US buyers beware

[btho...@mchsi.com]

I gotta say that I was very excited when I heard that the new record was going to be released on vinyl by Second Motion Records in the US. And apparently they are now taking pre-orders for the release (which has been delayed until June). And, if you buy both the CD and the LP you can get the LP signed by the band!

Sounds great right? Well, beware that there are more shenanigans going on with shipping rates. It will cost you $15 for both the CD and the LP just to ship in the US. Or if you also throw in the EPs, it will cost you $20. I'm really getting tired of these practices. No records stores (Dusty Groove, Amoeba, Newbury Comics, etc.) or indie labels (Merge, Sub Pop, In the Red, etc.) charge this much and it certainly doesn't cost anywhere near this much to ship, especially if you offer to ship by media mail.

-Brian

[Chris Barrus]

On Apr 15, 2009, at 9:22 PM, btho...@mchsi.com wrote:

> Sounds great right? Well, beware that there are more shenanigans
> going on with shipping rates. It will cost you $15 for both the CD
> and the LP just to ship in the US. Or if you also throw in the EPs,
> it will cost you $20. I'm really getting tired of these practices.
> No records stores (Dusty Groove, Amoeba, Newbury Comics, etc.) or
> indie labels (Merge, Sub Pop, In the Red, etc.) charge this much and
> it certainly doesn't cost anywhere near this much to ship,
> especially if you offer to ship by media mail.

I balked at purchasing the LP from Second Motion precisely because of
this outrageous shipping charge. Just as another datapoint, Aquarius
Records (who I order from a lot) charges a flat $4.75 for up to two
items and $6.50 (including tracking and insurance) for >= 3 items.

I dug around the Second Motion site some more to see if this was their
standard shipping rate for LPs and apparently it's not. They'll ship
the Adam Franklin LP for $5.00 and the U2 LP for free (via their
Amazon store).

Anyway, I'm going to wait until the LA show and see if they're selling
the LP at the merch table.

[Glenn Page]

we should send complaints to second motion, maybe they will change the rate if we shout it out loud enough!!

Glenn

--
Glenn J Page
www.eyeseavancouver.com
www.violettown.net
----------------------------
George Carlin  - "Frisbeetarianism is the belief that when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stu...

[Holly Jordan]

Have any of you contacted Second Motion and asked about the shipping charges?   It could just be an error.

[kate away]

But they explain this clearly on their website, they are doing two shippings for the higher priced items, hence the cost:

THE VINYL LP (all orders) and physical Pangaea and Coffee Hounds EPs (Deluxe Version Only) WILL BE SHIPPED ON JUNE 10th. The first date of the North American Tour (the band will be signing them before the San Diego show so you will not get it on June 10th but they will be shipped from San Diego that day
All CDs and Digital will be delievered by May 12th regardless of what format you purchase (yes that means if you buy the higher priced items, we will ship you twice -- once for the CD and Digital arrival to you on or before May 12th and again on June 10th with the EPs and LP. The digital files will be available when we ship the CD (approx one week in advance)

---

Date: Thu, 16 Apr 2009 01:39:00 -0400
Subject: [Seance] Re: US buyers beware
From: hejs...@gmail.com
To: vanca...@gmail.com
CC: quart...@gmail.com; seanc...@googlegroups.com

---

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[btho...@mchsi.com]

 Indeed. It wasn't an error.

-------------- Original message from Holly Jordan <hejs...@gmail.com>: --------------

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[btho...@mchsi.com]

Certainly saw that. Splitting up the shipments still would not cost anywhere near $20. That's more than twice what it would cost. And if you have to wait until June 10th for most of it, why not give the option of having it all sent in one shipment?

-Brian

-------------- Original message from kate away <kate...@hotmail.com>: --------------

[Holly Jordan]

Stephen at Second Motion addressed the postage cost issue in depth on HW.  Here is a link to the thread.

 

http://www.hotelwomb.yuku.com/topic/5853

[Sue C]

Stephen at Second Motion Record's is doing a fabulous job with Church merchandise. He understands the situation and is happy to come up with better, cheaper solutions for everyone but you must understand that it's a very small independent business trying to give you what you all wanted and we should support him. His email is ste...@secondmotionrecords.com and he's a reasonable chap who loves our band as much as the rest of us. Stephen has some better postage solutions (and as Holly said has posted a detailed explanation in Hotel Womb of the rundown of shipping costs). Suggestions and ideas should all be directed to him IF you feel something seems wrong or you're unhappy. There's no sense comparing SMR to any big corporate company with the staff and backup for a big website set-up. This is all hands-on. Its not easy to set up different postage and handling choices on a small website to get this all happening for everyone.

