Sold Walking Dead LE Nib.

[zpeakabonk]

Hi

up for sale is a Walking Dead Limited edition NIB low serial number...

price 6799 gbp VAt included shipped in the uk,

cheers michael

 

[cooldan]

@johnwhitfield

 

[zpeakabonk]

???????

 

[Spandangler]

By putting an @ before a forum members name, it flags the thread for their attention. So I think Dan is just bringing this to Johns attention

 

[zpeakabonk]

aha okay hehehe didn't get it before, thanks

 

[johnwhitfield]

Sorry bought mine from pinball heaven

Being honest I like your prices but would prefer to buy from phil

He's helped me out so much in the past and done so much for the uk scene that not buying a NIB from him just seems wrong

 

[cooldan]

He's helped me out so much in the past and done so much for the uk scene that not buying a NIB from him just seems wrong

i agree, and hoped this is exactly what you would come in here and say. good for you, dude.

as zbeakabonk has previously said, it's a free market so he is welcome to sell in the UK or anywhere he wants, but @philpalmer at Pinball Heaven offers a service that goes well beyond the norm, and if i ever bought NIB in the UK, that's where i'd go as well. any problems with the machine, i know he'd sort them out because i know many people he has done this for. he knows the guys he buys from in the US over 20 years of selling, he sponsors all the UK shows with money and prizes and machines and time ..... so UK people are his customer base.

@zpeakabonk , i'm not saying you should go back and sell to the French market, but ..... well ..... you might not like it if a UK seller came and uncercut your prices in France because they didn't have to spend any time and money on getting the French pinball community's respect.

 

[jonathan]

That's unfair. Phil is a good guy but you've effectively told Zpeakabonk to **** off back to France!?

He can sell pinballs cheaper than anyone in the uk can. Fair play to him. I wish him every success. Business is business and he owes nothing to a fellow seller he's never even met from a different country

 

[aaronhicksuk]

As somebody who has no alliance to Phil or Zpeakabonk I agree with Jonathan. I've never bought a NIB pin but have purchased parts from both suppliers and never had a problem with either. I wasn't aware of Zpeakabonk before he posted on here but I'm glad that he did as no supplier sells everything and I've bought parts from him that Phil doesn't even offer.

Sponsoring uk shows etc is great for the pinball scene but £400-£500 is a lot more to pay for effectively the same thing. Granted Phil may have a proven record of sorting problems but who's to say that Zpeakabonk wouldn't do the same?

Clearly both sellers are buying machines direct from Stern for likely similar cost, so why such a big difference in price?

I guess a lot of it depends on who you are and the value you place on after sales support etc. As someone who feels confident tackling most problems myself such a difference in price is tough to ignore as even if the vendor completely washed their hands of it £400+ buys a lot of replacement bits.

 

[mission65]

I have bought from pinball heaven and no prblem, but I think that this is very unfair too.
Most merchants would love to have a competition of just 1.
Great idea lets support a monopoly, no wonder there are threads about unfair pricing in the uk compared to other countries especially the U.S.

 

[replicas]

I also bought my TWDLE from Phil because you get the best all round deal.
Totally agree with John's earlier post.
Let's support the people who support us in our pinball hobby. Phil does lots for our hobby and even more that we don't see.

 

[jonathan]

I'm more than happy to support the hobby. I don't support xenophobia though, however thinly veiled it is

 

[johnwhitfield]

The problem with competition is that it doesn't always work.

JJP has forced Stern to up their game but the net result is that prices have pretty much doubled.

I suspect all of us buy from a variety of stores across the world. My first port of call is normally Phil or Andy but I also use Pinball centre and Parts4pinball. All of them are good guys but I'd prefer to support UK sellers where possible. Why? Simply because if people don't buy from them then the risk with increased competition is that they stop trading.

Nothing wrong at all with doing business with people based in different countries but the local guys do put a lot back into the scene and this to me is worth spending a bit more for. It's like not using your local corner shop as prices are higher than Tesco but then moaning when they close down.

However, I think the France/UK thing is a bit of a red herring. One of the main reasons we've got such high UK prices is Sterns policy of ensuring US machines don't work in the UK unless you hack the boards.

