Price increases looming

[Doc B.]

Once we have worked through the holiday rush we will be sitting down and evaluating our product costs. In the past year many part prices have jumped again, presumably due to increases in raw materials prices and fuel surcharges. We haven't yet delved into it in detail, but I imagine we will see increases across a broad range of products. As always we will try to arrange fair warning before the price increase, and this is the first of such notices.

[porcupunctis]

Doc, will I have a few more weeks before I need to pull the trigger on a set of Paramounts before the price increase?

[Doc B.]

Probably,  but we have to do the analysis on a product by product basis. So it will take some time before I can say which products will increase (possibly all) when and by how much.

[Doc B.]

We finally found a little time to begin some price analysis. We started with Crack, which in terms of sheer quantity is our largest selling kit.
Ouch! In the past couple of years since the Crack kit was released our parts cost has risen nearly 29%!

And so we are forced to increase the price. The new price for the basic Crack kit will be $279. We have always made an effort to create a sort of grace period where one can purchase a kit before the increase hits, and we plan to do so this time too. The price of the basic Crack kit will increase on Sunday, February 12, so you have a bit more than a week to order one at the current $219 price. Please understand that this means we will be getting another rush of orders and it may take a few weeks to get them packed and shipped to everyone.

[lextek]

Any increase in the Speedball upgrade?

[Doc B.]

There will be an increase in the Speedball kit as well. A few years ago we had increases in certain product pricing due to increased parts costs. As I recall the main part of that was due to a whopping 23% increase in capacitors and resistors, as that was when everyone was headed towards RoHS compliance. This time we are seeing increases almost everywhere. The difference is that this time it seems to be caused by raw materials costs continually going up for everything along with continually increasing fuel costs bumping up shipping. And that is of course being passed from our vendors to us. So chassis plates, wood bases, transformers, PC boards and just about everything else keeps creeping up.

Part of our thing has always been to run absolutely as tight a margin as possible. And we want to continue to do so. It takes a bit of work analyzing each individual product to keep the lowest prices possible without going broke. The most informed answer I can give at this point about the increase in price of any one of our kits is that it probably will and that will probably happen within the next 30 days.

[lextek]

Guess it's time to order....

[Jim R.]

Yes, but still an amazing deal for $279!

-- Jim

[lextek]

Yes, but still an amazing deal for $279!

-- Jim

Can't be touched for mush more.  I know I have spent much, much more.

[Doc B.]

2-18-12 - Ouch! In the past couple of years since the Crack and Speedball kits were released our parts cost has risen nearly 29%!

And so we are forced to increase the price. The new price for the Speedball kit will be $125. We have always made an effort to create a sort of grace period where one can purchase a kit before the increase hits, and we plan to do so this time too. The price of the Speedball kit will increase on Sunday, February 26th, so you have a bit more than a week to order one at the current $99 price. Please understand that this means we will be getting a rush of orders and it may take a few weeks to get them packed and shipped to everyone.

[Geek]

Let me guess.... the resistors had the biggest jump?

Resistors from my wholesalers took a 65% leap in one shot last summer 0_o;

Cheers!

[Doc B.]

Just a little reminder that you still have a couple of days to get the Speedball upgrade for the Crack amp for $99.

http://www.bottlehead.com/store.php?crn=224&rn=446&action=show_detail