I think from a life lesson for kids perspective it makes sense. We had layers for a few years and doesn’t really have a payback from the $ side even with today’s prices. Especially when figuring they molt and don’t produce eggs for much of the winter. Lots of costs and kids get tired of it after they get pecked a few times.

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I still cannot believe the outrage on deposits. There is no signed contract on the final price, it's just merely to hold a place in line for the opportunity to buy an item, final MSRP to be determined.

I totally understand being disappointed, but damn I seriously question how people have accumulated any wealth if this comes as a surprise for you.

Plus everyone likes to leave out the part where they shit on everything.

They’re still fun to own but don’t do it just to get eggs. It’s a side benefit.

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About $7800 for a NIB Deluxe. I'll love to talk with your friend if they were in the northeast!

Chickens are great. We had them years ago, but as you mentioned, they are a lot of work (you need to keep the coup clean if you live in a residential area). I didn't have the time to maintain them anymore, so I gave them and the coup away.
Some of them were friendly companions, others not so much. Plus, going down to the coup to grab some eggs for breakfast was satisfying. It was a fun hobby for a while.

Again, no honor in NOT raising pricing on buyers already committed.

That’s just good business. $tern is short-sighted and cash grabbing everything. I like their games, they’re fun. But not ever owning another with current market strategy of fuck you, pay me.

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Unfortunately, I think this mindset is the minority these days. Lots of people with the gotta have it right now no matter the cost mentality. People like to say things like 'you must not be able to afford it' etc, but the reality is some people are more frugal than others, and people place different values on things. I got into pin when they were in the 100's of dollars for routed games, and that was expensive for me at that time...but not remotely life altering. The same could be said now, but my mental block is still the....i paid less than $1000 for every game I own. I can't even believe I bought 3 NiB games in the last 3 years because at the end of the day, I don't think any of them are 'worth the amount they cost'. We just happen to be in a time when you can sort of offset that mindset with the 'i could sell it for nearly or over what I paid for it'.....and Stern knows this.

Got to play a lot of pins today, to see what *I* like and compare to what’s available.

Played James Bond premium, didn’t really understand the rules but just wasn’t a satisfying shooter for me, the pops felt cramped, the upper left drop targets and missile wasn’t great for me. I guess I’ll give it a miss, maybe it can be saved by code idk.

Didn’t really care for Rush LE

I have both Elvira and CC SE+ on order playing both today I’m satisfied as my choices.

Elvira is a code monster and super easy shooter.

CC SE+ super fun shooter and simple but fun rules. This is not my favorite pin ever but at these prices seems like a super bargain.

When I get a topper for Elvira, to compare with the CC SE+ (with topper). I would say those are both pins with outstanding toppers. Elvira will set me back a full $2K more than the CC SE+.

Played Fathom for the first time ever and I have a Haggis on order. I was a little underwhelmed but the pin was 40 years old or whatever and it didn’t shoot all that great and it was set very shallow and feels floaty. But I can see the potential and fun there and hopefully having a new pin might make it shoot a bit snappier.

Finally played the pro yesterday and it was fun but very DP/Avengers; what i was expecting from Gomez.
Q's hole " huh huh" worked like shit, a flashback to GBs, but could have just been this machine.
The jet pack is completely stupid. Yet. Kind of fun at the same time

since I've joined this hobby three major pins have come out; Toy Story 4, Rush, Jame Bond, none of them excite me the way Godzilla, Avengers IQ, Deadpool, or Star Wars do. And honestly I don't see them being played at my local pinball palace as much as the other games. Maybe it's just the theme, but I do hope something really new and exciting hits that brings people rushing back for the latest and greatest and makes the new prices seem worth it.

Toy Story is based off of an unpopular movie, is visually polarizing, doesn't have a good mechanical gimmick, and is a Lawler stop-and-go machine, not a flow game, which is a style often less popular with newer players who expect the ball to never stop moving.

Rush is Yet Another Band Pin, and if you like the band it's possibly very special to you, but if Rush means nothing to you I don't think people are that excited about more rock pins just in general.

