Tell me more about buying wholesale...

[JayKeeley]

What the fuck?

Labels, distributions as well as just individuals can buy for wholesale prices. You don't have to be official company or even have name for distribution. If you are willing to take 5 or more copies per title, you can obtain wholesale price. NH prefers to use underground network than large (/mainstream) distribution companies.

You gotta be kidding.

So the next time 5 of us here want the same album, all I need to do is buy it at wholesale price for us?

And here I was thinking that being a distributor = being an entrepeneur.

I guess small amounts is the way to go without having to disclose it as taxable income? I mean, if I bought (and sold!) 1000 copies of the new Drudkh, surely I would have to disclose that in my tax returns? If not, what the fuck happens if I get selected for an audit?

And I suppose the eBay route can bypass this because auction houses have a different ruling. Plus, you have to pay eBay a commission anyway.

And if you're only doing a few "buy it nows" on eBay, I guess that small amount won't show up. There are a few companies using eBay to sell, right? Are they set up as legal trading entities?

My mind is boggling right now.

What else do I need to know?

 

[Demilich]

I just emailed Faustian Distributors and got a reply like 4 seconds later...

I'm sorry to tell you, but all the wholesale/trade copies are already
gone from FD. You should ask from NH if he hava more copies left.

I'll get back with their answer as soon as possible, in case anyone's interested.

 

[JayKeeley]

OK, but I guess I'm asking about this in general.

For example, we should just start a thread to see how many people want the new Negura Bunget, or whatever else, and then just buy in 'bulk'.

I'm just surprised we didn't do this sooner, knowing that 80% of us all buy and own the same albums.

 

[M.Lehto]

Sometimes when I order something like zines, I've took several copies and got them as wholesale and then sold the extras with my own records. I've also done this with records few times, since it's much easier for me to sell October Falls-vinyl and some other title too, so people can buy them both from me and save postages.

 

[Demilich]

I'd be glad to go for wholesale on a bunch of the releases many of us want (Primordial, Moonsorrow, Negura, Nokturnal Mortum, Drudkh, Slough Feg/Hammers, etc etc) if the option is available. I'll be glad to get the ball rolling by ordering 3 or 5 of the new Drudkh album from Northern Heritage and selling them first to anyone at RC who wants one, then maybe at other forums, then on Ebay if i still have a couple left.

 

[JayKeeley]

Cool man.

Personally, I don't want to set up a business as such and sell to the general public because it's too much hassle. Shit, I don't even use eBay.

However, with us forum regulars, if we all decide on similar albums (which we do more often than not), I'll also be happy to order wholesale and then 'distribute' to you guys. All you need to do is pre-order through me (wholesale + shipping) and easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

Right, I can talk to Cruz del Sur tonight. How many people here want the new Slough Feg and Hammers albums?

 

[Erik]

Sorry to be a bit of a party pooper but is it really worth it? I mean, yeah, you might get the new Negura album for $9 instead of $12/ea but to have the package sent to one person and then the individual CD's distributed over half the world will A) take a fuckload of time and B) cost a shitload of money for packaging materials, stamps etc, and what happens if one package gets lost in the mail? Who would you hold responsible? To me, there just seem to be rather obvious reasons why people DON'T do this all the time...

 

[Chromatose]

I've considered it before with stonerrock.com's distro service (since their prices are so horrible).. but I don't think it would ever be worth the effort, and yeah, all that stuff erik says

 

[lurch70]

Sorry to be a bit of a party pooper but is it really worth it? I mean, yeah, you might get the new Negura album for $9 instead of $12/ea but to have the package sent to one person and then the individual CD's distributed over half the world will A) take a fuckload of time and B) cost a shitload of money for packaging materials, stamps etc, and what happens if one package gets lost in the mail? Who would you hold responsible? To me, there just seem to be rather obvious reasons why people DON'T do this all the time...

Erik speaks the thruth ... we would end up paying close to if not as much. And you would go through hell to send the stuff out.
DOn't forget that if you send international ... get ready to wait on line at the Post Office and fill out customs forms.

But if you still want to do this, contact Emi also. He approached me once asking me if I want to get invloved on this end. Same with NB the band themselves ... they wanted to sell me stuff at "wholesale" except the prices sucked and the chances of getting stuff from Romania in one piece is like zero,

 

[Demilich]

Right, I can talk to Cruz del Sur tonight. How many people here want the new Slough Feg and Hammers albums?

I think you know my answer to this one

 

[JayKeeley]

Yeah, of course, I was only thinking of North American residents. No waiting in lines in the post office. (By the way, the cool thing about mailing stuff these days is that you can buy shipping on-line).

Some albums are out in Europe before the USA, so I figured it would be a nice way to get them sent over just for us.

It's not really about getting it cheaper, it's about getting it sooner. If people want the Slough Feg before it's 'officially' distributed in the US, I'm sure they would pay wholesale + shipping. Even if it comes to the same as 'regular retail' price, the benefit is that you get it now and not next fucking year.

 

[Demilich]

I want new Slough Feg more than I want pretty much anything else (musical or otherwise)... Cruz Del Sur is infuriating me with their non-clip-posting ways!

 

[lurch70]

the problem with Cruz and Code666 is that they use the same guy to do their web work ... he does nice work but heavy flash stuff ... and the guy is obviously overworked and to modifiy flash files is a bitch.

tried to talk Emi into a more functional site that he could have control over ... but it seems they prefer the more designer look that is stale and hard to update

 

[JayKeeley]

I'm no expert, but the Cruz del Sur site is horrible. The navigation bar is built into a flashware spinning thing, and you have to 'catch' it like you're shooting ducks.

NAD - are you reading this thread? Did you know about any of this 'anyone can buy wholesale' crap? I mean, I look at how much I spent on shipping promos...imagine how many albums I could have thrown into the package....*slaps self*

 

[Demilich]

Time for RC to expand into web-distro territory? Maybe not... but it'd be fun to get easy access to all these European things from a reliable source on the continent.

 

[lurch70]

It's not really about getting it cheaper, it's about getting it sooner. If people want the Slough Feg before it's 'officially' distributed in the US, I'm sure they would pay wholesale + shipping. Even if it comes to the same as 'regular retail' price, the benefit is that you get it now and not next fucking year.

I hate to say it, but these scattered release dates are one of the many reasons that music downloading has become the monster it is today.

 

[JayKeeley]

I hate to say it, but these scattered release dates are one of the many reasons that music downloading has become the monster it is today.

I agree with you 100%.

However, unlike you or Speed, we buy the albums we like once they're finally released, even if we already have the MP3s.

 

[lurch70]

i've been known to do that also, alas there have been few and far between releases that made me do this.

 

[JayKeeley]

Well, if I judged everything on one listen, or 'skimmed' through an album to sample it, I wouldn't buy anything either.

 

[JayKeeley]

Time for RC to expand into web-distro territory? Maybe not... but it'd be fun to get easy access to all these European things from a reliable source on the continent.

You know what, let's try it with Slough Feg and see how it goes. I'll talk to Cruz tonight.