Re: Titanium For Borrowing
Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2012 10:36 pm
With all due respect, the decision of a private party to lend out their puzzles is none of Chris' business, regardless of whether the practice upsets him or not. This, however, is probably a moot point given Chris' reputation as a nice guy. Furthermore, he has aided in this practice by upgrading the practice TiX to be made of a more durable material suitable for multiple rounds of solving.
He probably doesn't even make that much off of the metal puzzles compared to obsession sales, and I would even wager that he has lost a fair bit on several of the metals in an effort to ensure the highest quality. About 150 of the Silvers had to be remade--plating issues with the Red that also required new cores--and we can all imagine the capital that has been invested into the Gold production. All of these replacement puzzles were offered to everyone free of charge. Even if he marks the products up 100% over manufacturing value (design hours, machine costs/labor, material, assembly and testing hours), I'm sure the final product to us is worth far more than the 90 pounds that we've chipped in.
While this is certainly a business for Chris, the extremes are probably more of a passion, and I'm sure he would like nothing more than for us to lend out our puzzles.
Matt's 2 cents...
He probably doesn't even make that much off of the metal puzzles compared to obsession sales, and I would even wager that he has lost a fair bit on several of the metals in an effort to ensure the highest quality. About 150 of the Silvers had to be remade--plating issues with the Red that also required new cores--and we can all imagine the capital that has been invested into the Gold production. All of these replacement puzzles were offered to everyone free of charge. Even if he marks the products up 100% over manufacturing value (design hours, machine costs/labor, material, assembly and testing hours), I'm sure the final product to us is worth far more than the 90 pounds that we've chipped in.
While this is certainly a business for Chris, the extremes are probably more of a passion, and I'm sure he would like nothing more than for us to lend out our puzzles.
Matt's 2 cents...