You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider seenev.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Quoted from RikeIsland:Not sure if Stern slipped in a run of Godzilla Premiums or not but I just got the notification to pay up and it ships to me tomorrow.
Eh. I have an order in and haven't heard anything. Would be a great surprise though.
Quoted from djsolzs:Hope not cause I for one will be bailing at that price point. Encouraging to hear some are still shipping now. This game will be made for a long time.
Yeah... If my order gets pushed to next year, I'm out. They've crossed the line of what I'm willing to pay.
Quoted from Fsdre:No, hopefully they still make some!
At what point does the license expire and it stops making sense for them to renew it when they're running small numbers of them?
Quoted from sawyerfamilyaz:This doesn’t give any indication of what Stern builds this year. It could easily be that this distributor has sold out of their Nov 2022 allotment and any open allocations they do have to sell will be next year.
In my experience, FUN! has given out dates that are, let's say, optimistic at best. I wouldn't take them as a source for dates.
I wonder if the pinball market will follow the real estate market. The owner of the house next door had an offer to buy the house earlier this year for $585,000 and the owner scoffed at the offer, thinking that the market is so hot that he could get $650,000. Well the house has been listed at $565,000 for two months without any takers. He expected a bidding war, but by the time the house went on the market, the market had cooled significantly.
I'm starting to think that waiting for the secondary market next year is a better path than ordering an NIB that's at least that far away. Stern reminds me of the owner of the house next door in a lot of ways. I wouldn't order a game right now with such a long lead time when the market could be totally different by the time it ships.
Quoted from Jason_Jehosaphat:If 007 is “awaiting approvals” from EON and thus isn’t yet on the line, what *is* on the line? SW and LZ are done, no? Is it GOTG or something more clever, like JP2 Premium or Zilla Premium?
They could be building bond games and updating the code later, if necessary. If they aren't building Bond right now, then this has been a really sloppy release.
No doubt some distributors will take some Godzilla Premiums from the October run, hold onto them until the next run, and then charge the new price. I mean... Why wouldn't they?
Quoted from Vino:Because most distributors have a long list of waiting customers and it would be deemed unethical business practice.
Please report any who are doing it.
It would be hard to prove, but if you look at distributors like Automated who already price gouge with prices way over MSRP on some titles, I have a hard time believing some won't do it.
Quoted from Tilt:i can guarantee that we wont do that. every one that they send me will go to fill orders
I'm not accusing anyone in particular. I think I just hate the way this works and if I don't end up getting my game before the increase, I'm always going to wonder if I had a fair shake at it. In fact, I'm certain I would change distributors after this year because I wouldn't feel good about the whole situation. Sucks that Stern puts us all in this position.
Quoted from Thomas3184:I mean if you are on a waitlist and get one next year that has a build date of Oct, you know what’s up. Not like they are gonna fake serial numbers and build dates. Stern tracks those for sure for warranty and replacement/recall.
That's true. I hope people keep an eye out for that and call it out. I won't keep my order if it goes into next year, but I hope everyone else is thinking about it.
Quoted from baltistyle:Speaking up for a great experience with Automated. Called in, paid retail msrp as a first customer and then Godzilla Prem came home to me. They are not one of the oldest and largest vendors because they are doing it wrong…. It’s people that take unlimited deposits for a dollar that are doing it wrong for the customer.
This certainly looks like price gouging to me. I bought a NIB pin from automated and had playfield issues. I sent all the info to the guy, and then checked back a month later. He never sent it to stern. Had to start the whole process over. Ended up just talking to stern directly. At the time I paid a few hundred over msrp to get the game, thinking it should come with good service. Nope.
Screenshot_20220928_140921.jpgQuoted from Ivanhoe:I think we can all agree that some business are better than other and once in a while your going to have a customer that had a problem and everything went wrong including how the reseller handled it (or didn't handle it).
I can say from personal experience that Automated never price gouged me and always treated me right. They didn't make me a cappuccino or blew smoke up my ass like at some places, it was exactly what I expected. I call or drop in, I see what they have in stock or available for order and buy it. If I pre-order, I check in every so often to check on the status. Never did I pay over MSRP for NIB (I always bought current titles).
