Maybe both.

We can be sure on a price increase given the current Australian & world economic conditions. My guess is a price point of around 15k aud for the next machine.

And I expect Haggis to stick with quality rather than quantity in their manufacturing.

Which is $9,752 US right now. Dollar is killing it on the currency exchanges due to the Feds raising interest rates. Aud is really getting hammered along with the Yuan and the British Pound right now, only time it was worse in the last 10 years was beginning of COVID in March 2020 (came down by May 2020) but doubtful this run will last. Shipping rates are still pretty high though...

It's around what a Stern premium sells for here.

I see the median income is around $52,000 aud (does that sound right?) US (in 2020) was $67,521 which would be $103,855 aud. Median is a terrible metric here as we have a poor distribution of wealth (more poor and wealthy with a shrinking middle class). Still, seems like talking your spouse into a pinball purchase in Australia is twice as hard as here...

Looks like it's close to double what you thought.

Capture (resized).PNG

I usually compare spending by looking at the price of a small car.

Toyota Corolla 1.8 Ascent Sport Hybrid e-CVT Hatchback/MSRP
AU$27,395

What would you pay there?

Looks like right around $24,000 US, so actually more here by exchange rate but about the same vs income base on what you posted. So not so different after all.

We have always paid a premium price for cars in Oz compared to what you guys in the US generally pay. It's just something we are used to doing here. Probably because our cars are mostly imported + the lower volumes & the high distance of getting them here. And they need to be RH drive. I often looked at cars in dealerships over there on my trips & was blown away by how cheap your cars were compared to ours. Trouble is... the steering wheel is on the wrong side!

At 15k aud on the current exchange rate a Haggis pinball machine will still look good value in the US considering it's quality. I believe Haggis machines are always going to be lower volume production, high end machines with an exceptional attention to detail.

Incidentally I listened to a report recently on inbound tourism to Australia & due to the current exchange rate etc we are expecting high volumes in the next couple of years & Americans are supposed to be "leading the charge" apparently.

Gods country.

I think a visit to Australia is on most Americans wish list. It is on mine. I have some friends from the Australian Army I met in Afghanistan I would love to visit. Melbourne area.

Australia being one of the geologically oldest countries on earth that makes sense too Made it first, did the rest, came back for a beer and a bullshit at the bar

Don't worry guys. We will just blend in and you'll never know we are there.

zAmerican+Tourists (resized).jpg

So the Earth was slowly developed country by country hey?

I've in NY. I dress like this so people avoid me. Its easier that way

LOL of course bloody not but Oz is one of the oldest by geological rock formations, it's been proven

Never knew that.
I always thought that the big bang thingo all happened at once and that the rocks in any part of Earth stemmed from there. Not sure how a rock can be younger than the very start. Maybe they didn't count it as a liquid lava?

Hell even if you go along with the creationist version it all happened within a week.

Can you give me a link so i can learn more about it? Can't find the info with goggle, i must be entering the wrong terms.

I found this to be a fascinating read and there was heaps that i didn't know myself nor heard about in any TV series/shows. I knew that continents moved due to the tectonic plates but this goes into how mountains etc formed.
https://austhrutime.com/venerable.htm

Aaaahhh, they use inverted commas every time the say "old" or "new". They are talking about the exposed rocks on the surface as "older" than other places.

It's a thought exercise for sure and one way to view things.

I always think of the world as a closed system, boy in a bubble kind of thing.

Nothing gets in and nothing gets out (besides us and fungus spores) and every single atom or force that was ever here is still here. Just changes from one thing to another sometimes.

So the water and the rocks and the dirt etc have all been here for the same length of time. Every cell in your body is from that time too.

All matter, all energy from one big bang or one wave of the sepulchral hand.

It's good to have your thinking challenged sometimes.

We're all made of star dust

The big bang sent matter/energy throughout the cosmos. We don't know what happened before that because we don't have anything to observe from before that moment.

All that matter slowly lumped together. The lumps would form planets, then gas giants, then stars. The stars would grow massive and eventually implode on themselves, dispersing all the different atoms it formed in its nuclear oven.

That happened a lot of times over a very long period

One of those lumps was Earth. Every atom on Earth more complex than hydrogen came from a star exploding

And the Earth isn't a closed system. It's constantly bombarded with particles from outer space, be it ions from the sun or large chunks of meteorites. And some of the ions on the otter edge of earth's atmosphere get swept away by solar flares. And of course humans have figured out how to get stuff into outer space, and then promptly littered a bunch

I'm led to believe that at least half of all water on earth came from outer space. Brought here in the early times from ice etc on meteorites.