Bond launched with seriously anemic code, and quickly became very boring because of it. Maybe it ends up a code masterpiece, but it's not grabbing location players like that.

It is what it is, there's no need for a constant drip of killer games to drop like clockwork to keep the hobby interesting. Since you're new you have a huge backlog of incredible games, don't mistake new for better.

EggBeaters (or a generic) are actually a pretty good deal. On the downside, once you open they are only good for 7-10 days.

Had Chickens for years with the kids. Agree with all of these things but no one mentioned that the eggs taste notably better than store bought eggs. My daughter has Chickens at her place and now we buy from her. Best of both worlds.

Oh and the Stern price increase have turned me off of them for now, I would have been a Bond buyer but went with Scooby Doo instead - better value to me.

Yes, they do. Eggs from free range chickens are always better tasting. Years ago we had chickens too, One time a buddy comes over and asked
WTF do you have them? I said for the eggs. He said eggs are only $1/doz. Haha, now they're almost $5.

Our eggs come in Pro, Premium, LE, and SLE.

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First of all, good luck getting chicken food. It’s expensive as shit. Second, if you don’t get organic chicken food, the chemicals added to chicken feed would make your head spin. Check it out. Ignorance is not bliss when it comes to your health.

No it's not.

Don’t own chickens yet, but my cousin says it’s not cheap.
He was complaining about the coops he bought. Well shoot, I’m gonna move this to a thread as I think more pinsiders have chickens than I originally thought!!

There isn’t “chemicals” added to it. Go to your local feed provider and look at the label. Soybean meal is the main protein for rations 22% for grower and usually 10-11% for laying ration. Corn for starch and energy. Then your trace minerals. Free choice calcium etc….. if you want organic food I certainly respect that but the o pay ration difference is organic grains all the other additives are the same.

But what was used to raise those soybeans? Corn? Isn't Roxarsone added to most chicken feed, espeically those not produced by feed mills?

Standard grown food is a cesspool of chemicals, antibiotics, and everything else under the sun. 80% of all the products of big pharma go to farmers, let alone what they use to poison the ground.

Besides - Poultry has been associated with increased risk of cancer at the top of the stomach, lymphoma, pancreatic cancer, prostate cancer, and endometrial cancer. Harvard researchers found poultry consumption to be the food most likely to spur prostate cancer growth.

I raised them for a number of years. I stopped only when I realized the health risks of consuming poultry. Having said that, as pets, they are fantastic. They each have their own personalities, and some breeds like Buff Orpingtons are wonderful to have. If you just want to have pets and occasional eggs for baking - it's a great endeavor.

Listen everyone has an opinion that you may or may not like on here. This comment reeks like you are the toast of the pinball world when your not.

This is a forum to exchange thoughts, ideas and things off the cuff. This website is the free marketplace to exchange ideas and thoughts aboout pinball.

Common Levi come to the table and drop the exstensive manufacturing resume, you know so much about manfacturing to drop that golden nugget of that line when you disagree with something.

Its ok to disagree with something but everytime you open your own mouth you come off as a pretinous busybody.

Show us levi show us how pinball manfacturing is done open up your own plant. Show the world how Levi can make millions in cold hard pinball cash.

I think you may have missed the point of his comment.

What it boils down to is that lots of people have lots of opinions on how a pinball business should be operated. Maybe those opinions are driven by passion for pinball, sure, but most don't have the know-how, experience, or temperament necessary to successfully operate a business, let alone a manufacturing business. Passion alone doesn't keep a business afloat. If passion was all it took, everyone would be doing it.

Agreed. Pinball has really kept up with inflation of other commodities quite well. And I realize inflation alone isn't the only factor. Take Addams Family for example, which likely sold for around $1500 in 1992. That's brand new. That would be $3,128 today. Would sure be nice if you could buy a home use only TAF for that price today. And don't forget there were 20,270 of these things made! The most common game in the industry.

This is from a old thread about MSRP. "Late 1970's solid state Gottliebs about $1800. High Speed around $2200, Black Knight $2400, Medieval Madness $3600"
I get your point but I do not think TAF was anywhere near $1500 MSRP or real world new price. I think it was closer to $3000.

