness".

Now, open up a brick and mortar shop, with 10-20 employees, to "service" the industry. Spread the overhead for that shop out over 100 kits per year (and obviously other supporting products, but at similar types of sales levels).
Spread out the cost of the engineering, software development time, prototype builds, tooling, etc out over this 100 kits.

Now open up a brick and mortar shop, with perhaps 20-40 employees to "service" the industry. Spread the overhead for that shop out over 1000 kits per year. Spread out the cost of the engineering, software development, prototype builds, tooling, etc out over 1000 kits.

Which kit do you think will end up priced lower, and by how much?

How much profit do you need to make per kit to keep your doors open?

[azjimi]

Originally Posted by stimpee

Go to Vortech, or Rotrex, or ASA, or Opcon, and ask them to give you a price for 10 blowers at a time, or perhaps 100 a year.

Then ask them to give you pricing for 100 at a time, or 1000 a year.

Go to your local machine shop, and get them to give you a quotation on a bracket for 10 at a time, or 100 per year. Then ask them to give you pricing for 100 at a time or 1000 per year.

Go through all of the other components in the kit and do the same thing. Make sure you also account for differences in the kits, and the level of "completeness".

Now, open up a brick and mortar shop, with 10-20 employees, to "service" the industry. Spread the overhead for that shop out over 100 kits per year (and obviously other supporting products, but at similar types of sales levels).
Spread out the cost of the engineering, software development time, prototype builds, tooling, etc out over this 100 kits.

Now open up a brick and mortar shop, with perhaps 20-40 employees to "service" the industry. Spread the overhead for that shop out over 1000 kits per year. Spread out the cost of the engineering, software development, prototype builds, tooling, etc out over 1000 kits.

Which kit do you think will end up priced lower, and by how much?

How much profit do you need to make per kit to keep your doors open?

Good to see some people understand business.

[ozone]

Two words: price point. These guys have done their marketing and research and determined that $10K or whatever is the right price to sell their merchandise. The cost that went into development has already occurred. Parts cost is probably fixed, minus fluctuations in materials costs. The free market system has priced their product at whatever it sells. From there onwards, its comeptition.

That being said, I'm in total agreement that I think it costs too much. For me anyways. I don't consider myself a modder, let alone a serious modder. However, if a S/C was in the $5K range, I'd seriously consider it. 25% more output or whatever it is, it would be worth it. Stock M3 is still a sick beast so it's not like it really matters to me--I'm not on the dragstrip. I just like to go from point A to point B. Quicky. And enjoy it. Those guys that really race their cars and have ca$h coming out of their a$$es will pay what the market bears. And props to them, people should do what they want with their money. So I'm anti-boycott b/c these guys are providing a service and aren't trying to necessarily rip you off. You are though being ripped off, if you think it's overpriced yet you still pay for it. IF it's too pricey, just don't buy it and prices will fall. Free Market 101.

[azjimi]

Originally Posted by ozone

Two words: price point. These guys have done their marketing and research and determined that $10K or whatever is the right price to sell their merchandise. The cost that went into development has already occurred. Parts cost is probably fixed, minus fluctuations in materials costs. The free market system has priced their product at whatever it sells. From there onwards, its comeptition.

That being said, I'm in total agreement that I think it costs too much. For me anyways. I don't consider myself a modder, let alone a serious modder. However, if a S/C was in the $5K range, I'd seriously consider it. 25% more output or whatever it is, it would be worth it. Stock M3 is still a sick beast so it's not like it really matters to me--I'm not on the dragstrip. I just like to go from point A to point B. Quicky. And enjoy it. Those guys that really race their cars and have ca$h coming out of their a$$es will pay what the market bears. And props to them, people should do what they want with their money. So I'm anti-boycott b/c these guys are providing a service and aren't trying to necessarily rip you off. You are though being ripped off, if you think it's overpriced yet you still pay for it. IF it's too pricey, just don't buy it and prices will fall. Free Market 101.

I always appreciate an educated vs. emotional (ie. boycott) response. You are basically saying that being ripped off is a state of mind and I actually kind of like that. As far as "Free Market 101", you left out one crucial element which someone mentioned earlier. There is another outcome when people don't buy & that is that the business fails. Survival of the fittest...Darwinism 101.

And me too...if the price were lower, I'd buy...for whatever that's worth & it's not much. I may buy anyway...I truly dunno right now. What I do know is that I totally respect people who put their time, money, and LOVE into a product. I feel that the people who do this are the hardest of the hardcore enthusiasts and that they deserve to make a good profit if they produce a quality product. It's called hanging it out there...something a lot of us do not have the guts to do.