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Shady dealers of the past
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Badmike
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Posted: Mon Dec 25, 2006 9:16 pm

MShipley88 wrote:One explanation for cougie owning three houses.....

He inherited them.

Rich kids often mistake inherited wealth for personal merit.

One recent example:

Q: Isn't it amazing that Lamar Hunt helped found the AFL when he was only 28? I mean, wow!

A: No. He inherited a huge fortune from his oil tycoon father and he was born already owning half the streets on the Monopoly board, with hotels already built on them.

Probably, Cougie's game sales help him keep up the taxes on the houses.

Mark

You know, I have thought about that, it would explain a lot. Oneway a total asshat could run a business year after year when on paper it looks like he should lose money. I know a couple for years that owned a used bookstore...they absolutely ran the business into the ground with idiotic business practices, yet every year the wife's wealthy father would bail out the business with a check around tax time. That business ran for about ten years, and that was about 9 years longer than it should have (the father finally got tired of writing those checks every single year). I wouldn't be surprised if something similar keeps Cougie afloat.

Mike B.

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jhaynes01
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 4:45 pm

Wow... what is up with the animosity with us bclarkie. I have a feeling it has a lot to do with us watching for buy it nows on Ebay, and beating you to them occasionally. We certainly have done nothing to you personally to warrant the flaming.

BTW I'm Jason, and I'm in charge of the RPG department at trollandtoad. For all of you who have never ordered from us, and are just going to take some angry flamer's word about us, I'll go ahead and tell you a few things about our company.

RPGs

So, I really have no idea why you've got an axe to grind with us bclarkie, but if you would like to discuss it, I'm more than willing to talk to you directly.

You guys are an absolute joke. Maybe I'll allow you to take advantage of my ignorance and buy one of your $16,000.00 Magic Cards.

Maybe I need to report you again, it wouldn't be the first time that I had report someone more than once before they acted on it....

Oh and for the record, It sellers just like you is exactly the reason why we have this thread.

Last edited by jhaynes01 on Wed Dec 27, 2006 5:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

napoleonsdad
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 5:25 pm

BTW I'm Jason, and I'm in charge of the RPG department at trollandtoad. For all of you who have never ordered from us, and are just going to take some angry flamer's word about us, I'll go ahead and tell you a few things about our company.

Hi Jason. You know I have to tell you I've been watching this thread and although I find it interesting to some degree I also feel from my perspective it's kind of moot. My impression of ToadandTroll was formed long ago and has nothing to do what's been previously stated. Simply, FWIW, I find your prices consistently to be on the high side, at least for RPG's. Again, that's just my impression.

Badmike
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 6:31 pm

jhaynes01 wrote:Wow... what is up with the animosity with us bclarkie. I have a feeling it has a lot to do with us watching for buy it nows on Ebay, and beating you to them occasionally. We certainly have done nothing to you personally to warrant the flaming.

BTW I'm Jason, and I'm in charge of the RPG department at trollandtoad. For all of you who have never ordered from us, and are just going to take some angry flamer's word about us, I'll go ahead and tell you a few things about our company.

I for one enjoy having T&T post on Ebay...it's so much easier to sell copies of Rtn to TOEE and similar items when T&T prices them out of reach for most collectors. My prices look awesome in comparison!

Mike B.

"THE MORE YOU THINK ABOUT WHY i DONE WHAT i DONE THE MORE i LAUGH" Cougar
"The Acaeum hates fun" Sir Allen
"I had a collecting emergency" Nogrod
Co-founder of the North Texas RPG Con
NTRPGCON

FormCritic
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 7:16 pm

jhaynes01 wrote:Wow... what is up with the animosity with us bclarkie. I have a feeling it has a lot to do with us watching for buy it nows on Ebay, and beating you to them occasionally. We certainly have done nothing to you personally to warrant the flaming.

BTW I'm Jason, and I'm in charge of the RPG department at trollandtoad. For all of you who have never ordered from us, and are just going to take some angry flamer's word about us, I'll go ahead and tell you a few things about our company.