 

[jagman]

Sorry bought mine from pinball heaven

Being honest I like your prices but would prefer to buy from phil

He's helped me out so much in the past and done so much for the uk scene that not buying a NIB from him just seems wrong

have to agree with john on everything said, i`ve ordered mine with phil aswell, there`s only a couple of hundred difference in the price , all being well, should recieve the machine this week

 

[philpalmer]

Thanks for the great comments guys, a couple of clarifications needed though,

but £400-£500 is a lot more to pay for effectively the same thing.

Unfortunately I have to buy through Electrocoin, this adds 10% cost right away, for absolute zero! To get to a margin this low I have to buy a lot of games!! Its taken years and years to build upto this volume. The latest shipment of games which is actually scheduled to arrive into the UK TODAY cost me a SIX FIGURE SUM!!!!! All requiring prepayment at the time of order, so its no easy task. Many customers are given a discount of the web price to prepay if that is what they want.

Final clarification

He can sell pinballs cheaper than anyone in the uk can.

Thats not true, if I didn't have to support the product then I could do them cheaper, but lets clarify Stern warranty which basically is "get stuffed", my games are guaranteed for 1 year, this is covered by ME, not Stern or Electrocoin, ME. This isn't free, it costs ME money, that money has to come from somewhere. Everytime one of those piece of sh*t displays fail, I send it to Electrocoin for repair, I get a bill for it, I return it to the customer FOC. Same of sending engineers out, it all comes out of PH funds, not Stern or EC!

Thanks again for the nice comments.

Phil

 

[Poibug]

I also bought my TWDLE from Phil because you get the best all round deal.
Totally agree with John's earlier post.
Let's support the people who support us in our pinball hobby. Phil does lots for our hobby and even more that we don't see.

Couldn't agree more.I got my MOP from Phil,and when Sterns "quality control problems"occured.Phil came thru straight away

 

[mission65]

Well put Phil, sorry to hear that stern won't let you buy direct, and good point about the displays, I can imagine that is a real pain.
so do I now take it that stern don't give a damn about customer care in the uk and don't mind if we pay more than other countries on top ?

 

[Poibug]

Well put Phil, sorry to hear that stern won't let you buy direct, and good point about the displays, I can imagine that is a real pain.
so do I now take it that stern don't give a damn about customer care in the uk and don't mind if we pay more than other countries on top ?

Probably half right,lucky Phil does

 

[mission65]

Yep

 

[JT.]

I don't agree with a lot of this post tbh, or the last one where zpeakerbonk tried to sell new pins.

If poeple aren't part of 'the scene' or 'this hobby' or however we want to put it, and just want to buy a pinball machine for themselves and play it, then I think they should be able to, from whoever they want, and I don't see why that seller should be made to feel that they should leave our forum, which is how this post comes across. If people want to pay for the extra peace of mind for a UK warranty from Pinball Heaven, then that's OK, but I don't see why another seller shouldn't be allowed to offer a similar product, albeit without the peace of mind of buying from a UK based supplier with an outstanding reputation for pre and post sales support, on our forum and without fear of this sort of reprisal.

 

[Fintan Stack]

Sorry, but you guys really suck sometimes.

We all love Phil and Pinball Heaven.

But don't **** this guys for sale ads over constantly! If you don't want to buy from him then don't buy from him! But stop trying to run him out of town!
How would you like this **** happening all over your for sale ads.


Come on chaps. This is not the Pinball Info way.

 

[philpalmer]

Its Stern and Electrocoin, a bad mixture... imagine 2 companies both firmly stuck in the 1980's, no ability to adapt to modern business practices and no desire to!

Its fun fun fun daily!

