Ergodox massdrop groupbuy discussion

[hdss]

I am thinking about organizing a groupbuy, within the massdrop buy. Basically collecting all the parts at one adress, mine perhaps, and shipping when complete. Also keycaps and switches which arrive later from a new buy.
Collecting for NL and maybe neighbour country's like DE, BE and UK. After collecting make complete packages and ship them out. Saving the costs and hassle of multiple shipments. Savings on shipping has to be reviewed after this interest poll.

Which users from EU want to buy what? Also which users like the idea but don't thrust me perhaps. I am ok if someone else collects that we agree upon to be thrusted, if that may be an issue.

Just polling the interest if this groupbuy makes sense. Can a user spread the word at geekhack for me?

[bjarven]

I am thinking about organizing a groupbuy, within the massdrop buy. Basically collecting all the parts at one adress, mine perhaps, and shipping when complete. Also keycaps and switches which arrive later from a new buy.
Collecting for NL and maybe neighbour country's like DE, BE and UK. After collecting make complete packages and ship them out. Saving the costs and hassle of multiple shipments. Savings on shipping has to be reviewed after this interest poll.

Which users from EU want to buy what? Also which users like the idea but don't thrust me perhaps. I am ok if someone else collects that we agree upon to be thrusted, if that may be an issue.

Just polling the interest if this groupbuy makes sense. Can a user spread the word at geekhack for me?

But will this really scale well? I was under the impression that there's no shipping savings in ordering many kits. MD will charge $20 for each kit, doesn't matter if they all ship to the same address or all over Europe. Doesn't make any sense but that's the way it is apparently...

[AloisiusFauxly]

Yeah, probably best to coordinate with an Amerifriend - get all of the kits shipped to them (free), then they can send it all to you as one package.

[dox]

So if shipping to the US is free and shipping to the world is not, this means it's a US-centered service where people from Europe subsidize free US shipping?

Webwit, they are based in the US, so naturally it costs more to ship elsewhere.
Frankly, when the project started back in 2011, the estimated cost was $400.

Now we are about to get this keyboard for $200, and $20 shipping for Europe is really cheap!
The way I see it, shipping in the US might be $10-$20 and shipping to Europe might be $30-$40
so they are actually giving a good discount on shipping to all of us, and in fact Europe might be getting the bigger discount on the shipping. You are thinking way too negatively all around this project

Honestly, getting this keyboard in Europe for ~ 165 euros *shipped* is a FANTASTIC deal, I really wish you start seeing this in the proper light, and help promote the ErgoDox effort and the group buy like it deserves to be promoted.

^This. And from what I saw today, massdrop accept direct credit card payment too (not only paypal).
And I don't remember anyone else in the community seriously offering to run this group buy other than massdrop.

[hdss]

bjarven; you are right about scaling advantages. I was or still am under the impression that ordering multiple sets costs one time shipping. Maybe a bit more because package weight increases. But do not forget adding shipping costs of the other parts. I believe shipping the keycaps are a lot more expensive than 20 dollars, 50 maybe more. Add some customsfee. shipping in NL costs 7 eur. Planning to order some switches at 7bit, like brown and reds.

20 users. 20-50 eur shipping means 1 to 2.5 plus shipping from me about 10 to 20 eur. about 25 shipping instead of 20+50 shipping. .30 customs fee (something like that) that is 33 to 91. 58 euro saved 5 crates of your favorite beer.

AlosiusFauxly; great idea

About cable lengths, that usb cable looks too short to me. What about the trrs cable? What is the length of that one, anybody knows? Found it on the description page, length is two feet, 61 cm. Very long but ok

[webwit]

Dox, this is not about the ergodox, you know I love that board and I hope it succeeds in terms of getting into the hands of as many people that want it.

It is about whether it is a good development if commercial 3rd parties pick up community open source projects to compete with community groupbuys, in the long term. Effectively control is relinquished from the community to the commercial party, which in the end is just a middleman. If it is like this buy, massdrop will be fast to compete, and people will use massdrop because there is no community groupbuy, but people won't start a community groupbuy, because there is already massdrop. It seems clear where this is heading. I don't think them failing at some point is a threat, more them succeeding and cornering the market. If it succeeds it will be sold as is usual the goal of startups and it will be even more about profit maximization. Ebay/paypal wasn't as expensive as they are now. But would you empower them again if we could start over? Effectively they take an increasing cut and control all garage sales now. Do we want the same to happen to hobby forum projects? It would make an interesting intellectual discussion. The Korean forums are a bit ahead in this matter, for example OTD has made some pretty specific choices, but of course they are real DIY focused.

[rknize]

I share your unease about losing control. The logical part of my brain says that the middle man here is providing a useful service for a price. Being a commercial entity, they also have access to materials at prices that "normal" people do not. If they are able to compete against grass-roots, zero-profit efforts and still make the end customers happy, what is the harm to the community? Lack of flexibility comes to mind. However, highly-flexible group buys have been notoriously complicated and time/life consuming for those involved.