We've been in the game industry since 1994.
We are a Bizrate and BBBOnline certified retailer.
Our Customer service is top notch, and any problems customers might have with their orders from us are resolved almost immediately.
We ship out most packages within 1 business day of receiving payment.
We have a large selection of RPGs, CCGs, CMGs, Board Games, Toys and More... we're certainly one of the larger online game retailers.
We verify that all of our out of print D&D Products are complete before we put them up for sale, and we carefully grade each item.

So, I really have no idea why you've got an axe to grind with us bclarkie, but if you would like to discuss it, I'm more than willing to talk to you directly.

Hi Jason...welcome here!

I haven't ever bought from TrollandToad. Too expensive. But, so far as I can tell you guys are a legitimate business.

I just wish that all of the new sellers on Ebay would stop looking at your store prices in order to get an idea about how much their stuff is worth.

Mark

"But I have watched the dragons come, fire-eyed, across the world."

napoleonsdad
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 7:38 pm

ToadandTroll

OOPS, sorry Trollandtoad :oops:

Plaag
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 9:29 pm

I've bought from the website before, not from the Ebay store.
Prices and conditions on the Shadow World books were better then what I was finding on Ebay at the time (and got everything in one lot), so my experiance there was a good one.

ShaneG.

I reject your reality and substitute my own

bclarkie
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 9:31 pm

jhaynes01 wrote:Wow... what is up with the animosity with us bclarkie. I have a feeling it has a lot to do with us watching for buy it nows on Ebay, and beating you to them occasionally. We certainly have done nothing to you personally to warrant the flaming.

BTW I'm Jason, and I'm in charge of the RPG department at trollandtoad. For all of you who have never ordered from us, and are just going to take some angry flamer's word about us, I'll go ahead and tell you a few things about our company.

Hi Jason, unfortunately it has absolutely nothing to do with BINs at all, I could really care less. As a matter of fact, I don't ever even remember getting beat out by your rehnvohek ID, ever, so somehow trying to belittle what I am saying as me just being petty is actually quite weak. It does however have to do has everything to do with the fact that your prices in a lot of circumstances are ridiculously high and in the rest of those circumstances they are down right insulting. Also, when someone from your store comes on here and actually tries to condesend me the way that was attempted, what kind of response did you expect?

Additionally, despite what the previous posters claim was, it is absolutely 100% against Ebay's rules to buy from yourself whether or not you are "testing out your new software" as was claimed. Just so you know, I even emailed Ebay just to be sure. Even if that was truly the case where you were "testing out new software", then why did you guys also find the need to leave yourselves feedback? Interesting behavior if you ask me.

So in conclusion, "ridiculous prices" + "stealing other people pictures and claiming them as your own"+ "shilling" + "lying about your shilling" + "coming on here trying to make me look like an ass"= not too many good things are going to be said by me.

Lastly, if you are coming on here and trying to somehow bully me to get me to shut up or have me somehow back down from me telling the truth, sorry, it isn't going to happen. I hate to break it to you, you will not be the first "shady dealer" that I have taken on on this forum............

"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -Neitzche

jhaynes01
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Posted: Wed Dec 27, 2006 10:20 pm

Alright, so we've narrowed the problems down that you have with us.

Let me explain to you a few things about the software we use:

It basically copies everything over from our website into ebay. Occassionally we like to quality control this, so we buy our own items. Whenever an item is purchased off of Ebay, using the ebay email that is sent to our account, the item is automatically entered in as an order on our website. So, we just like to make sure the things are working correctly. Incidentally, the same software automatically posts feedback when it is posted for us. In the future, I'll talk with Jon (renvhoek - the owner of trollandtoad) about making a dummy item called test, to test our software, so that there can be no confusion or hard feelings.

I understand there was a problem with the pictures thing. Needless to say, the person who did that is no longer working for the company, and I believe that all the pictures that we currently have up are our own. You're welcome to double check them all if you think I'm wrong. It's a very special concern to me, and I really don't want us getting anymore negative attention because of it.

Regarding Prices, we don't actually ever make anyone buy anything from us. Although, I agree that some of our prices look kinda high, and I will be double checking them shortly. For instance, the Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil mentioned above... the price on that one appears to be just plain silly (even though we've sold 2 of them in the last 3 months... which leads me to believe it's not that bad after all) I do think there is a problem with quite a few of our prices, though, and it is something that I'm going to look into. But There are quite a few items on our website that have great prices.. mainly newer books, but there are a few older. (We have some 1st edition hardcovers in lower condition for $6-$8 quite often).

