Making money is what pinball has always been about or they wouldn't come with coin doors. If the OP wants to take a shortcut to riches and fame, then that's his right to try.

I just think that scalping kinda sucks. If the game hasn't shipped yet, and you're not going to keep one, take yourself off the list and let someone buy it at the proper price. It's this scalping that drives up the cost of these things in the first place. They create an artificial shortage and demand pushes up the price. It's really bad behavior.

Now, if you get the game and it's not your cup of tea, by all means, sell it/list it for whatever you want. List it high and see what the market will bear. But the scalping? That just rubs me the wrong way.

Price police checking in... this thing sold yet? Looks like much ado about nothing if no buyer in sight...

No, sorry but its the buyers that pay the price that are the problem. Blame the buyers not the sellers... SEND MONEY NOW!

Very true. Buyers have always dictated market value.

You don't see a problem with someone buying up stock of something that they have no intention of keeping on a limited item? There's bound to be people who weren't at their computer within the first 5 minutes of the announcement and couldn't jump on the phone to call a distributor. Why should they be punished $2000 for having to run to the bathroom or, you know, just having a job that keeps them away from the computer for a while? We know that there are several scalpers out there based on listings we've seen, on eBay, on Craigslist, or in other listings.

If they want to run a profit game, open a freaking business already. This is supposed to be a hobby, not an opportunity to exploit.

No, it's supply/demand. If you constrain supply, cost rises. If you increase demand, the same happens. You can turn the dials on either side. Scalpers are inflating costs by messing with the supply side of things.

No, it only happens because their are buyers willing to pay and they know it. Blame the buyers.

Punished? Lol, this is pinball not life and death. Go buy a Premium. We all don't get a trophy... or an LE!

If you don't understand simple supply and demand, you're really not fit to discuss buying and selling...but it's basically all you do anyway.

ok

Is it?

It's okiedokie.

What about all of those buyers of late 90s pins that paid $10,000 +? . Now they are all being reproduced for

it is...

They seemed pretty happy with their purchases.

you will never get through to Tony. He makes a side business out of buying, hypeing, and selling. He also likes to speculate and then tries to sway market on items he is either hoping to pick up on the cheap or sell for inflated prices. It is just what he does.

Did you sell your 12k NIB AMH yet? F****g hypocrite...

They really only had choice to buy what was available. Some of those pins, like CC, MM, or IM were in very short supply, so they were expensive. As the audience grew, enough people came into the hobby that could afford the asking prices and supply even got smaller. It got to where a remake only made sense. But man, if you were dropping $9,000 on a MM a couple of years back, you probably are doing just fine in life that a little price adjusting shouldn't upset you.

It's called willpower brother! We all have a choice. You pay 10 grand for something and you still have made a choice.

Yes, they definitely had no choice... Damn sellers!!!!!!

Man, you're thick. They had only a choice to buy what was out there. Yes, they could choose not to buy, but SINCE THEY WERE BUYING, they only had the option to buy what was in the market.

ok

That's why when I go out to eat, I only look for places that are selling $200 steak dinners. I would never want to post on the forum that I ate at Sizzler.

I do think it is funny that you try to make yourself feel better about what you do by attempting to say my sale of a game is the same as what you do.

Reality of what I did >> Bought 2 AMHs when they were still widely available to anyone to purchase. Plenty of supply and no demand, so I was making a conscius decision to buy a low demand game (at that time) in order to support a local pinball startup. I put 1 on route to share with anyone that wants to play it for .75 per play, again to largely support a local pinball startup. The other one I worked it so it would be one of the last ones built and left it wrapped up brand new with plans to open and enjoy it for myself. 1 year after buying the game I needed quick cash and put it up and current market. To ease your mind, I ended up not selling (glad because I really dig the game). That said I would sell for less than you are flipping your current one just to keep one more person from buying form you

Reality of what you do >> Well I dont really need to lay it out because everyone paying even a small amount of attention sees you are a frontman schill for every new LE that comes out. You buy up and feed the hype machine while constantly flipping for a quick profit. You specifically look for games which will be high demand and low supply and then buy buy buy. Turn around and then try to time your selling on the top of the hype train. You must have been salivating when you saw the prematutre hype on GB giving you ample time to grab a few LEs. Are you still just front manning for a distributor or have you struck out on your own now?

Blah, blah, blah, blah... f****g hypocrite!

Pattern vs. one time opportunity...it's a big difference, to be honest.

And whysnow is right, it took a long while for demand to ramp up and cause AMH to sell out. It really wasn't until TPF last year that the game shot up in demand and orders took off.

Lol. Whether supply is high or low, if you don't have buyers the value is zero.

Capitalism is fun.

Maybe it's a fact that LEs should sell for 9k outright. The demand is there. It's stupid to buy an LE without trying to make money off it. I know it's your dream theme, but a premium wouldn't disappoint you either. The LE seems...cocky. Idk. Don't hurt yourself putting it together. But if you do, we expect full details on the show.

