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I have some theories about why your sales are low which don't involve the price of items, kore.
1. Publicity. You may have shot yourself in the foot with your many delays in getting the site up. I think a lot of the buzz died down.
2. Theoretically unlimited quantities and time to order. People aren't rushing to order as they would with a standard one time sale because the notion of rarity isn't there and they know they can probably get it some other time if they choose to. You put something on sale for one week only and publicize it well, people flock to it because they know they only have one chance and they can convince themselves that the item will remain at a high value because it's not being sold indefinitely.
3. You've promised more teams. This is probably the biggest one. I've ordered both wemadefox and MBC merch, not because I liked the teams, but because it was plausible, at the time, that they could be my only opportunities to own progamer merch. You say it's highly likely that other teams will be onboard soon and generally only the CJ fanboys are going to buy now. If I think you'll have a wide variety of clothes to offer, I have to budget and be more selective. I think I would have bought something by now if you hadn't suggested STX merch would come on sale. I'm waiting for it. 
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What I guess I should get across to people is that none of the teams will happen if this initial thing doesn't pan out the way the teams would like it to. Meaning, if CJ doesn't get the results they want other teams won't want to do business. I'll figure something out this week one way or another.
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On April 19 2010 23:19 kOre wrote:
What I guess I should get across to people is that none of the teams will happen if this initial thing doesn't pan out the way the teams would like it to. Meaning, if CJ doesn't get the results they want other teams won't want to do business. I'll figure something out this week one way or another.
Well I desperately want one of those CJ shirts but I'm a poor student who has 25 pounds a week to spend on food and things, so buying one means that I have to not eat for a week, and while I'm not blaming you in terms of price, I'm just reminding you that me and others are quite poor, but I'm going to try and get one in the next week or too.
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On April 19 2010 23:26 Kerotan wrote:Show nested quote +On April 19 2010 23:19 kOre wrote:
What I guess I should get across to people is that none of the teams will happen if this initial thing doesn't pan out the way the teams would like it to. Meaning, if CJ doesn't get the results they want other teams won't want to do business. I'll figure something out this week one way or another. Well I desperately want one of those CJ shirts but I'm a poor student who has 25 pounds a week to spend on food and things, so buying one means that I have to not eat for a week, and while I'm not blaming you in terms of price, I'm just reminding you that me and others are quite poor, but I'm going to try and get one in the next week or too.
What's a week eh? =P
Just kidding
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C'mon fellas, just take a several-hundred-dollar-bullet for the community.
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put up some SKT stuff, and the sales would go throught the roof from the TL community
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On April 19 2010 23:54 textbook wrote:
put up some SKT stuff, and the sales would go throught the roof from the TL community
Point A ---> Point B
You can't just go to Point B right away, that's illegal.
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I'm not surprised at the 50 sales number for CJ. Teamliquid isn't as big as it seems, and the number of people who care about owning progamer merch AND can afford it at the same time isn't that high.
If you're saying it's only 10% of what you need, then you'd need at least 500 sales for CJ for other teams to even consider this? I just don't see it happening - variety needs to happen first, and when your sales are higher (say, 50 items per team) and in the 500-600's range, you could start doing bulk shipping to US for much cheaper and have someone on this end redistribute it with cheap USPS mail.
Out of curiosity, how many jackets have sold?
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Hyrule19269 Posts
Things needed for better sales:
1. Better advertising - ask a mod to change the thread title to "Starcraft Pro Shop" or something.
2. Lower prices - I know it's hard but like that guy said, $80 shipping for $25 item is insane.
3. Variety - bit of a Catch 22, eh?
4. Sale Offers - Putting things on sale for a week at a time will increase sales. Try dropping the jacket to $200 every 3rd Saturday of the month, or something. Have 2-3 day sales. Stuff like that.
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TBH, I don't think the community is big enough to support a persistent store at all. At least not something you could make enough money to live off of. But if you introduce some sort of one-time sales and promote them well you'd probably see an influx.
Your business prospects should seriously improve once sc2 drops if you can secure related merch, of course. Who knows how long it'll last, but sc2 will certainly have its time in the mainstream.
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I will be buying the CJ fall jacket and samsung keyboard in a few days, don't worry!
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Hyrule19269 Posts
Yeah...once I get a job I'll buy something, and if they shipping becomes no longer insane, I'll probably buy more.
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It's unfortunate that CJ is one of the teams I dislike.  The only player I used to cheer for was Much, but he's gone now. I don't know, I might buy a shirt anyway just because I want to support this. We'll see.
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I'm going for the fall jacket and t-shirt as soon as paypal verifies me =/
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AWESOME! thanks for this opportunity Kore! I am interested in a CJ shirt ^.^
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Yeah these prices are quite steep, especially if you consider authentic soccer/basketball jerseys cost about the same. Perhaps you can secure a "grand opening" discount or something like that?
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Hyrule19269 Posts
Give the first person named "tofucake" on this website a free jacket. That will definitely raise sales.
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Ya reason I haven't bought anything is price. I'd love to buy everything you have but I'm just a poor college student. I will however fork over money for something I'd really love (T1 hoodie + shirt). That's like 100$ assuming the same prices as the CJ gear which is something I can spare maybe twice a year if that.
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Most of the complaints here are about the price, which is understandable, considering the demographic that this type of thing is geared towards. But you have to think, remember a while back when the opportunities to get progamer merchandise were few and far between? I think we should applaud Kore already for being able to get this up and going. It's obvious he cares about this just as much as we all do, and wants to get more sales so we have access to more teams, so I believe that he's doing anything he can to lower the prices for us.
We just have to look at this from another angle, this merchandise isn't usually readily available to the public, and when it is, it's hard to get to. So considering that fact, it's not unusual for some of the products to be slightly above the affordability range of most of the people here.
We just have to trust in Kore's negotiation skills, and hope for the best here. Instead of telling him about the price and shipping, which he already knows, we could give him ideas on how to raise purchases.
For example, I really like the idea about having a sale once in a while, but we have to think about what Kore said before, that he's not even really making any profit from this, so cutting prices here and there might be kind of tight, and the money might have to start coming out of his own pockets... =\
Hopefully the advertising stuff works out a bit better and we can get more interest in this, since it is a pretty nice opportunity that has been set up for us.
Also, I can't help but think that if sales aren't really doing that well, CJ might pull the plug on this project. Realistically, it wouldn't be a very smart investment for them if they signed off on this international distribution thing, and only 10-20 jackets were sold, for example.
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I'm saving for a keyboard I'm going to put the order in this week.
I posted it earlier but if you allow direct CC ordering without going through paypal that would help as well. Paypal can be a big hassle and a lot of people just don't trust it.
edit I went ahead and ordered it now, I'll just eat more pasta this week lol
Posters above were correct that Paypal allows you to pay directly through a credit card without verifying a bank account and all that normal hassle. Maybe state that in text somewhere on the site because a lot of people have negative preconceived notions about paying through Paypal.
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EPT