Sue

[Sue C]

Oh, and before you write to Stephen, read his post to Hotel Womb first (sorry I should have posted it). Read it before you write to him so there's no misunderstandings.

 

Sue

 

Posted to Hotel Womb today:
------
Hey everyone,

I don't read these boards regularly, I simple don't have the time. But I respect everyone here and in fact I was a member of the old Church email list before posting boards were around, so I go way back with the people here, even if you guys don't know me and I haven't remained an active participant in the boards.

I know there are a lot of questions about shipping costs and people who are upset at what I am charging for shipping. I want to explain the situation here so everyone realizes this was not don't out of trying to screw anyone but was done after some discussion with MWP on what the best solution is to deal with this situation

The reason this is complicated is because the Vinyl is a 2xLP gatefold 180 gram.. Double LPs are very expensive to ship because they are very heavy. When you toss in 3 CDs on top of this, you can see where this becomes a shipping dilemma. As we discussed appropriately, shipping costs are shipping costs, we cannot do anything about it and if you don't want to pay them, then obviously you're better off buying things at a local store or at the show, which we of course support as well. The only problem with that with this particular piece is that this is a very limited print run and we cannot guarantee you they will be available by the end of the tour. Our distributor got 1/2 and we are taking the rest on the road, depending on demand they could be sold out by mid June very easily.

I know from experience in recently doing the Adam Franklin LP (which is 180 gram but it's only 1 record) and adding a CD to that as well (the equivalent of the CD/LP Combo I am offering for Untitled #23) that the average price of mailing this package first class mail is $12. The reason is because of the size and weight it goes up to a Priority Mail only situation at First Class and you factor in distance (which does matter even domestically in the United States) and that's why it can have a variable of $2-$3 each. So even if I wasn't charging anything for handling (which I try to minimize as much as I can even though this is a tremendous amount of work for me) charging $15 for that is totally not out of line as it's easily $12 shipping cost, $3 covers my handling and having to purchase the boxes (which are 12.5 x 12.5 durable and secure to help protect the records from being damaged) I ran a major indie distribution company for 7 + years so I have seen how Vinyl gets treated and there is nothing more that bothers me than seeing an LP come in the mail back to us or even worse to a customer that's damaged. LPs are expensive to make so so where with a CD you may have to sell one or two more CDs to make up for that lost piece via damage, with an LP you have to sell at least 7 copies to make up for that one that's damaged.. Brutal.

Oh, just so everyone knows, the Pangaea EP and Coffee Hounds EPs will NOT be in slip cases like you have seen on the band's websites. We are re-pressing them in digipacks so that does factor into weight (a little) and cost. Vinyl is the real issue but for the record I wanted people to know this.

Anyway I wanted to explain the situation for everyone here, apologize for any miscommunication and offer a solution:

Ok here's the deal.. First Class Mail vs. Media Mail.

First Class:

It gets really tricky because of the weight it literally can fluctuate anywhere b/w $12-$22 for shipping.. Since I don't have an exact replica of the LP here to compare I have to go with some others I have here. In fact I used the new U2 LP as a barometer and Adam Franklin's single LP at a bottom end. The difference is dramatic.

But as you would expect even 4 oz makes a difference in $10.

But the strange thing (that the post office failed to tell me when I went there which I just learned now from playing around on the website with about 30 different scenarios) is that there is a certain weight that things can get up to and the price at First Class/Priority actually drops.. Which makes no sense in the grand scheme of things but I guess if I had done this more I would have known. But, something that weighs .4 oz more, absolute same method of shipment, absolute same distance was $8 less. Then I added another 2 oz to this package and it just about doubled in cost.. In other words, there is this small window you have to be in to get that price..

