Last thing... your major mea culpa announcement to the world features more of what lead to a major mea culpa in the first place. The irony was entertaining!

__________________
-Wolfram v. Kiparski
NAR 28643 - TRA 15520
MTMA Section #606 President

I was only noting the new MSRP isn’t that much more than the original MSRP given the ten year interval. I didn’t say it made sense.

Personally, the MSRP of the Alpha and Alpha III are the ones that irk me the most. The Alpha’s current parts list hasn’t changed (so no new design) since they went back to white motor tubes close to two decades ago. The Alpha III has been unchanged for much longer than that. You’d think molds and such would be amortized long ago…..

And, you can get an Alpha III launch set at Hobby Lobby for less than the MSRP of the kit alone.

__________________
Bernard Cawley
NAR 89040 L1 - Life Member
SAM 0061
AMA 42160
KG7AIE

I'll add the Big Bertha to that list. Irksome...

__________________
-Wolfram v. Kiparski
NAR 28643 - TRA 15520
MTMA Section #606 President

Yike! I just looked at that. Agreed.

Especially when the Star Orbiter, which contains twice as much BT-60, is $13 less expensive.

Some of those prices make no sense.

__________________
Bernard Cawley
NAR 89040 L1 - Life Member
SAM 0061
AMA 42160
KG7AIE

….and the MSRP of the Bullpup (IMO.)

__________________
Never trust an atom. They make up everything.

4 out of 3 people struggle with math.

Chemically, alcohol IS a solution.

NAR# 94042
SAM# 0078

After Damon purchased Estes there began a policy, which continues to the present day, of raising the SRP price of the entire product line 5%-7% annually. Some years it has been more than that (recently for example). The longer a product is in the catalog, the more price increases it will experience.

Lee Piester once told me that the biggest mistake he made at Centuri was not raising prices often enough.

Twenty years from now, when many of us are gone, folks will be discussing the price of $40 Alphas, $45 Alpha IIIs and $50 Big Berthas. Some may recall the 'good ol days' when a re-issued Ventris went for $90 instead of $200.

__________________
Bob
S.A.M. # 0014

OK, I get that to some extent, and that fact that the Big Bertha and the two Alphas have been around for over half a century now means that they have “benefitted” more than most others from this policy.

But where’s the balance? Where’s the relationship between cost and price? Surely the single 18 inch BT-60 in a Big Bertha doesn’t cost 3 times as much as each of the 18 inch BT-60s in a Star Orbiter or Vapor. Yet that’s how they are priced.

Eventually the designer’s work, the documentation and especially the tooling should amortize out.

But at some point this blind incremental increase just gets silly. For example, I did a chronology of the Alpha III and relatives by looking at Estes calatogs from 1971 onwards. One of the sillier things that came from that is seeing that the 2452 RTF Athena — which is, from a parts point of view, a pre-built Alpha III with a longer body tube and bigger nose cone — was always priced at least 30% LESS than an Alpha III KIT every year that they’ve appeared in the same catalog. And each time the price went up on one, it went up on the other. So those people in the Chinese factory where they were assembling 2452 Athenas were paying Estes to put them together? And the box the Athenas were packaged in was significantly less expensive than the bag/header card package of an Alpha III kit? I don’t think so.

I get the general need to stay ahead of the costs of production. That’s why I don’t really complain about motor prices or even the general trend of MSRPs going up over time. But there are some crazy outliers where it seems obvious the “miracle of compound interest” has simply outstripped any rational relationship between cost and price. And these three 50+ year old kits are prime examples of that.

__________________
Bernard Cawley
NAR 89040 L1 - Life Member
SAM 0061
AMA 42160
KG7AIE

Spot on... Considering that I can order a Baby Bertha and a pack of BT-60 tubes directly from Estes and have the total come out less than the price of a Big Bertha, it does seem irrational. But I suspect that our perspective as avid hobbyists is flawed, and if you and I were running Estes we would go out of business within a few years. The demand for Big Bertha and Alpha model rocket kits must be inelastic, and if so, the irrationality falls on our shoulders (the consumer) rather than on Estes. Why not charge more if raising the price doesn't affect how many are sold? THAT's rational!

So, yes, to echo your earlier comment about not being surprised about an $80 Ventris kit, I suppose that I shouldn't be surprised either.

__________________
-Wolfram v. Kiparski
NAR 28643 - TRA 15520
MTMA Section #606 President

Not to derail your argument....but the Baby Bertha fins aren't the same as those used on Big Bertha. They are close, though, so that might just work.

EDIT: Nonsense stuff deleted (but still quoted by Tigerhawk below)

__________________
Bernard Cawley
NAR 89040 L1 - Life Member
SAM 0061
AMA 42160
KG7AIE

Uh Oh…..did I misremember what the BB’s MSRP was when I looked at the Boosted Bertha last night??

[Opens 2023 catalog that is readily to hand] Yup, I did. Looks like I need to go back and redact that entire post.

(I’d have struck through the text and left it, but it doesn’t look like strikethru is supported here.)

*sigh*

__________________
Bernard Cawley
NAR 89040 L1 - Life Member
SAM 0061
AMA 42160
KG7AIE