I think you are answering a question I did not ask. So let me make this clear and simple since it is past noon where you are, and you likely have already had a few.CaptainCore wrote: ↑Mon Oct 08, 2018 5:07 pmMatteo V wrote: ↑Mon Oct 08, 2018 3:23 pmJust wanted to save this from some COREporate mandated editing. Good info as used kites may be coming down with more kites on the market and less buyers. Also watch for closeouts on brands that have never had closeouts before.CaptainCore wrote: ↑Mon Oct 08, 2018 10:24 amAnd if you think it doesn't matter, this summer here in supposedly cold foggy and windy England, saw some kite suppliers saying their business was 60% down according to my pal who runs iksurf magazine, this thanks to the most windless and hottest summer on record. Even our own sales stalled for the first time in the four years since we re-engaged after the Slingshot drama, this August did not exceed last August and numbers were down.
UK figures are unlikely to affect world kite prices, but as we all know, it's a global village, numbers are not exactly soaring away given the maturity of the market, so any decline in numbers equals price hikes which none of us want. Kite prices have gone beyond the point that any of us feel really comfortable about and you only have to look at what happened with windsurfing business, higher prices equals fewer people equals even higher prices. That's without considering the liklihood of a tariff war and its effect on us.
So all in all, a gloomy outlook without wishing to further ruin your monday morning too much.
Doesn't work like that I'm afraid, all that happens is less get built by all brands so the OEM builders with fixed overheads and in some cases increased material and even labour costs, put up the unit cost. We need a constant flow of entry level participants to hopefully outweigh the wastage from those that move on. As to discounting on a large scale I think it unlikely that Cabrinha under their new financial constraints will be building much to close out and I'm fairly sure North/Duo will have had a chill wind blow through with all their marketing spend, certainly here in the UK which was a big market for them and at this time I've no idea what the European market has been like this year but chances are if we're down up to 60 percent it can't have been good for them, since they are the clear market leader, not a good year to decide to change brand name. Nothing marketing spend can do to overcome the ravages of a bad weather season, ask the ski/snowboard industry.
Given: Kites are produced about 3-12months before they are typically sold (like cars).
3-12 months after the kites have been produced, if sales are down significantly for that period, there are lots of unsold kites (last years) laying around. Thus there are too many kites and not enough kiters to buy them.
This should first mean some good closeout prices on those kites, unless the kite MFG wants to take those kites back and destroy them to keep their prices up.
If closeout prices for that overstock are significantly lower than retail, especially on brands that typically have no closeouts, this should drive down used kite prices as a kiter could just get brand new last years kites for the same price that used kites were going for. Thus the used prices would decrease in some proportion to closeout prices.
So from what you have stated, this is what we can expect? Or does Core destroy unsold kites instead of closing them out? And to be CLEAR, I am not asking anything about the next sales cycle.