I think they are also within their right to sell used games at whatever price they feel, we do it here on Pinside. They have a business, they pay rent (or property tax)...they need to make money to keep the lights on so I can see what I'm buying.
If they have old stock NIB then they should sell that at whatever price want too, they stored it all that time...like a fine wine, there's a demand; Fillnoutpinball does it with current titles, take a look at their "vault" page. I don't see anything wrong with it...if someone is dumb enough to pay $21k for a NIB Godzilla LE then send that guy my way because I have a few games to sell him too.
One last word about Automated, Mike gives back to the community, donates and has fundraisers for charities. I think you should reconsider your condemnation before you act like judge, jury and executioner.
I had a bad experience. You had a good experience. Hopefully most people have good experiences. I've heard from others who had a similar experience to mine. Let the record include them all. People can take all of our stories into account when they choose a distributor.
Reading how long everyone has been waiting makes me realize that I'm never getting GZ. Oh well. Maybe I'll get lucky on the secondary market if the economy keeps going the way it is.
Quoted from mbl1116:I’ve seen plenty of GZ premiums listed for 10,500 or less recently. Factor in the price increase and shipping costs and you’re pretty much there.
I ordered it from a distributor with free shipping to a state the doesn't collect tax... So $10,500 does not sound good to me. I heard a lot of business noise this week that makes me think the economy is heading for bad times, so maybe NIB isn't a great idea right now anyways. Those $10,500 premiums could be under $9,000 in six months.
Quoted from JCrusher:Wow they’re really trying to unload those mandos. Did stern just over estimate the market on those and make way to many?
So the only way to get the most desirable games is to buy a bundle with an undesirable game? These distros have no shame.
Quoted from action76:Factory Friday post says they are cranking out GZ premiums. I'm sure it won't be enough to get to mine but there's always hope
[quoted image]
When did you order?
Quoted from JustEverett:Capn12 is correct. Unfortunately. I put down a $500 deposit for GZ in October 21 and another $500 deposit for JP in January 22. Originally I was quoted $9k. Recently spent a lot of time talking to the distro and it sounds like I’m going to be stuck with the price increase. Distro is stuck in a bad spot with little they can do to honor the original price. Really unfortunate that there isn’t a way stern will work with distros to honor these orders that have been backlogged.
It's on purpose.
Quoted from Riefepeters:Regarding pricing…The rumor mill is that the UMRP is the same as MAP is the same as MSRP on the pro in 2023; however, there is a spread on the UMRP and MSRP on the premium model. So technically the distro does not have to charge you the full increase in MSRP on a premium, but would on a pro.
But if you’re buying a desirable premium title and you don’t have a long history with the distro - then why wouldn’t they pass along the full increase if they have downstream demand on the title and can easily increase the price.
Well if word gets out that that's the case, the distros are going to piss a bunch of people off that way.
Quoted from Blenderhead:I get the GZ premium I ordered June 2022 in about 2 hours from the time I write this! Happy camper here! made the October run! Party time!
June 2022? Hmmmmmmmm. 
Quoted from Thunderbird:Stern price increases are being met with very little enthusiasm around the world. They were foolish to increase LE prices a whopping 17% over Rush LE, which was already priced high. Premiums rising to $9700? That’s an outright fleecing too. Only pros managed to escape such plundering, at a small 1% rise in MSRP.
Distributors are sitting on stock now. I see them post in game threads announcing the have stock, trying to move it. Stern and JJP have really shot themselves in the foot with their price increases.
It seems like toppers and accessories are also sitting on shelves. The prices for a block of plastic and LEDs have gone past the point of sanity.
Quoted from Gubbin:Meanwhile.. There's still Rush Pro and Premium on Amazon
With the Amazon credit card 5% cash back, that's like $450 off. Still too expensive in my opinion.
Quoted from Bohm:So how much will the Godzilla Premium I have a deposit on cost me?
Nothing if you cancel your order due to the price change.
Quoted from Gubbin:Looks like JDJP on the line
[quoted image]
Aren't there a bunch of people wanting the premium and like no one wanting the home version? I don't understand stern sometimes.