Since it's so difficult to know until each package is on the table what exactly the weight will be (you may say how is this? It wont' change, but believe it or not it can.. I have packages of the Adam Franklin LP that are the exact same thing that vary b/w $8-$12 sometimes and I am like "it's the same damn thing! Why is it $4 more! But the problem is the distance.. So it gets really complicated and also sometimes for whatever reason there is maybe a little more bubble in the bubble wrap or cardboard in the packaging and that little bit can make something go up $2, esp in the priority mail/first class scenario.. What I am learning now is that this works great for certain types of mailings but for what we're doing here with LPs it can cause problems. Its by far the most reliable way to ship but its not reliable with cost and doesn't follow a scale we would expect with simple "size and weight"

Media Mail

So - I of course know about Media Mail.. Have used it many times in the past.. And to fix this situation, the solution to this is definitely media mail. The downside is that there is no guarantee that people will get it quickly.. CDs are not a problem as I will mail those ahead of time and can prepare the extra time on the front end... I was planning on mailing everyone everything a week ahead of time anyway, I am back from Ireland on May 6th and that is the day I am planning on shipping. May take me two days but I will get it done (and email the digital links)

but the LP's its different and this is where I made a judgment call that backfires with shipping cost.

we'll be mailing them from San Diego on or about June 10th. As I stated on the site the reason the vinyl is delayed is due to having to re-do the masters and art for the double LP, the band being on tour in Australia and not having time to address is, and also vinyl manufacturing plants are being overwhelmed lately with business. Which is great! But what used to take 4-6 weeks to make, now takes 8-12 weeks.. Depending on who you go with.. Major labels are making Vinyl and taking up business at the better plants so there are others but not many.. Then you always run the major risk of sacrificing quality for time, I don't want the quality to be cheap... Defeats the purpose.. So we find a happy medium but as a result have to delay the LP.

But the band will sign copies for those who bought the higher priced versions in San Diego, I will be handling this personally. But since that is when we will mail them (likely on June 9th or the morning of the 10th) then if I use media mail.. This means some people domestically will not get the LP for minimum a week, there is no guarantee of 7 days.. And overseas? maybe even two weeks.. Which is 1/2 way into the tour.

I was concerned about this, as I will be running the merch table on the tour too and I didn't want people to come up to me at shows angry that they didn't get their LP .. Even though they are signed by everyone which would be pretty difficult to do on the road obviously, I didn't want people saying "why didn't I just get it here and run around and get them all to sign it here" that would create some chaos I want to avoid.. Ultimately I want everyone to be happy so as a result I didn't consider media mail for the LP.

So if I made any mistake it was assuming people wanted the LPs' in a reasonable amount of time 2-3 days after June 10th, I want people to come up to me on the tour excited and happy with what they purchased, the customer service I provide and smiling.. And looking at what we have on the road and feeling good about it all and maybe b/c you already bought the other stuff you would want to get a T-shirt and not feeling like you're blowing a lot at one time.

I wish I could offer people to choose your shipping method between First Class/Priority vs. Media Mail on my site but I am not that sophisticated yet.. Paypal is a great service for small businesses like me, they are a life savior! But there is no perfect situation and they don't make it easy to offer customers choices.. There are three different ways to factor in shipping costs and each situation has flaws.. Esp when you are selling things from digital downloads to big deluxe packages. Weight and size of course is the key, but unless I have a sophisticated system to factor in the correct weight of a double LP it really misses the mark on this.. So you factor in price.. But that's not always the best barometer either and if you are not careful you start getting shipping charges for digital!

The real solution is a hybrid of both but that takes time, money and some experience that it hard for me to deal with since I am doing this all by myself.

So I have changed my prices to be more reasonable and I am going to mail everything media mail for the LPs so that you are not having to pay really high shipping charges. Otherwise if I do first class there could be scenarios where I lose $5 per package, so media mail is the only quick solution to this.

For the CD/LP combo it was $15 to ship, I lowered it to $10 (domestic US)

For the Deluxe Version it was $20 to ship, I lowered it to $12 (domestic US)

International rates will be $2-$3 more.

None of this is factoring in my time but hey again I want people to be happy b/c I want you all to trust my business, be happy and most importantly to come back to me again for other things ... and be loyal customers that understand and expect the customer service I want to give you. I come from the world of mom & pop record stores that offered this service for decades.. And with many of those stores gone or struggling, its' very important to me that I offer this to everyone that entrust me to buy from my store. This is why I do this and it's something I take very serious as it's a major part of my future to have an online store.. Learning as I go but still... And trying.. But there is no situation that works best for everyone. In the end, media mail is probably the best solution that makes most people happy, but I realize some people may complain they won't get their LPs quickly, but that's the trade off if you don't want to pay for first class rates. Hope this makes sense.

