Gunfighter Mk.II + SCG [Availability]

[Hummingbird]

Hi,

 

I am really interested in the Gunfighter Mk.II + SCG combination, however I was wondering wether it is at all possible to buy this within the foreseable future? I get the feeling that unless you always pre-order in good time, then you won't be able to get these sticks?

 

In other words, at what point can I expect being able to purchase this? On March 7th ? Or is that simply when all the pre orders will be shipped?

[Hummingbird]

Nobody knows?

 

Wish VKB had a more reliable production line :(

[Foul Ole Ron]

Mar 7th is when the next batch will be shipped. I had to order back on October 23rd, 2018 to hopefully be in this batch (that's not even guaranteed it seems). My guess is that if you wanted to get a Gunfighter Mk.II they won't open pre-orders again for a while as they have to clear all the current backlog and you'd probably be lucky to get it towards the end of 2019.

[Hummingbird]

Odd way of doing business I have to say, esp. considering the demand.

 

They're losing out on a lot of money by having such a scattered production.

[Seb71]

They don't lose any money if they sell everything they can manufacture.

[CBStu]

They don't lose any money if they sell everything they can manufacture.

Lost sales = losing $. Most people won't wait around. They will find an alternative. If they can make 100/month and sell them all they make 100 profits. If they could sell 125/month but can only make 100, they are losing 25 profits.

[Foul Ole Ron]

They don't lose any money if they sell everything they can manufacture.

 

One would think they could make more money if they could manufacture faster and produce more stock as I'm sure some people get tired of waiting and go elsewhere. But to keep their costs down the manufacturing is done in China and they get better rates I'm sure when they get a large batch done. Might be difficult for them to get a manufacturer to do small runs.

 

All that being said it's a bit frustrating to have to wait nearly 5 months to hopefully get your order completed. They seem to have issues estimating when they will get their production runs done as when I ordered in Oct. they were estimating January. Now it's hopefully Mar 7th but that first batch will only cover half of the orders. The other half will have to wait a couple of weeks apparently but I'd probably file that under "we'll see" for now.

[dburne]

Yeah the wait is certainly well worth it for sure, loving my Gunfighter Pro setup.

I imagine part of the reason for the production numbers they run is in cash outlay also. Virpil also I would think.

[Seb71]

Lost sales = losing $. Most people won't wait around. They will find an alternative. If they can make 100/month and sell them all they make 100 profits. If they could sell 125/month but can only make 100, they are losing 25 profits.

 

One would think they could make more money if they could manufacture faster and produce more stock as I'm sure some people get tired of waiting and go elsewhere. But to keep their costs down the manufacturing is done in China and they get better rates I'm sure when they get a large batch done. Might be difficult for them to get a manufacturer to do small runs.

 

All that being said it's a bit frustrating to have to wait nearly 5 months to hopefully get your order completed. They seem to have issues estimating when they will get their production runs done as when I ordered in Oct. they were estimating January. Now it's hopefully Mar 7th but that first batch will only cover half of the orders. The other half will have to wait a couple of weeks apparently but I'd probably file that under "we'll see" for now.

Again: they don't lose anything if they already sell everything they can manufacture. You can't sell more than you can manufacture/more than you have (unless we are talking about stock exchanges, but that's another story).

[Hummingbird]

Making maximum profit is all about how well you can match production with demand. If the demand is far greater than your production then you're losing out on a lot of profit.

 

Thus when you consider the absolutely enormous increase in the demand for joysticks just within the past few years, and esp. high end sticks (Star Citizen alone generated an gigantic amount) , it seems quite odd that VKB hasn't capitalized on this and cranked up production.

[Seb71]

You don't make these with Copy-Paste. Manufacturing more products requires an increase of production capacity. And scaling that for what might very well be just a temporarily increased demand would be disastrous. Betting on Star Citizen's succes would also be unwise.

[Bogey Jammer]

Well, nobody knows how VKB manage their money. What can we understand as potential customers is that we can decide to not give our money if the wait feels way too long. It is not loss based on production capacity, but it's clearly a loss of business opportunity and degradation of reputation.