Quoted from PinStalker:They know all the people waiting so long for older games will already pay the higher price, so no reason to be good to those people
Not all of us. I've had a Godzilla Premium on order for a while. It's not going to make it before the end of the year and I won't pay the new price. I'm pretty much done with Stern. There would have to be something really, really special that makes the price worthwhile for me to buy anything else. The way stern operates, I can't see it happening.
Quoted from Cobray:As much as Stern squeezes dollars (and even pennies) from every little thing they can and given the way they have moved forward with being less personal with it's buyers and 100% about profits (and NOTHING else), I'd say this is even more of a pipe dream than a dream.
Now go buy that $2,000.00 crappy plastic topper that costs $128.00 to produce, please, it's the end of the year and they need to pump up the numbers.
Haha. I went from liking George Gomez on podcasts to finding him way too disingenuous as he keeps claiming that the cost of parts is what's driving up their prices...as if the profit margins aren't huge even without the increases. It's the same messaging that soured me on disney parks.
"Due to inflation, we're raising prices way above the rate of inflation. And we'll do it next year too."
Quoted from MaxIsDead:Yeah, I am out on these newer games at these prices. IF a game becomes a solid hit down the road then maybe, but I've got a room full of great games. I don't need to buy more, especially at these prices. I feel like they are going to see a sharp drop in demand.
Bond was a double F-you with the high price, lack of code AND wired 2 pop's together like a home pin cause they wanted to save 20 bucks on an auxiliary driver board. I choose to vote with my wallet.
I'm interested in seeing how they backtrack or handle the situation when demand does drop and there's no more backlog of orders to fill and games are sitting at distributors unsold. I'm got an email from cointaker recently listing all the NIB games they have available and I never signed up for any email list. I get the sense that distributors are already struggling to sell what Stern is sending them. Once the Godzilla backlog goes away... What does stern do?
Quoted from Tilt:as of right now, home pins are not being phased out, just that the current ones are, others are in the works
Of course. Why should Stern worry about filling orders for the games they have when they could be creating more (cheaper) variants to clog up the line?
Quoted from skink91:When are Bond 60th’s expected to hit the line?
Did they sell any?
Quoted from Aurich:I'm sure there are Foo Fighters fans who would be down for a pin, but geez, what a milquetoast theme. They have no cool mascot, they've never even had a cool album cover (sorry if you're a fan, but I googled and looked, it's true), it's just a zero personality band to me.
The Foo Fighters are a pop band pretending to be hard rock. I listened to them in high school and I thought their music was cheesy. It's hard to believe it's like 25 years later and they're so respected. Whenever I hear about them putting about a new album, I can't help but think "aren't you guys too old for this now?" It must be hard to be so rich and famous and still try to sound like a moody teenager.
Quoted from JackG:Not good. Price went up 2k from initial deposit and shipping no longer included free. Plus, been waiting 2 years.
It's not THAT good of a game. I would cancel.
Quoted from rai:Remind me not to ask you about your options on games because your ratings are horrible.
[quoted image]
[quoted image]
No one else takes the ratings here seriously. Why should I?
Seems crazy to me that Stern pinball, by far the biggest company in the business, with a huge backlog for certain games, cannot procure parts and stick to a schedule at this point. It's not like the demand for these games is a sudden surprise. A year ago they could have worked to line up 6+ months of Godzilla parts and then just made that non-stop while the procurement people lined up parts for the next game.
Their flexibility in production schedule doesn't seem so much a testament to their agility as it does to their poor management... Unless of course the unreliable schedule is a feature and not a bug, used to artificially create scarcity, push lower cost games to buyers, and delay popular games until price increases take effect. It's hard to see stern as being anything but either incompetent or evil... Maybe a little of both.
Quoted from bigguybbr:GM last year had 95K vehicles parked nearly finished because of supply chain issues. Ford had 45k parked waiting on parts before they could be completed and leave the factory. But a pinball manufacturer should have no troubles in the same time period?
Has the line at stern ever stopped since the covid shutdowns? Clearly they have all of the generic parts that go into every game. It's only game-specific parts that seem to trip them up, and thus they keep shifting their schedule... But I haven't heard of games parked, waiting for parts. If they have the parts to keep the line moving every day, then they're failing at procuring game-specific parts and I think it's reasonable to assume that could be handled better. I don't see any reason why Bond Pro has to be on the line over Elvira, especially when Elvira has been off the line for what? Two years? Plenty of time to procure parts... If they wanted to.