It's still a Stern ,10k gets s couple nice Bally /Williams pins. Maybe it's just me but same old red dmd,cheap cabinets , . My last Stern (luci) was $6200 cash NIB , I don't see 4k in a few years . Who ya gonna call ? DP & JJP

There's no debating that the cost of Stern LEs suck. Any other theme and I'd be out. I'm willing to pay it, for this game, but I don't like it. In the end, it's just a sacrifice of an extra B title game at the end of my row, so I'm fine with that for this specific theme. But to try to make money off of it, I really don't care to try and do that at any point. If I simply couldn't handle the cost, I'd back out of the purchase and drop to premium rather than flip the machine. Let someone else get it at proper cost than to needle someone for a cheap gain.

But you had no choice!!!!!!!!!

that's true, but when you try to make money on a game that hasn't even showed up yet. Seems to take more of a toll on people.

I would be happier if pinball didn't become the one hobby where scalping became accepted or encouraged. In every other hobby, scalpers exist, but they're outright detested. There's always going to be opportunist jerks, but let's not be the first to embrace them and help them along.

Only the people who's feeling would be hurt. Can't please everyone, I guess. Pinball has a special place for people here, and they get offended over things like this. I personally have no issue with someone who just flips games, as long as they're honest about condition.
Full disclosure, I'm a stern fan. I have 2 gb pro ordered.

The line between hobby and business is pretty fine in pinball. If you can make 2k before your check clears, do it. "There will be more girls, son"

According to the ad, it's already in the box ready to ship.

that maybe true. Only Stern really knows for sure.

That's how the world works though....If the original buyer does take his name off the list the distributor will not surely sale the game at the same price they sold it to the original buyer...they will mark it up as well. That's how supply and demand works. Someone is going to profit on it.

If he doesn't have it yet and is advertising that he does, then this ad should be reported as fraud. As should any others that don't mention it is a pre-order instead of new in box.

I'm requesting the OP post some pics of the box.

You can thank Stern for some of what is happening. Time was when companies made a product and then advertised it and sold it. With this "we will have it soon, but order now before it is gone" hype, it drives this type of garbage. I cancelled an order today for a Stern pin because of their post on Facebook and for no one in the tree being able to give me any kind of an answer to my questions. I have no problem waiting on something....I can wait for months....but to continually tell people to call their distributors for information just to avoid the question is just crap. If you call the distributors, they have no idea and tell you Stern does not tell them anything until the last minute. They cannot (or will not) tell you if issues have been addressed, specs, timeframes, etc. They should at least be able to give you a target production date...but then again people might see there are some real issues at hand, and decide not to throw money at their doorstep so quickly. I also love how they are pushing those mods like crazy, and even funnier are the folks buying them for pins that aren't even shipped yet. Hell of a business model.....

No, thank the buyers... the buyers are in COMPLETE control.

No, thank the US treasury for printing unlimited amounts of money.

Couldn't agree with you more.

There are lots of positives that come with the distributor model, but yes, there are plenty of drawbacks. Maybe just for the LEs Stern could handle direct sales, though that would make distributors a bit upset.

The distributor model does frustrate communication in some ways, but it also helps in others. Look at how backlogged JJP gets with tech support. Without the same size of distribution network that Stern has, they don't have a very good communication buffer for those sorts of things.

Oh I get the distributor model, and I have no problem with it. I have a problem with hyping up games to generate sales, and then going total information blackout on the deal. Stern does the big press release, not the distributors. They start the ball rolling, and then when you want to know something, their stock answer for any question is to call your distributor. And they are correct in saying that, so long as they provide the information for them to work with. If they had provided any credible info recently, it would have made it here somewhere. The distributors know nothing, and are afraid to say anything out of fear. Some just make stuff up so people hear what they want to hear, and then that drives the rumor mill that much more. There should be NOTHING wrong with giving out projected production timelines in a professional production environment. Just saying "you get it when you get it" is just bad customer service all of the way around. If you order a car, you get a build date. (All except Tesla, lol) I suspect the reason they don't give out the dates is due to production issues....who know what those are, and if they are minor or major...doesn't really matter. Customer service when something breaks is only part of the deal...they need to be treating their customers decent from the start. If you don't want to give timelines, don't announce the games, and don't say on your website they are available. Produce them first, and then sell them off the dock, or give people an idea of when they will be getting their purchase...especially an investment this large.

Fair points all around. They should definitely arm the distributor network with better information. I'm sure distributors don't love it when Stern refers people to them and they don't have any actual info to provide. It causes a fun little frustration loop.

What exactly did Stern do to hype this game almost no one in the world outside of some pinheads even know it exists far as I know the only somewhat mainstream web site was IGN. Most of the hype seems to have been generated right here on pinside.