Thus, my wait-and-see stance.

[dox]

Webwit, I know you want this to succeed and I'm sure that you would have organized the group buy like me if I could have done it myself. But the case of this project is pretty much closed.
If any member want to organize a second run group buy (we've seen this before), he will be more than welcome to do so.

I can understand your concerns and maybe we should start a separate thread to discuss the place of third parties in the community.

[webwit]

Sounds good. Ideally I'd love to see some system or network for groupbuys so that effort and payment is distributed among a number of senior/trusted members.

[rknize]

Some wheels are already in motion for that.

[dorkvader]

Yeah, probably best to coordinate with an Amerifriend - get all of the kits shipped to them (free), then they can send it all to you as one package.

I am willing to help with this. I already do some international forwarding of keyboards and keycaps for members on GH, and I am assembling boards for people already. If Europe wants to have them all shipped to my address, and pay for shipping to Europe for distribution there, I'm always glad to help.

That said, I don't know if you'll save the $20/kit. That $20/kit will have to cover shipping across the ocean, and shipping inside EU.

bjarven; you are right about scaling advantages. I was or still am under the impression that ordering multiple sets costs one time shipping. Maybe a bit more because package weight increases. But do not forget adding shipping costs of the other parts. I believe shipping the keycaps are a lot more expensive than 20 dollars, 50 maybe more. Add some customsfee. shipping in NL costs 7 eur. Planning to order some switches at 7bit, like brown and reds.

20 users. 20-50 eur shipping means 1 to 2.5 plus shipping from me about 10 to 20 eur. about 25 shipping instead of 20+50 shipping. .30 customs fee (something like that) that is 33 to 91. 58 euro saved 5 crates of your favorite beer.

AlosiusFauxly; great idea

About cable lengths, that usb cable looks too short to me. What about the trrs cable? What is the length of that one, anybody knows? Found it on the description page, length is two feet, 61 cm. Very long but ok

I have no idea why they included a USB cable so short. I thought it was just to get the internal connector, but that is also provided, according to the site. Luckily, I have longer ones I will be using.

[AloisiusFauxly]

It is an interesting discussion, webwit. I agree with you that it would be bad for one company to completely take over and eliminate community-based GBs for the reasons you've listed. But as rknize has said, it doesn't take much for a company's reputation to turn sour. I can't see the community tolerating it if they suddenly take a turn for the worse through neglect, poor customer relations, etc. I imagine that the first thing that goes wrong would keep people away and effectively remove that company as a serious option here.

Anyway, I get the sense that most people here would pick a board-run GB over MD, wouldn't they? Again, I'm new here, but I don't see a company like MD eliminating GBs, just filling in where there is a lack of interest in running a GB.

[Zifle]

Anyway, I get the sense that most people here would pick a board-run GB over MD, wouldn't they? Again, I'm new here, but I don't see a company like MD eliminating GBs, just filling in where there is a lack of interest in running a GB.

The only reason I would have chosen MD over a community driven GB, would be significant savings (at the very least $25-50+)

[fossala]

If someone wants to deal with the money side of a group buy, I'll deal with the distribution. I just don't like having other peoples money tied up in my bank/paypal account.

[7bit]

If someone wants to deal with the money side of a group buy, I'll deal with the distribution. I just don't like having other peoples money tied up in my bank/paypal account.

Same for me!


PayPal money collector wanted!

Preferably from EU (some Euro country), Canada or USA.

[TDub]

Mmh a groupbuy within the massdrop group buy seems interessting, but how will this handle import tax (for the EU for example?).

I live in Germany so I will most likely have to pay an additional 19% in import tax if I order over massdrop and customs inspects the package. If there is an EU "sub" groupbuy for massdrop, which saves me the 19% then you can definitely count me in!!!!

[Merijn]

The cheapest would be to have it sent to someone in Luxembourg, which has the lowest VAT rate in Europe when importing things, namely 15% opposed to 19% in Germany and 21% in the Netherlands. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_U ... #VAT_rates)

[Dreadwyrm]

You could count me in the EU group buy as well, in theory there should be no taxes AT ALL between EU counties. If we can choose someone in a country where they don't really put much tax on imported items or where we can somehow get around the system, we should.

[Dreadwyrm]

The cheapest would be to have it sent to someone in Luxembourg, which has the lowest VAT rate in Europe when importing things, namely 15% opposed to 19% in Germany and 21% in the Netherlands. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_U ... #VAT_rates)

That could be accurate, but you don't count in the fact that in certain countries they don't really check packages, and don't put tax on them at all - a fine example would be mine, Hungary, where I have ordered at least 30 different types of products (from clothing to computer hardware to straight razors etc.), and have NEVER payed the 27% VAT. Not even once. They simply don't enforce the law, even though I exceeded the 200$ tax cliff.