Quoted from Sorokyl:really GZ prem has just been "whenever they have parts and time".
They ran it at least 10 times in 2022. most of those did not show up on the "production schedule.". Prod schedule is pretty accurate for things that have a "once a year" run but thats about it.
Maybe they'll hit a point in the next year or so where they just do 1-2 GZ runs a year. not there yet.
I honestly think my distributor just pretended to take my GZ order last year. I've heard nothing. I don't even want it anymore but I haven't bothered canceling because the distributor never communicates anything anyways.
Quoted from HB_GAMER:Sounds like you should initiate communication.
I think I just need a new distributor. Communication has never been great with these guys.
Why do we even need distributors anymore if they can't communicate or even tell you when you might get a game? Stern should just sell everything direct. The service couldn't possibly be worse than what we get from dealers.
If I email my distributor and say "I want to buy X, " I get a response in minutes. If I email my distributor and say "I have an issue with my new game and need support," I'm lucky if I get a response within a week, and then they're just telling me to try contacting the manufacturer.
I've lost a lot of my interest in this hobby these last few years, especially for buying new games. It shouldn't be so hard.
Quoted from Tilt:Grouping all distributors together is not really a fair thing. I can tell you this, I pride myself in answering any questions i get within a very short time. Often within hours, even in the middle of the night. I want to earn everyones business and with a product like Stern, that you can buy from a number of distributors, If i dont answer, you will go down the line to someone that will, so i want to reply instantly to be the one that earns your business.
As for communication, There is always room for improvement, but whether its us, or another distributor, we dont always know the answer. I try to explain in an email, but my phone is always on, and calls are sometimes easier to explain. I travel to tons of shows as well just to meet people so that you are more comfortable sending these amounts of money to someone you might have met in person rather than email. Now back to communication. Lets use the current popular title, Foo Fighters premium. I know how many i ordered, and i know how many i am being allocated beteween now and July. But that is all i know. So if any distributor tells you that you are able to get one in say september, they are just bullshitting you. I know that there is a run in july, so i know (as long as there are no hiccups at manufacturing) who is able to get in one on that run. But i can not honestly tell you that you can get one in september. Our current schedule for foo fighters only goes till july. Will there be a run in august, i sure hope so, but i dont know if its august, december, or 2024 right now to give you the honest answer. and no distributor does.
Service stuff. If your distributor doesnt answer your emails about that, then look elsewhere, not saying you might like the answer, but there should always be a reply to your question. THATS OUR JOB. On foo fighters, there is the plastic for the ramp breaking, stern has a fix in the works, but we have no clue when it will come. We also want it sooner than later, but have no control, but your distributor should at least answer you and tell you that one is coming, and that we dont know the time frame. But you deserve an answer There is no excuse for no answers, unless legitimate like we never got the email. I know i have had a few times where my dog jumped on my lap and stepped on the keyboard, and opened an email and i didnt notice, so i didnt realize i had an email, and i apologized when i founf out that happened, but it was an accident and i didnt know. I also have the same frustration, We are Stern only, and im a colector, so i buy other brands myself for it, and have often not had replies to emails asking for updates.
Lastly, let talk about deposits and payment in full. We dont like it either, and there is what i hope is good ways to work with it. Im also always open to suggestions to improve as well.