So that basically covers everything. I think I've been pretty fair and straightforward with my posts, and I hope that I've made some impact here. We certainly would rather have friends than enemies. 8P

BTW Thanks All for Welcoming me here.
-Jason

Hi Jason, unfortunately it has absolutely nothing to do with BINs at all. I could really care less. It has everything to do with the fact that your prices in a lot of circumstances are ridiculously high and in the rest of those circumstances they are down right insulting. Also, when someone from your store comes on here and actually tries to condesend me the way that was attempted, what kind of response did you expect?

Additionally, despite what the previous posters claim was, it is absolutely 100% against Ebay's rules to buy from yourself whether or not you are "testing out your new software" as was claimed. Just so you know, I even emailed Ebay just to be sure. Even if that was truly the case where you were "testing out new software", then why did you guys also find the need to leave yourselves feedback?

So in conclusion, "ridiculous prices" + "stealing other people pictures and claiming them as your own"+ "shilling" + "lying about your shilling" + "coming on here trying to make me look like an ass"= not too many good things are going to be said by me.

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JohnGaunt
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 8:52 am

bclarkie wrote:So in conclusion, "ridiculous prices" + "stealing other people pictures and claiming them as your own"+ "shilling" + "lying about your shilling" + "coming on here trying to make me look like an ass"= not too many good things are going to be said by me.

But if you look beyond all that . . .

deimos3428
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 11:58 am

jhaynes01 wrote:Regarding Prices, we don't actually ever make anyone buy anything from us. Although, I agree that some of our prices look kinda high, and I will be double checking them shortly.

The concern isn't high prices. (If I had a nickel for every RPG seller with high prices, I'd have at least three bucks. Maybe even more!) The concern is predatorially high prices on rare items.

As an example, pricing a Tsojconth at $2000 is so far off the chart it makes you look downright greedy. That's only one example, but it certainly isn't helping your image. You'd serve your own interests by reviewing your entire "Dungeons & Dragons RARE items!" section. The Acaeum is an excellent reference point, incidentally.

jhaynes01
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 12:55 pm

Regarding the rare stuff:

We've Sold the following in 2006 at our prices:

2 Copies of Quest for the Fazzlewood
2 Copies of Lost Caverns of Tsojconth
Various other rare stuff.

We price them according to our cost of replacement, which, should we have to bid on them at auction is usually pretty high. If I'm not mistaken, and I'm sure you guys would know, but a Lost Caverns of Tsojconth went over $2000 on ebay last year, and it wasn't one of ours.

Simply put, If it's selling at these prices, and going high on ebay at auction, then our price is probably not far off the mark. If things are selling at a decent rate period, then our price is probably not far off the mark. If it's not selling for us, then our price is definitely wrong. There's very few D&D items though, from my initial inspection, that are not selling for us at our current prices.

Our primary goal for the D&D Dept. is not to have the cheapest prices on the net, but to have everything in stock that people would like to buy.

I still agree that some of our prices need revising but not necessarily the rarities.

Thank You for the advice, though, I will take a look at that entire section.

I'm kinda new to the boards here, so is this a discuession that should be moved to somewhere else besides the "Shady Dealers" Section? Honestly, I don't think we should even be in this section. 8P Just because we have higher prices than some does not mean we are bad folks.

-Jason

[/b]

bclarkie
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 1:24 pm

jhaynes01 wrote: Regarding the rare stuff:

We've Sold the following in 2006 at our prices:

2 Copies of Quest for the Fazzlewood
2 Copies of Lost Caverns of Tsojconth
Various other rare stuff.

That is kind of a vague reference. Would you care to share what prices that you actually obtained for them and perhaps an auction link or store listing. I expressly remember seeing you guys try and sell both Fazzlewood and Tsojconth on Ebay auctions several times at prices around $1600 BINs, all of which did not sell, perhaps I missed the ones that you are referencing.

jhaynes01 wrote:If I'm not mistaken, and I'm sure you guys would know, but a Lost Caverns of Tsojconth went over $2000 on ebay last year, and it wasn't one of ours.