[BugBuster]

The cheapest would be to have it sent to someone in Luxembourg, which has the lowest VAT rate in Europe when importing things, namely 15% opposed to 19% in Germany and 21% in the Netherlands. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_U ... #VAT_rates)

It is possible to mark it as a "gift" and just put inside couple of non-business stuff like cookies or socks and don't put any invoices or any of such papers and put couple of usual magazines instead, then AFAIK most of the time it would skip the customs. (I'm not a guru though, there might be more tricks)
Also the estimated value can be reduced, I always order from HobbyKing stating just 10% of the real value and paying no EU import taxes most of the time. But there is a risk, that if it gets lost and was insured, then you get just 10% in return, i.e. the declared value.

[damorgue]

If someone wants to deal with the money side of a group buy, I'll deal with the distribution. I just don't like having other peoples money tied up in my bank/paypal account.

Same for me!


PayPal money collector wanted!

Preferably from EU (some Euro country), Canada or USA.

Why Paypal and not a bank transfer within EU?

[Merijn]

The cheapest would be to have it sent to someone in Luxembourg, which has the lowest VAT rate in Europe when importing things, namely 15% opposed to 19% in Germany and 21% in the Netherlands. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_U ... #VAT_rates)

That could be accurate, but you don't count in the fact that in certain countries they don't really check packages, and don't put tax on them at all - a fine example would be mine, Hungary, where I have ordered at least 30 different types of products (from clothing to computer hardware to straight razors etc.), and have NEVER payed the 27% VAT. Not even once. They simply don't enforce the law, even though I exceeded the 200$ tax cliff.

The cheapest would be to have it sent to someone in Luxembourg, which has the lowest VAT rate in Europe when importing things, namely 15% opposed to 19% in Germany and 21% in the Netherlands. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_U ... #VAT_rates)

It is possible to mark it as a "gift" and just put inside couple of non-business stuff like cookies or socks and don't put any invoices or any of such papers and put couple of usual magazines instead, then AFAIK most of the time it would skip the customs. (I'm not a guru though, there might be more tricks)
Also the estimated value can be reduced, I always order from HobbyKing stating just 10% of the real value and paying no EU import taxes most of the time. But there is a risk, that if it gets lost and was insured, then you get just 10% in return, i.e. the declared value.

I am completely aware packages don't always get checked. My experience with smaller size packages they usually pass through, in the Netherlands, but in some cases with really big ones they get picked out. From friends in Germany everything has been picked out by the customs, from the smallest screw to the biggest monitor.

There are the things like marking it as gift or putting a lower value on the package, but that classifies as fraud as far as I know. Both parties must know the risk and agree to the risk of sending it as a gift or a lower value on the package than the actual value.

When sending from individual to individual for products only for the one receiver I usually don't consider it much risk, but with bulk shipments for multiple people I think the possibility of it being picked out should be greatly considered.

[BugBuster]

If one individual in US sends relatively small box to another individual in EU without any business papers inside - I think it is rather safe to skip customs even without lowering the value. Just mark it as "gift".

[Dreadwyrm]

There are the things like marking it as gift or putting a lower value on the package, but that classifies as fraud as far as I know. Both parties must know the risk and agree to the risk of sending it as a gift or a lower value on the package than the actual value.

I would love to see them prove that it was not a gift. With private organisation, they won't know anything about the deal at all. On the other hand, the size and quantity of the package would be more troublesome to deal with... how many packages are we talking about? Considering that there are currently 51 people in the group buy, and this will likely jump to 60-70, I would expect to see at least 15-20 coming to the EU.

[Merijn]

I am going to pay the $20 shipping fee, on a $200 keyboard it's not that much. I've paid way more in shipping in the past so I don't think this is much of a problem.

[Dreadwyrm]

I am going to pay the $20 shipping fee, on a $200 keyboard it's not that much. I've paid way more in shipping in the past so I don't think this is much of a problem.

They do not ship to where I live, at least I can not mark it on the form.

[richie]

You have to email them to add your country!
Look like no Koreans have ordered yet, looks like a lot of people waiting to see the aluminium case.

[Merijn]

I am thinking about ordering the base set now and by the time erryone has one the cheap case group buys will pop up and about that time my wallet will have recovered.

[Dreadwyrm]

You have to email them to add your country!
Look like no Koreans have ordered yet, looks like a lot of people waiting to see the aluminium case.

Thanks, I emailed them.

Now we're only waiting for the aluminium case.

[gdaian]

I'm in EU and would participate in a nested GB (for one kit) if it reduces cost. However, I expect minimal savings unless we can avoid customs.

In this regard, I've had luck with packages not getting checked when delivered to France via USPS. FedEX and UPS always get the 19% IME.

Unless someone in the US is willing to handle shipping and payment, we could perhaps work out a deal with MassDrop. There's no reason shipping price should be linear. MD could package a bunch of kits and send them to a trusted EU reshipper for cheap. Alternatively, if someone is planning a trip to Europe and doesn't mind taking a bag full of electronics through the airport...

There are some unknowns which have a significant effect on whether a nested GB is worthwhile: Are larger packages more or less likely to get checked by customs? Which countries perform less checks?