Deposits. we require a 100 deposit to get on our list for a game, and at that time we will tell you any information we know about expected availability, but its a guesstimate from experience, and with parts issue lately, its not always accurate. But this helps us to determine how many machines to order and such. So when you place deposits with multiple distributors and cancel all when you get the game, you are messing up things for the ones you cancel. Not all people can absorb 100k in cancelllations. Refunding a deposit. although that really goes against the purpose of placing a deposit, we still will refund any for any reason, i often ask if i did something, but regardless of the reason, i still always give the refund. and the only time it is not a full refund is if it is over the time frame that paypal will give it back 100%. For instance, godzilla premiums had a wait time of a year or more, if after a year you found someone else had one and ask for a deposit, paypal already charge be 3.87 in fees for the 100 deposit, i cant get that back, so i refund 96.13. If its in the 90 or so days that they allow it, you get the full 100 back. Im not here to make money off of refunds
PAID IN FULL: although i have to do it myself for some titles, i hate it and dont want to be part of it on the selling end. There is really only two reasons i have people pay before i have the machine in hand and ready to ship. STERN LE's are required by us to be paid right away, so in those cases, we also require payment up front, but stern has been overall pretty good about getting them out in the expected timeframe. And on our first run of pros for operators, we do not "require" payment up front, but i tell our customers that we expect the machines in three weeks, its best to get payment to me between now and that 3 week estimate so that if i get your game on monday, i can ship it out that afternoon or tuesday. Your welcome to still send in the payment the day the game arrives, its just that it will delay you getting that game a few days, but that is the customers choice. When stern tells me that they have x number of a title are ready for me to send a truck for, that is when i send an email asking for the balance, just so you get your game quicker, but i dont send that email till i know the games are basically on the truck to come to me, not off of my allocation of what i should expect. I did not get all the foo fighter premiums yet that i was allocated for last month, i didnt send emails to all those that were in the allocation to send payment in, because i dont have those games yet, and i dont want to sit on your money
I appreciate all that. You're not the distributor I'm talking about. Still... The entire system is problematic for buyers. I went with my usual distributor, with whom I had had good experiences prior, but because of that loyalty and decision to give them my repeat business, I got shafted on Godzilla, getting pushed into the new year and the much higher price. Had I shopped around, I could have had it last year at the lower price. Should we really have to scour the market to try to find a distributor with a game in stock every time we want to buy something? Should we have to start all over every time with someone new just because they have allocation at the right time? If anything, the system discourages repeat business for dealers.
Quoted from Markharris2000:FWIW, I just picked up another NIB JP-Premium today, shipped from Stern this week. The production line must still be cranking a few more JP-Premium units out! Sounds like they have multiple lines active right now, with 3-4 titles being produced at the same time. What a logistic challenge to be sure....
Uhh.. How many times have you bought that game?
Quoted from Markharris2000:THREE. (I know, I know, don't ask....)
I'm asking... Why?
Quoted from qbass187:There’s plenty of folks who weren’t/aren’t too happy with CT for one reason or another. But I can only speak for myself. No chance in hell I every buy NIB from them. Just not a great way to conduct business In my opinion.
I have the same problem with Flip n Out. Ordered GZ a long time ago. No deposit. Just an invoice. Never heard from them again. Could have gotten the game from a smaller distro before the price increase. At this point, I wouldn't do business with Flip n Out, cointaker, or automated. I guess they don't really need our business anyways as they all seem to have more than they can handle.
Quoted from ekayden:Same here! (But I got Pro)
So you got an invoice (a bill), didn’t pay it, and then wondered why they never contacted you? Doesn’t sound like much of a mystery to me. They were taking full payment in advance for Godzilla, no doubt due to its popularity. You might not like that practice and can certainly take your business elsewhere. I didn’t mind, and I got my machine delivered to my house 7 days after the manufacture date (a week ago now). That’s fast! They still have more in stock now, so you can get yours without prepaying.
No. When I put in an order, they said they weren't taking deposits for Godzilla and they didn't know when they would get it. They just sent an invoice as a record of the order. I never heard from them again. In the mean time, other distros had stock and I could have gotten it from them cheaper before the price increase. I feel like the least they could do is send out updates... Tell me how many orders are ahead of me, when the expected runs are and their allocation. I wouldn't say they have bad service. It's more like no service. To be fair, I had a couple decent transactions with them before and I thought they deserved my repeat business, but I've learned now that distro-customer relationships mean nothing anymore and you just buy from whoever has what you want at the time.
You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider seenev.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Wanna join the discussion? Please sign in to reply to this topic.
Great to see you're enjoying Pinside! Did you know Pinside is able to run without any 3rd-party banners or ads, thanks to the support from our visitors? Please consider a donation to Pinside and get anext to your username to show for it! Or better yet, subscribe to Pinside+!
This page was printed from https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/what-is-on-the-line-at-stern-pinball-delays?tu=seenev and we tried optimising it for printing. Some page elements may have been deliberately hidden.
Scan the QR code on the left to jump to the URL this document was printed from.