 

[zpeakabonk]

Wow. so many different opinions, and so much anger........

everybody should be free to buy or not buy. if my price and service are ok, you could, if you prefer to buy local so be it, i don't mind, like i said free world and everybody should do whatever he/she thinks is best

about sponsoring the community.... people who know me can tell you more about my pinball love and event sponsoring
by selling parts no other shop offers i also sponsor the community .....

don't need to get personal ...
by the way, all sterns i sell have 1 year warranty......

cheers Michael

 

[cooldan]

i apologise to any i may have offended, though i did expect it to cause a bit of a debate, which can be healthy if we all try to stay civil to each other. i'm not xenophobic btw, i'm equally offensive to all creeds and nations. reading it back now, my post indeed came across like a local with a pitchfork trying to run the new guy out of town, which was over the top. interesting to read the opinions for and against increased competition in the marketplace. i don't know much about Electrocoin or the hold they have over the UK market, but it sounds like they have some incriminating photos of Gary Stern with a hamster up his bottom or something, to wield that amount of monopoly power.

if i knew more about imports and exports and free trade and taxes and volts and frequency then i'd think about all the ways to grey-import goods from across the pond to the UK, of course. we all want to cut our costs, and we all shop around sometimes when it comes to expensive items. and i bet that all of us are fed up that in the UK we basically pay the same in £ as the Americans do in $ .... and the exchange rate is currently about 1.6

anyway here's a nice picture of a unicorn as a rainbow chaser

 

[RGV]

@zpeakabonk - I wouldn't take it personally mate. The hobby would not be what it is without so many passionate people and sometimes that passion makes people feel they have to speak out. I'm not reading any malicious intent from either side of the debate here though, just honest (if passionate) opinions.

This is generally a friendly place and while we sometimes disagree, everyone here would probably buy most other people here a pint if they ran into them in real life. Which is more than you can say for the rest of the internet

For my two-penneth I would say however that this is possibly not the politest place to have this discussion. There have been "spirited debates" about critiquing peoples for sale ads before, even since my relatively recent joining, and things seemed to have calmed down for a while up until now. Maybe someone should start a thread in the General area on the "Buy British" (or "Buy Preston" ) theme for further discussion?

 

[mark9]

Sorry, but you guys really suck sometimes.

We all love Phil and Pinball Heaven.

But don't **** this guys for sale ads over constantly! If you don't want to buy from him then don't buy from him! But stop trying to run him out of town!
How would you like this **** happening all over your for sale ads.


Come on chaps. This is not the Pinball Info way.

Yeah I agree here....why not start a new thread and discuss the advantages/disadvantages of buying on home soil or from abroad. I thought there were rules about debating seller's prices on a for sale thread? Or do these rules only apply to the Brits?

By the way I have used both PH and Zpeak, and am happy with the service both provide.

 

[Paul]

Since i'm Admin here i'm not allowed to have an "official opinion", and understandably so.

However just to say from a forum perspective, I'm more than happy to have anyone from anywhere advertise their stuff on here, as long as they are reliable and do what they say they will do.

It's up to individuals where they decide to spend their hard earned cash, and this will depend on their beliefs and personal preferences. I will support anyone pinball, be they from the UK, USA or Europe. It's in our best interests!

Yeah I agree here....why not start a new thread and discuss the advantages/disadvantages of buying on home soil or from abroad. I thought there were rules about debating seller's prices on a for sale thread? Or do these rules only apply to the Brits?

Mark - that applies to the for sale/trades/wanted forum - it was brought in purely because people would advertise something and then some would be shot down in flames for saying "That's way too high" or "that's extortionate".

If it doesn't sell, then either the market isn't right, or the price isn't. Simples!

 

[kevlar]

This thread makes me so glad we will soon have pinball machines made in the UK and sold direct to customers so no import duty/shipping cost from US/Electrocoin duty/ final seller cut ....should work out MUCH cheaper .........wait...WTF?

 

[johnwhitfield]

****ing hell I'm worried about the "Buy Preston" slogan. How much will it cost to buy it?



Disclaimer - I live 5 mins from this area.... (so not really in a place to take the **** out of Preston as I've never been there)

Michael, good luck with your sale. Maybe you'll make it over to some of the southern UK shows next year, if so I'd gladly buy you a drink

 

[zpeakabonk]

yeah why not, i do 6 shows in France each year, when it is in my free time i will come and collect that beer hehehehe , i do have a job next to the pinball parts shop , working 6 months a year outside of France , so sometime's hard to combine all