I think the documentary TILT the battle to save pinball mentioned that the MSRP for Pin2K went up to 3200 from the old DMD price of 2700. I believe I'm recalling that correctly.

That’s def the case with LE or CE pins…but you do have to keep in mind Stern’s factory & employee costs. When they were selling NIB for about $4k in 2010, at one point they only had 1 designer (Borg), one dots artist, and 1 in-house programmer (Lonnie)….and they were struggling. Now they have 4 or 5 designers, a whole LCD animation team, and a slew of programmers. They’re doing well now, but pinball is a fickle product - 1 or 2 flops can really cripple a company. So, I think the high prices are mostly due to the increased staff & also a cushion against flops.

I'm sure you're right. I spent about 20 minutes searching for old price comparison threads and nothing about Addams Family was mentioned explicitly. Someone sent me a PM and said the gold version was $4000 in 1994. So that would be about right.

So for the sake of argument, $3,000 in 1992 would still be $6,258 today. Behooves me to think anyone can find a home use only or new in box Addams for that price. The average price is now in the 10k range.

Every source I've seen that's reliable puts that era of games closer to $3500, if we're playing pretend numbers.

Which, sadly, puts the Stern Pro pricing not entirely in the out of reason range.

We did the same thing! It cost me like $8 for a cold brew and donut one day. I went back and calculated how much I was paying for coffee. I cut the cost by 75% just brewing my own! It does taste so much better!

$8/day, 5 days a week, 50 weeks a year, for forty years. It's chump change.

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Dang!

Wow! These days that could buy like...2 pinballs!

What percentage of total price goes to licensing and paying the movie star call-outs?
Could today's collectors tolerate playing a game that had no licensed theme and used anonymous Stern employees for the call-outs?
Even if people said yes to that, is that enough to influence Stern or JJP?
So many people say they want to see the next new pinball done up in their favorite TV show, movie, or musical group. That costs money. I can play any old game in my collection and put on a GnR album on the stereo at the same time and I've saved thousand of dollars right there from not buying a one-band jukebox with flippers.
I can change albums and instantly have a Kiss pinball, or a Foo Fighters. Why pay thousands of dollars to have their music shot out of a pinball speaker?
And it's still pinball.
Could you live without the added cost of the Insider Connected thing?
I know, I know, you're going to say that'll never happen.
Still, I'm asking, what "add-ons" to a modern pinball machine could you live without?

I feel this needs to go on a t-shirt. You pretty much nailed it.

It's a nice idea. Now ask yourself what's your favorite modern non-licensed pin. If it takes you awhile to answer that, that tells you something.

I don't know how much licensing costs, but it's likely not cheap. But theme alone sells a lot of pins, and that's hard to overcome. Buttery smooth Dialed In could have been a blockbuster with the right license. Instead, it's "that weird cell phone game".

What choice does a N00b have? I just bought a NIB SW because the used ones are nearly the same cost now. Everyone should realize that once the NIB prices go up = ALL SS pinball machines, regardless of age or era, going up by similar percentages. The used market inflates in line with new unit pricing. Thats at least what I have seen thus far.

Here’s my 2 favorite newer non licensed pins.
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Most every used Star Wars I have seen is cheaper than nib price . Are you using pinside? Only the Le has not been cheaper used

For anyone wanting a dual zone 36L fridge/freezer travel cooler Electronic Express has them at 70% off MSRP. $320 off. INSANE super clearance situation where the guy said they have 500 units in their warehouse they are trying to get rid of!

https://www.electronicexpress.com/catalog/198679/avanti-36-liter-portable-ac-dc-cooler

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Aaaand it's up to retail price again. Got lucky on that one! Still discounted online though.
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It´s wierd because scoring is linear as heck and much of it besides starting disasters and getting sims, makes absolutely no sense at all.

Many distributors often discounts from MSRP on Sterns. For example MSRP on a TMNT Premium is $9699, but Automated has it for $9499.