Shopsmith's new website is up....

[JPG]

Compare $449 to $338.02.
  Sale                                                         List
(449.00 - 338.02) / 338.02 = 32.832...%    (499.00 - 422.53) / 422.53 = 18.098...%   Before / Current Price Increases

(422.53 - 338.02) / 338.02 = 25.001... %   (449.00 - 449.00) / 449.00 = 10.020...% Before / Current Sales Discount

So a slightly more than 18% list price increase and a much smaller discount rate for the sale price.


Hope this is accurate - I struggled with it.

[RFGuy]

Compare $449 to $338.02.
  Sale                                                         List
(449.00 - 338.02) / 338.02 = 32.832...%    (499.00 - 422.53) / 422.53 = 18.098...%   Before / Current Price Increases

(422.53 - 338.02) / 338.02 = 25.001... %   (449.00 - 449.00) / 449.00 = 10.020...% Before / Current Sales Discount

So a slightly more than 18% list price increase and a much smaller discount rate for the sale price.


Hope this is accurate - I struggled with it.

JPG,

Thanks. I was lazy with my math and only computed one of them. Also, some hate the verbosity of my posts so I was trying for brevity. Is an 18% price increase (on list price) acceptable in only 6 months compared to a 33% price increase (sale price)? Would be nice to know the source (cause) of such a high price increase.

[dusty]

Was the speed reducer not originally priced at $49 . Oops

[JPG]

Was the speed reducer not originally priced at $49 .

How many decades ago?

[RFGuy]

So, the discussion always seems to veer way, way off the tracks on the forum. I find it interesting that in only a 6 month (or less) time frame, several products have had significant price hikes. Maybe these are justified because the suppliers (those who actually manufacture stuff) are charging Shopsmith more now. Instead of discussing this, we prefer to get a time machine and presume it is inflation. For comparison, the last time soda was $0.05 was around 1959, BUT if I went to buy a soda today and it was 20% more than it was last week, I would still complain. From the logic on this forum, I should be happy that I can still buy soda, that they still make it and that I got it for a "discount" in the past. Foolish me for complaining and for being shocked by a step function increase in price. Consequently, some products stay the same price for a loooong time, e.g. soda was right around $0.05 between 1886 and 1959. Was the speed reducer a fairly constant price for a reasonably long time prior to 6 months ago, like the soda example from a century ago? Perhaps it was and it might be time for a significant increase now. Then again, there could be other reasons that have already been discussed at length on previous threads. Some of you will appreciate the reasoning AND humor in my post. Others will not and will tell me how I am wrong.

[JPG]

Humor?

[dusty]

Just in case it might be of interest the advertised price of a Shopsmith Speed Reducer just a short twenty years ago was $241.50. How's that for inflation.

reference: 2003 Master Catalog and Service Parts List

[JPG]

I think that explains the recent increase. Been same fer 20 yrs!

[HopefulSSer]

I don't want to pay higher prices for stuff any more than anyone else does. That said, was SS a healthy, successful company at the prices they til recently charging? Or were they circling the drain? I have no idea of their actual financial situation of course. But from an outside vantage point looking in, with their frequent "clearance sales" and the dropping of more & more products from the catalog, it seemed to me they were on a long glide path to insolvency. I expect higher prices are a gambit for the company to survive. Now it just remains to be seen if the higher prices result in greater profits resulting from higher margins, or reduced profits from lost sales. Time will tell....

JPG or someone mentioned that the sale price was $950k or thereabouts. That doesn't seem like a lot for a healthy, thriving company selling hundreds of thousands of fairly expensive machines per year (suggesting it isn't and doesn't).

If it were the case that there were only two options, being:
1. Higher prices but SS survives and is able to continue supplying new machines and to support older ones, or
2. Shopsmith ceases operations

...which would you prefer?

[algale]

someone mentioned that the sale price was $950M or thereabouts.

$950K not $950M!!!