No

Just as an example - https://www.science.org/content/article/remains-impact-created-moon-may-lie-deep-within-earth

Nevermind the simple asteroids that fall on the planet all the time. Or that the very premise of how the planet even formed was a collection of matter to start with. It's just far less active in our minuscule human perception of time.

All matter in the universe is fixed - but what is sitting in this planet's parking spot is ever changing.

A perspective of the timeline we are talking about here

Cosmic_Calendar (resized).png

Well if you wanna get into the weeds, the amount of energy and matter in the universe is fixed. Matter converts to energy and energy can be converted into mass

That's what the whole e=mc^2 thing is about

And then there’s my Fathom. Started as a big explosion on my credit card. Was originally lots of parts floating around the Haggis factory, and over 100’s of days it slowly clumped together to form a beautiful pinball machine. There’s a theory floating around it has finished it’s evolution and will explode to life in my gameroom very soon. The scientists are still trying to prove this last part.

Which is why the statement was as it was. Matter can not be created nor destroyed - it can only be changed. But now you're delving into the definitions of Classic physics vs modern definitions, etc. None of it matters for the premise here (Its the mass of matter that is converted, law of conservation, etc)

The thing about string theory is you gotta understand that there are actually eleven dimensions...

How much do you think shipping is to the 11th dimension?

Free, it's already there.

I'm not sure that upping price or quantity is a good idea for Haggis' next game.

It took Haggis nearly the full window to sell out of Fathom Mermaids at roughly $8k USD and 250 units. Increasing either number by much, seems like a recipe for disaster. Particularly, in this softening market.

Also, how long would it take Haggis to build 500 or 1000 games? I shudder to think.

Price increase is pretty much inevitable.

1) They will have proved they are not a start-up risk and can deliver
2) Their old price point will be multiple years old by then
3) They will have a reputation for high end after fathom that they can capitalize on

Compare a sales pitch standing on the shoulder of Celts... vs standing on the shoulders of Fathom.

4) Don't take pinball's normal hot and cool streaks as a contracting market.. we just came off one of the hottest runs ever.. That is not perpetual. The market will cool some and then it will keep on trucking again.

5) Capacity can be fixed - it's just a question of making it work for their intended business plan. Of course, higher prices also help keep the pockets full to pay for higher overhead too.

The only argument I can see is if they want to keep quantities limited for the 'exclusivity' kind of thing. But the pitch both they and CGC with their boutique'd level games followed by a more conventional level example have proven pretty successful in getting a healthy balance of demand without blowing it out or limiting yourself too much.

They should up the price and just do a slightly higher but limited number of “Mermaid Edition”(equivalents). It’s a top end boutique product that can demand a higher price and clearly they are limited in how many they can produce.

Not sure what their agreement with PPS is and whether a certain volume is required.

punkin we still looking at next year before our last batch invoices are due?

That seems deeper than what I was expecting, with multiple upvotes, I better get caught up!

que1 (resized).jpg

Manuel! Fawlty Towers for the win! haha I hadn't thought about that show in a decade or two.

Love that show. Love John Cleese.

Guesstimate on the last batch payment notification….? Do you have a guess on when youll have to pay up…?

No mate, was talking to them a couple weeks ago, but never asked. I have a custom request in for mine and told them in the beginning i was happy to wait till last.

Yea. I know. That is why I asked you. Im in the last group with you. Just wondering how much longer i have before giving over the cash to Nitro…hoping 2023…looking for thoughts.

I'd say they are still working on the first hundred at a guess. Maybe the second half of the first hundred....

But i'm only guessing. I would certainly say they'd still be building them next year, and if you particularly wanted to delay payment they would oblige you, but you may not get back into line when you want to.

Fathom (resized).jpg

How many weeks was it between final payment and that notice?

Would have to look it up - been about 6 months I think. But I get the impression things are speeding up - just a hunch. I saw they loaded a few games to go to Europe the other day

Go Haggis. Go!

Yeah that does make me wonder about the timing for more recent payers, in entering my 7th week since full payment. Still reckon I'm likely to land Bond Premium before my Mermaid.

Got my email today, my mermaid is boxed up and ready for delivery.
Haggis is only on the other side of the city so it will be at my place next week.

Pretty excited!

How long was your payment to ready wait time mate?

Can you drive to Keysborough and pick it up ? I would. Pics of loaded game. "what game did you bring home today " thread.