Raffling Yo-Yo's?

General Yo-Yo
1

Have manufacturers hit rock-bottom when YYE begins to raffle small, boutique brands? Taking a moment to think about this; one has to wonder why the manufacturers do not produce more when the demand warrants a raffle?

In my mind this is manipulative marketing. Producing less contributes to the rarity and therefore, makes the yo-yo more ‘collectible’, This certainly hypes demand. But for those of us that just want to buy and play one; this hoop-jumping is simply abusive.

I think that if YYE needs to create a raffle; then they should either seek more supply from the manufacturer; or raise the price so much that the “collectors” feel the sting.

Buying yo-yo’s should not be a game.

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It’s annoying sometimes but this is far from unique to yoyos

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I guess my question is, why? RSO dropped these back in Feb. I doubt he would have had issues selling all of them. Why hold two back for YYE? Why agree to sell just two, if it’s going to cause extra measures to be taken?

4

Most RSO is sold direct through Elvin iirc. According to his site, there are 37 unknown udon bowls:

https://roundspinningobjects.com/the-bowl-udon-edition-by-unknown

A decent portion of his sales are pre-sales, then there was a drop available directly on his site a month or two back.

Elvin is pretty strict on quality control but I’m sure he also works with a very high quality machine shop. Let’s say he ordered 80 halves and ended up with three b-grades. Idk how many retailers are getting the udon bowl, stateside or otherwise.

So, 37 available, let’s say 7 sold to pre-sales, then perhaps 20 were available directly during the drop, that leaves 10 available to retailers. Say 3 retailers were interested, each were probably offered the ability to buy up to three, and once those had been allocated any remaining were maybe offered to retailers interested in more stock.

But say 25 were sold direct, that would leave only 5 available for retailers.

Maybe YoYoExpert only had the extra capital to order two units, or maybe two was the max available.

Why not order more halves then? Well for one I imagine titanium throws are expensive to produce, 80 halves may have been all that could be budgeted for. Also you do not want to have excess stock sitting around especially if you mainly sell direct to customer; you want to order the max amount that will sell out quickly. Plus it’s a special edition of a yoyo that has already had other releases over the last couple of years.

Regardless, the best way to purchase an RSO I’ve found is directly from Elvin and that outside of the bigger drops the ones that YoYoExpert receives are more of a convenience if you didn’t want to order internationally or last chance to grab one if o you missed the main drop.

Since YYE only has two and interest in this yoyo is high and to avoid a whole bunch of people desperately trying to check out, getting their hopes up with it in their cart only to get an “out of stock” page (like we saw with the Mowl Surveillance release), a drawing for a chance to buy one seems like the fairest way to sell them with the least amount of disappointed people, since everyone who’s interested will have an equal chance at winning.

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5

Lots of sneaker brands only do raffles so it’s fair for everyone. This isn’t really unique to just Yoyos.

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What makes you assume the company has the starting capital to make a larger quantity of yoyos or the time required to test and assemble a larger quantity of yoyos?
Im sure keeping the quantity limited helps with keeping the price and exclusivity up but I doubt many companies limit their production for just that reason.

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But buying yo-yos is one of my favorite games!!!

Sometimes I compete with myself to see how many yo-yos I can buy. Other times I try to win the game by not compulsively buying yo-yos. The great thing about the buying yo-yos game is that I’m a winner whether I buy yo-yos or succeed in not buying yo-yos!!!

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11

Whenever a low volume product congress out people will complain that the company should have made more. It’s not always that easy to make more.

Many people used to complain about clyw drops and how difficult they were and I’m sure many would have welcomed a raffle instead of going the website would load for them before others.

But in the end it’s up to the manufacturer. If you don’t like what they do then vote with your wallet but in pretty sure many others will take that spot for RSO.

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That is just your opinion, one of many. Manufacturers can choose to listen to you, or not to.
I am just buying yoyos that i like. If i can`t buy directly, i go to second hand market, and lurk there until i find what i want. Sometimes i find something awesome at relatively low price, and it feels amazing.

Leave economics away from yoyos! Playing with them and hunting for them is most exciting thing.

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