How do you feel about all these sales?

[Aiynzahev]

Hi guys

I am very happy when something that is normally out of my price range goes on sale and becomes affordable.

At the same time, there is something disconcerting about some of these large sales and price drops, especially the frequent sales and the big price drops.

While I understand these companies are responding to the new financial climate, I also feel a little dignity is lost, for example U-he never has sales, his products are of a certain un-fluxuating value. I can plan today and save for anything he sells knowing that I won't pay today, twice what I might pay tomorrow.

I am not upset about the money I may have saved if I had waited to purchase certain things, rather I am upset about

1) The value of what I own (resell value) suddenly dropping, as the reality sometimes I will have to let go of things to pay bills

2) The value of the work that goes into programming these plugins and how it reflects on the value of our work or hobby in general. Is music & creativity so unimportant today? (That is a larger discussion not for this thread though)

I know many of you are much more thoughtful and articulate than me, so I was hoping those of us who find this troubling could have a voice.

Please note, I know there are many of you who have no problem with the sales, this thread though should just be a collection of peoples opinions so that companies etc can have an idea of how people feel on the issue.

So please, let's not turn it into a debate, lets just voice our opinions on both sides, and let others know how we feel.

As for me, I will certainly take advantage of sales, and I am not at all against them, however companies that have continuously put their products on "sale" at lower prices are not winning my confidence and in some cases put me off buying anything from them for various reasons.

I feel there should be controlled, somewhat predictive sales OR price drops. With many of these companies it's both.

One of the main reasons is I simply cannot decide in 14 days if a product is really going to be of long-term use to me. I have to mix with it for a while, and if I do mix with it and don't buy it, I will end up with a lot of broken projects.

The easiest thing for me to do is buy, try and after a time period of my choosing decide if I want to keep. Meanwhile, I may find that it's retail value has halved, making this kind of process more costly than it need to be.

In short, I like sales, but I think many of these sales are unhealthy and will have long term repercussions, negative ones.

[Tricky-Loops]

I feel there should be controlled, somewhat predictive sales OR price drops. With many of these companies it's both.

That's exactly what companies shouldn't do (and many won't do)!

Because then our Average Joe will think "Well, company XX is always having a sale on this and that month, so I wait for the sale to buy it!"

Most companies want to introduce a surprise factor to their sales. People are looking on their website, and they also see the other products they can buy.

[Aloysius]

At the same time, there is something disconcerting about some of these large sales and price drops, especially the frequent sales and the big price drops.

I'll stop you right there and say that;

(a) Arturia have 92,794 'Fans' on Facebook.
(b) Plugin Alliance have 57,357 'Fans' on Facebook
(c) Softube have 13,329 'Fans' on Facebook
(d) Waves have 248,000 'Fans' on Facebook

I buy from all of these companies. A lot of people do. Not everybody is on Facebook, so this is just a Subset of their actual 'Fan-base'.

Can you imagine if every Waves Audio 'Fan' spent even $1 each this year? That would equal $248,000. I (like many others) have probably spent thousands on Waves Audio Plugins. Do you think a Sale is 'hurting' their business? I doubt it.

I reckon they can afford to indulge in the odd sale.

[Aiynzahev]

That's fine, like I said It's not my intent to debate, just to hear peoples opinions.

[Aloysius]

That's fine, like I said It's not my intent to debate, just to hear peoples opinions.

I reckon they can afford to indulge in the odd sale.

[Tricky-Loops]

A sale is good if a company needs much money shortly. After the sale there will be a slump but then everything will normalize.

But more than this it's a PR action. I remember I didn't know anything of D16 before they had their sale!

I don't know if it's good to have sales after sales. You could ask William with his Wusikstation...

[VitaminD]

The more sales the better.. it is a buyers market to buy and a developers market to make money.

I wouldn't have bought ANY of the products I bought had they not been on drastic sale.. it is software.. it depreciates in financial value tremendously over time.

And this is a hobby.. so careful purchasing needs to be used.

That said I DO wait for sales.. such as NI's summer sales (in general) to upgrade Komplete and IKM's sales to load gear credits and/or new gear models.