There was one Tsojconth in early 2006 that went for $1895.00. There was another Tsoj back in August of 2005 that went for $1850.00 This second was due to a newbie bidder who had no clue what the item was worth(and for that matter was never seen from or heard from again) and another bidder who posts here and who openly admitted that he got out of hand with the bidding on that. Every other Tsoj that has sold since then has been for less than $1500(there was only one that went for that price) and couple of others that went for ~$1200. The most recent one didn't even break $1125:

** expired/removed eBay auction **

On top of that there was one in August that didn't even break $1000:

** expired/removed eBay auction **

The fact of the matter is that from the last quarter of 2005 to second quater of 2006 there was a pretty substantial price surge on some of the rare items. This however is and was a clear spike and not an indication continual market upswing. This is evidenced by the now fading prices of the rare items since the middle of the year.

"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -Neitzche

Last edited by bclarkie on Thu Dec 28, 2006 1:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

napoleonsdad
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 1:25 pm

Simply put, If it's selling at these prices, and going high on ebay at auction, then our price is probably not far off the mark. If things are selling at a decent rate period, then our price is probably not far off the mark. If it's not selling for us, then our price is definitely wrong. There's very few D&D items though, from my initial inspection, that are not selling for us at our current prices.

If you can get your price then you should be able to find some easy pickin's in my store. I look at your prices and typically set my prices at 50-60% of yours. :!:

Deadlord
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 2:14 pm

It's really just a question of business ethics. Pricing something in order to make a reasonable profit is quite OK. Pricing it stupidly in order to fuck people over is quite OK as well. Just don't complain if you land in Shady Dealer heaven. Personally, I don't give a rat's ass what you do. I actually enjoy perusing idiotic auction prices occasionally. It reinforces my low opinion of most resellers.
The WORST thing you can do is try to defend irrational pricing and illegal behavior here. Too many smart and attentive people.
Tsoj should never go over $1,300 or so under normal circumstances, and that is for a VERY nice copy.

If you hit a Rowsdower, you get to keep it.

deimos3428
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 2:18 pm

jhaynes01 wrote:I'm kinda new to the boards here, so is this a discuession that should be moved to somewhere else besides the "Shady Dealers" Section? Honestly, I don't think we should even be in this section. 8P Just because we have higher prices than some does not mean we are bad folks.

Since you're new, I'll try to give you some friendly advice. You'll never appease your customer base by arguing with them directly -- the argument will simply escalate out of control and you'll come off looking even worse.

The best way to get "out" of this thread is to stop replying defensively, and to address the concerns of which you've now been made aware. We're a pretty savvy group, and if you take steps to resolve the issues, you might actually gain a few customers in the end.

If you have a specific question/comment regarding pricing, you might start a new thread in the appraisal forum. Similarily, if you have a particularly interesting item for sale, there is a Classifieds forum for that purpose. (There's also a lot of collecting-specific stuff that may or may not interest you.)

jhaynes01
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 2:46 pm

Cool..

bclarkie I can't seem to pull up the information on the auction.. but it was probably the one you mentioned for $1895 that i was remembering. As for our sales data, I'll dig them up and post what i can. We sold all of those early this year, So i'll have to do a bit of searching. I don't believe they were ebay sales, though... i think the customers ordered them directly from our website, and I think we sold one of the Fazzlewoods at Gencon this year.

Given this info though, I'm sure you guys can see why when we originally priced those tsojconth's at $1999.95 that we thought it was a good price given the ebay research that must have been done back then.

All this noted, I am looking at our prices right now, and have noticed some things that will be lowered in price within the week. :lol:

jhaynes01
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Posted: Thu Dec 28, 2006 2:48 pm

deimos3428 wrote:Since you're new, I'll try to give you some friendly advice. You'll never appease your customer base by arguing with them directly -- the argument will simply escalate out of control and you'll come off looking even worse.

The best way to get "out" of this thread is to stop replying defensively, and to address the concerns of which you've now been made aware. We're a pretty savvy group, and if you take steps to resolve the issues, you might actually gain a few customers in the end.

If you have a specific question/comment regarding pricing, you might start a new thread in the appraisal forum. Similarily, if you have a particularly interesting item for sale, there is a Classifieds forum for that purpose. (There's also a lot of collecting-specific stuff that may or may not interest you.)

Awesome, thx for the advice. And thanks for helping to keep this conversation constructive.

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