Anyway if I made any mistake it was not offering people choices but it's not an easy thing to offer.. Larger sites and stores that do this everyday have built that over time but I am doing everything Second Motion related by myself.. I build the website (with a little help to build the main engine) by myself, I update it by myself and process all of the orders by myself (with some help from my wife with the mailings when she has time out of her busy job too). I am often up to 2-3am in the morning working on the site, answering emails from colleagues, artists, fans, customers, whatever it takes. And obviously the shipping thing made me have a really hard time sleeping last night as I was upset that people felt like they were being screwed.. When the truth is there is no simple solution to this..

Anyway thanks for reading, I just wanted to explain this to people..

I will email each of the people that have already purchased the LP and offered a refund in the difference of the prices to go media mail and take 5-7 days longer (or more) to arrive but save you money.

I realize in some cases my structure above may still be higher than some retailers (Amoeba, Newbury, etc), but again they have many more shipping options than I do and in some cases I cannot compete (yet) I am doing this out of my house.. but just be aware when you support me (for what it's worth) you are supporting the band as directly as you can minus the church-merch store.. As this is just us, no middleman you are working with us directly so as a result putting more money into the bands hands instead of having 2-3 others make money before we do. Through distribution for example we barely make anything off these LPs.. But we want it to be available everywhere we can so we take that hit. Ultimately if we could sell everything thru the site and at shows that would be the ultimate way but it would leave so many people out and we want people to have options and choice that's very important. Even if it's limited.

Hope this helps bridge the gap so to speak

Feel free to email me directly with any concerns I answer every email and take it all serious. When I make a mistake I own up to it, this was a tricky situation to figure out. I have had my system charge people for shipping when they bought digital before, only because I was tweaking something in the system and unknown to me it triggered a change in that string of code.. I always immediately write back when I noticed it and refund the money.. Always getting really nice notes back thanking me for my honesty. That's how I do business.

The only thing I ask for is respect, don't just accuse me as someone trying to rip people off. I know there is a lot of people out there who think "record labels" are just trying to screw people left and right, major labels and the industry has certainly done that over the years and made everyone very cynical. Its irritating. But show some respect before you hide behind email and your posting board to go off on something.. I respect you so show it in return. If you don't and just go off on me like I don't care, that's insulting towards everything I'm trying to accomplish and making major assumptions.. and if you do that, naturally you may get a response appropriate to the tone you hit me. The best scenarios are when people understand, don't assume and maybe email me "suggestions" in a kind way and not being a-holes. That works for us all.

I have been doing this for 20 years, I didn't just start. I know there are good people who care in this industry to do the right thing. So before you assume anything, understand the circumstances and work with me, as ultimately I am doing everything I can to make this work for you and I can't please everyone but will always address concerns in an appropriate manner of time as the fans are what matters and the reason I have had a career in this business for 20 years is because of people here on this board and the dedication you give is so important, I cannot stress that enough.

Again email me at anytime I don't come here to read posts so don't talk behind my back come to me to discuss, hopefully this change will soften the blow and make more people happy to buy from me and know you're supporting a good cause.

also I will be in touch with everyone who has purchased the Combo of Deluxe so far, it will take me some time and I have other things to take care of but by the end of the weekend each of you will hear from me. Please be patient.

Thanks for listening and looking forward to seeing those of you in North America on the tour.

We just added shows in Albany, NY, Grand Rapids, MI and Kansas City..

Best,

Stephen
Owner/President
Second Motion Records
Stephen (at) secondmotionrecords.com

[Sue C]

And for something completely different, I heard a well-backed rumour that our boys will be back on Oz soil for touring November/December. I sure hope that one's true.

Sue

 

[Jonathan Sargeant]

Yeah, especially for Brisbane!

 

Jonathan S

 

 

 

---

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[Holly Jordan]

He's done a fantastic job of getting MWP's and SK's newest releases out to be reviewed.  I'm thrilled to actually see so many reviews of them.  I'll be looking forward to all the Untitled #23 reviews I expect in the next month or so.  :-)

[Sue C]

Which reminds me, their publicity machine is gathering reviews and all media articles and they're being passed around church central and to all parties involved (including church army) to forward for promotion of the best band in the world. If anyone sees any of those reviews or mentions online, they often have a Comments box underneath it, please fill a great comment about the band to help generate more interest (especially good for Adam Franklin;s fans who are all new to The Church). Tour news, venue news, fan forums etc etc etcetera

I tried to write a review  to Amazon's listing of U#23 the other day but there was nowhere to write it! Do they only have that option after release date?