If they didn't have sales, or I didn't find a way to get a healthy discount, I'd have never bought any... also the sales sometimes reduce the prices of second hand software on the marketplace making even sweeter deals. I know when Audiomidi was around I bought several of their no-brainer deals even when I didn't need them.. just because it was a nice deal I then used at least one of those deals to get crossgrade on another company's software which then caused me to upgrade to a large suite as a result of that.

But I'm guessing you're making a fortune with all of your nice sounding patch banks.. you should have a pretty good feel for the market as is since you make banks for many of these developers' products.

[ariston]

I haven't followed the plugin market for THAT long, but it seems to me that quite a lot of products were overpriced to begin with. Take the Waves stuff - I'll assume that they profited initially from being one of the few purveyors of good quality plugins. Now, they're feeling the competition and are adjusting their prices. I still think they're overpriced, they should really lower their prices instead of having a year-round "sale".

I do get upset once in a while when there's a sale on a product that I just bought (FXPansion Etch was a good case in point), but a lot of that's my own fault. I often buy new things on impulse right away, instead of waiting a bit to see the software mature AND drop in price.

I think U-He's model is wonderful. Good quality (and useful) freeware and demos to get people hooked, stable prices, great value and support. You know what you're paying for, and that's pretty unique in this market. Their success speaks for itself (of course, it doesn't hurt to have kick-ass products in your line-up).

[chk071]

Sales are the only way i can afford audio software as a hobbyist. As simple as that... the only "big" plugin i ever bought was z3ta 2 when it was on an upgrade offer from z3ta+ for 25 €, and Novation V-Station from Thomann for 25 €, when that was on sale. I thought about buying ACE a couple of times, but that's simply out of my money frame (the one i set for myself to prevent suffering from GAS ). So yes, i am very happy about sales. The argument "People who paid the full price will feel ripped off through sales" is not valid imo. If you take a look at the games branche, games which are 1 1/2 year old, and were once full price titles will be sold for like 10 €, to increase sales. Plugins age too. Also i think, as said, it is a good way to get things going, PR wise.

[VitaminD]

Good point. The PC games market is similar.. The people that have to have it now buy it for 50 dollars on release day. A year later it is 20 dollars. Another year after that it is 5 dollars.

Not that it is entirely the same.. but it does follow a fairly similar model of huge price at the front followed by drastic discount a year or two later.

Now it is pretty well known there are big sales in the middle of summer and the end of the year. Other companies have the surprise deals here and there. Unless you have to have it now.. best just wait for one of these deal times.

Patience can really pay off! Quite literally.

[Tricky-Loops]

Sales are the only way i can afford audio software as a hobbyist. As simple as that... the only "big" plugin i ever bought was z3ta 2 when it was on an upgrade offer from z3ta+ for 25 €, and Novation V-Station from Thomann for 25 €, when that was on sale. I thought about buying ACE a couple of times, but that's simply out of my money frame (the one i set for myself to prevent suffering from GAS ). So yes, i am very happy about sales. The argument "People who paid the full price will feel ripped off through sales" is not valid imo. If you take a look at the games branche, games which are 1 1/2 year old, and were once full price titles will be sold for like 10 €, to increase sales. Plugins age too. Also i think, as said, it is a good way to get things going, PR wise.

BTW, you can get ACE for free if you subscribe to the Beat Magazine (if you still haven't).

(I'm not affiliated with the Beat Magazine in any way - just to say that there's even a U-HE product that can be acquired cheaper!)

[chk071]

Thanks for the tip, i read that already. Don't really want to subscribe to Beat mag though, i usually only buy an issue if the included plugins attract me. Nice offer though nonetheless, if you keep in mind that ACE usually costs 69 €, and the Beat subscription costs 59 € for 12 issues.

[Numanoid]

I think the smartest tactic is launch a plugin at very high price, putting it out of most punters range. Then after a while do a big sale, putting the plugin within punters range. Punters then feel: I need to take this opportunity to get this plugin, maybe I don't need it, but this opportunity might not come again

[Numanoid]

the Beat subscription costs 59 € for 12 issues.

If you reside in Germany Outside of those borders, you need to cough up €69

[jacqueslacouth]

gone