# Group Buys???



## jttheclockman (Dec 26, 2008)

I asked this in the casual conversation thread but maybe should have asked it here. Do we ever have a group buy with Arizona Silhouette and Bill???  If so when will this happen.???  

Are there any standing discounts with any of these companies that is honored for being a IAP member????


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## Texatdurango (Dec 26, 2008)

A group buy will happen when someone wants to take it on.  

I've never heard of any type of discount for IAP members.  The only discounts I am aware of are the quantity discounts as seen on the vendors websites which are good for everyone who visits.

Now and then a vendor will offer free shipping or other little incentives if you contact them ahead of time telling them you are doing a group buy with a few thousand dollars in orders.

But also keep in mind the IAP members are a pretty captive audience and the vendors know it so don't expect too much in the way of additional discounts.


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## Daniel (Dec 26, 2008)

I do not recall ever seeing a Group buy for Arizona Silhouette. There are several small vendors that are resellers for the larger Suppliers. their prices are already lower than buying direct from the supplier which does not leave a lot of room to give discounts. The saving is already built in and the advantage is being able to simply place your order without all the hassle of organizing a group buy.
CSUSA Group buys are popular because they offer a 25% discount on any order that is for 100 kits (Mix and Match)
Other group buys are for items that can be bought at lower prices but require large min orders etc. Some things are not as easy to order such as ordering directly from china and other reasons that ordering as a group is preferable.

Any group buy starts simply by someone choosing to do one and getting pre approval from our Group Buy Czar, Mannie. Mannie primarily insures you know what you are getting into and that you will include all necessary information. there is also a standard beginning to form that requires you be an active memebr of the group long enough for it to have a feel of who you are and have developed some level of trust within the community.


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## amosfella (Dec 26, 2008)

Last time I did a large buy from craft supplies, there is a much larger discount offered for 200 and 500 pen kits.  IIRC, 500 was close to 50% discount, but can't remember for sure.  You have to stop talking to the nice girl at the order desk and ask to speak with the wholesaler.  I did that a couple years ago, and I'm just finally running out of pens from that buy.  I think I have like another 30 left.  Might be worth checking in to.


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## Daniel (Dec 27, 2008)

Some of the reluctance on most peoples part to not go as high as 500 kits is the work involved mailing. I even get in trouble with that sort of thing. That is a sweet discount though.


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## Texatdurango (Dec 27, 2008)

Daniel said:


> Some of the reluctance on most peoples part to not go as high as 500 kits is the work involved mailing. I even get in trouble with that sort of thing. That is a sweet discount though.


 
That would depend on the participants involved!  A recent buy I made included 186 kits, with only 5 people!  That averaged 37 kits per person and was a breeze to do.  If there were a dozen or so folks willing to buy 30 - 40 kits each, the 500 qty buy would be very doable but with larger numbers of participants ordering 3 of this and 1 of that, the buy becomes a hassle.


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## Russianwolf (Dec 27, 2008)

Daniel said:


> I do not recall ever seeing a Group buy for Arizona Silhouette.


I've seen a couple. The most recent was in conjunction with a CSUSA group buy, so you could order things from either company which was nice. I think that was earlier this year as I seem to recall the gift cards from CSUSA being accepted for it. The discount that Bill offers is clearly stated on his website (just the quantity discounts on regular priced kits).


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## amosfella (Dec 27, 2008)

Well, I had a reason for the 500 kit buy.  It wiped out my income tax liability for that year.


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## jason_r (Dec 27, 2008)

I've been playing with the idea of putting together something for a while that would help make group buys easier.  I'm thinking something almost like an online store the buy manager could setup, where people would enter their order, it would do the calculations and then it could even send invoices and tie in with USPS to print the envelopes.    

So on orders where the discount changes, it could update the prices and send invoices after the order period had closed.


A friend of mine wrote this site, which kind of gave me the idea:
http://www.imperialblock.com/store
One nice thing about that code is that it ties in with Google checkout or Paypal- google checkout's 2% instead of Paypal's 3%.

Would this run afoul of any group buy policies (IAP or otherwise)?
Would people be interested?
Do you (you=anyone reading this) know of anyone/any other forum that would be interested? (so maybe it would be worth doing and having ads on the site)


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## Daniel (Dec 28, 2008)

Jason, Without having spent a huge amount of time entering orders or clicking on things. My impression is it is a little like what people have to list and post in a thread here. then people that want to order have to copy and paste from it ir whatever.
First I like it very much for this reason alone.
As an example say I am doing a CSUSA group buy.
The options for a Statesman pen are
Rhodium w/22k gold RB
Rhodium w/Blk Ti RB
Rhodium w/22k gold FP
Rhodium w/Blk Ti FP

But you will have that person that will send an e-mail that says. Can I get 5 Statesman pens?
This does not seem to be a big deal on the surface. but think about it. Right now I am dealing with nearly 100 people in the the buys that I have going. Suppose something happens that requires I have to e-mail all of them. this could easily take 2 hours or more. as is I have to answer an e-mail from each of them reply to it with a total for payment. log all the info on a spreadsheet, and accurately record if their payment has been made, cleared, was correct and if not over or under by how much, as well as track changes. So I often end up with orders that are only half paid for etc. I must also make sure I have their address.
notice that can easily translate to 5 or more e-mails to send on my part just to handle one order.
Any way that will
1. require people to order specific items and quantities without errors
2. be notified of what there total charges are
3. require all shipping info
Would be a huge winner with me.