Sue

[Sue C]

Well, they're not ALL new to The Church but a lot would be.... Swervies that is :)

Sue

 

[Holly Jordan]

Yeah, I think that's it.  It makes sense for huge releases where an album is released worldwide all within a day or so, but it's a pain for smaller releases that get put out in different countries at different times.

 

I'm really bad at writing reviews, but I am a member of several different forums and keep anyone even remotely interested in the band informed.  Every board needs it's resident Church freak after all!  Plus I scour blogs for any mention of the band or solo members and add comments to those too. 

 

I have gotten a few people into -- or back into -- the band that way.

 

On Thu, Apr 16, 2009 at 10:32 PM, Sue C <kas...@bigpond.com> wrote:

 

I tried to write a review  to Amazon's listing of U#23 the other day but there was nowhere to write it! Do they only have that option after release date?

Sue

--
www.stevekilbeyart.com (Member of Artspan.com)

[matthew]

(softly chanting) Can-berra! Can-berra!

[Sue C]

Its just a rumour, albeit a good one, dont get too excited yet. I didnt actually think they'd be back in Oz to tour this year.

New USA tour dates to be announced TODAY! Soon. Gotta go :)

Sue

[Victor Gagnon]

Sue - thanks for forwarding the manifesto.

V.

[Andreas Rossi]

Hi Sue & everyone,

 

Any news about Europe dates?

 

cheers,

 

Andreas

Genoa/Italy

----- Original Message -----

From: Sue C

To: Seance List

Sent: Friday, April 17, 2009 3:45 AM

Subject: [Seance] Church Oz tour ? :)

[Sue C]

hi Andreas,

It's definitely in the planning but nothing definite yet. If it happens then Im pretty sure London will be included and I saw that someone wanted to book them for Italy. Thats all I know, sorry. Maybe others have been conversing and have more news?

Sue

[nick peters]

I really hope this happens.

2009/4/16 Sue C <kas...@bigpond.com>

[Scott Douglas]

Chiming in on this a little bit late but I wanted to let everyone know about my personal experience with Stephen at Second Motion.  In early March I ordered SK's "Painkiller" from Second Motion.  It got to be close to a month from the date I ordered the disc and I still hadn't received my CD.  I sent 2 emails to Stephen with no response and I was quickly becoming irritated.  I waited about a week from my first email to him and was ready to contact Paypal to file a complaint when I looked in my Inbox and low and behold Stephen had sent me an email. He was very apologetic about not responding and advised that for some reason my emails had went into his spam folder thus causing the delay in getting back to me. He indicated that there was a glitch with my paypal payment thus he never received notification of my order.  He advised he would send my order ASAP and also threw in the Shriek soundtrack for my troubles.  The next day he sent me an email advising my discs had shipped and about 3-4 days later they arrived.  I appreciated his sincere apology and business practices of throwing in the free CD.  It's refreshing in today's business world have a personal touch when dealing with a company.  Sure, sometimes problems do arise when dealing with a one-man run business like Stephen's but that personal touch can make up for it.  So, I do intend to again do business with Second Motion all because of Stephen's approach to things.  I think his words in his statement about the shipping costs are sincere and it sounds like he's backing those words up with his actions.  Just my 2 cents!!!

 

Scott

----- Original Message -----

From: Sue C

To: Seance List

Sent: Thursday, April 16, 2009 9:36 PM

Subject: [Seance] Re: US buyers beware

[Krensky/Severson]

Hi guys,

As supporters of artists ... I would really appreciate you taking a few seconds to do this.

My brother's children's book is in a contest to be featured on the Cheerio's cereal box!!!! He's been a writing fantastic children's books for 35 years :)

Please vote for him once every day starting today through the end of October!!

His book is Chaucer's First Winter by Stephen Krensky!!!!!!!

Go to: www.spoonfulsofstories.com

Click on vote

Select "more books"

Chaucer will be the top book on the left!!!

Please vote!!!!!!! Thank you so much!!!!!!!

Diane

=