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## Daniel (Dec 28, 2008)

George, In my experience the bigger discount would get more people to place bigger orders as well.


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## jason_r (Dec 28, 2008)

Daniel said:


> As an example say I am doing a CSUSA group buy.
> The options for a Statesman pen are
> Rhodium w/22k gold RB
> Rhodium w/Blk Ti RB
> ...



I understand the issue perfectly.  I have done a classified section
for the Thistle Class (sailing) http://www.thistleclass.com/classifieds
One common problem is that there are 2 hull materials and 4 mast colors, not to mention people who don't list where they're at.  So when I did that page I used lots of drop down menus to make sure people 
1) could see the available options
2) could only select a valid option
3) *had* to provide the needed data

On the imperialblock site I referenced, I have the customcardboxes store there.  Once Don set me up with a seller account, I was able to add items/set shipping/set prices.  Because it's really setup for single buyer transactions it doesn't quite do what a group buy needs, but it's not too far off.  I've actually considered trying to use it to run a group buy.  One challenge for that would be that you'd have to enter each item manually- a lot of work for something like the CSUSA order.


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## Monty (Dec 28, 2008)

jason_r said:


> I've been playing with the idea of putting together something for a while that would help make group buys easier.  I'm thinking something almost like an online store the buy manager could setup, where people would enter their order, it would do the calculations and then it could even send invoices and tie in with USPS to print the envelopes.
> 
> So on orders where the discount changes, it could update the prices and send invoices after the order period had closed.
> 
> ...



Jason,
I did something similar to this when I first started doing the Group Buys for the pen boxes. I built my own web page and used my website to host the page (but not linked to anything else on my website). Worked great using PP checkout. Since there has been a large continuous demand for the pen boxes, I no longer run it as a GB, but as a reseller and keep the boxes in stock for immediate shipping.
I can see where something like your suggestion could be an advantage, but when someone does a very large GB (like many from CSUSA) entering and updating the data could be very time consuming.
Something like this could also be set up using PP and a web host, but again time consuming.

Now if you are referring to someone buying a large quantity of items so they are always in stock for shipping, then you are getting away from the "Group Buy" definition and becoming a reseller, albeit at a lower price.


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## jason_r (Dec 28, 2008)

I meant a site where Joe could setup a CSUSA group buy, have
people order the items, send invoices with prices that were updated to reflect the 500 pen discount, print order sheets and , tie in with USPS click-n-ship so he just runs the envelopes through his printer or prints out labels .

Then Jack could setup a lenox bandsaw blade group buy, have people order blades, once enough blades were ordered close the buy, send invoices.....

Then Jerry could setup a Wooden Pens Pro group buy....

And Jim could have the 6-blade pen mill cutterhead buy open until he had enough orders...

While I might run one of the buys, I'd probably not.  I'm certainly not looking to carry an inventory.


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## Monty (Dec 28, 2008)

jason_r said:


> I meant a site where Joe could setup a CSUSA group buy, have
> people order the items, send invoices with prices that were updated to reflect the 500 pen discount, print order sheets and , tie in with USPS click-n-ship so he just runs the envelopes through his printer or prints out labels .
> 
> Then Jack could setup a lenox bandsaw blade group buy, have people order blades, once enough blades were ordered close the buy, send invoices.....
> ...



Jason,
Something along that line would be fine if someone would like to try that approach. I would like to see it on a small Buy first to see if there are any unforeseen problems before a large Buy were attempted.


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## Texatdurango (Jan 2, 2009)

amosfella said:


> Last time I did a large buy from craft supplies, there is a much larger discount offered for 200 and 500 pen kits. IIRC, 500 was close to 50% discount, but can't remember for sure. You have to stop talking to the nice girl at the order desk and ask to speak with the wholesaler. I did that a couple years ago, and I'm just finally running out of pens from that buy. I think I have like another 30 left. Might be worth checking in to.


Nathan,

Could you tell us when you placed your order and perhaps who the "wholesaler" was that you spoke with?

I just called Craft Supply and "went up the ladder" speaking with three people, all of whom said no discount greater than the 25% discount was offered even if I ordered 500 + kits.

If you have a name, perhaps I could speak with that person and see what can be done, perhaps I didn't get to the right people.


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## Rudy Vey (Jan 2, 2009)

Texatdurango said:


> Nathan,
> 
> Could you tell us when you placed your order and perhaps who the "wholesaler" was that you spoke with?
> 
> ...



Maybe he mixed them up with Berea. When I had large corporate orders, I always ordered 200-300 kits at a time and got quite excellent prices - they call it their crafters program.


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## keithkarl2007 (Jan 2, 2009)

god the amount of work involved in a group buy on the organisers part is unbelievable. emails here and there, updates and the rest. we don't half appreciate the time and effort put into it. my hat is off to all of you who do it


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