Silk Road forums

Market => Rumor mill => Topic started by: Pharmville on March 12, 2012, 02:17 pm

Title: ***PHARMVILLE: GOING ON VACATION, DETAILS ENCLOSED***
Post by: Pharmville on March 12, 2012, 02:17 pm
Hi Everyone,

Ben and I have talked and we have decided that enough of real life has intruded into both of our lives that we cannot possibly continue to do the work that needs to be done daily and give the excellent service that our buyers both expect and deserve unless we take a break and rework our systems and operational procedures to handle what is obviously going to continue to be a much larger customer base than we had ever anticipated.

For all of the people who have an order that is in the system: we will ship all those today and then for anyone who has a problem that is unresolved or an open pm, I am going to take one day off to handle some real life situations and then be right back working to finish all those pm's and get every one of those problems and situations resolved.

It would defeat the purpose if I was to explain all the things that need to be done because a whole lot of it is concerning security and I'd be splashing it out in public for all of LE to read and reread.  So if you want, just think of this as our annual vacation.  But actually we're going to be working to get every aspect of our business model in the status and condition that it needs to be to continue to be one of the better vendors on SR.  The model we're using was designed for a customer base of 30,000 people, of which maybe 25% or 7,500 were actual buyers and about 2,000 of those were frequent buyers.  That's the business we set ourselves up to handle and we both believe we did a very good job of it even up to the point of where it was 5 times that many.  But this model isn't suited for the size that SR is now and it's even worse for the size that SR is going to become in the very near future.  And we'd just be kidding ourselves to think that we can just keep pushing it further and further and still do a good job, not make mistakes, have good security, and keep all the products in stock and keep bringing you new ones. 

We've got to start over, from the ground up, and we've got to get some help.  Plus any professional vendor knows that you've got to change up everything from time to time to stay one step ahead of LE.  And we've gone longer than we should have without doing enough of that.  So now we're going to do it entirely, safely and securely.

The one regret we have is that we didn't have the chance to give our customers notice, but sometimes you're just trying so hard to make things work right that you don't notice until it's way past time that you've got to change things and change them a lot.  I was working my way through the pm's on Sunday and suddenly the PGP stopped working and I spent around 6 hours getting it back to working condition and that's what made me call Ben and say "we've got to start over, we can't just be patching this together every time it's not working, or we'll NEVER get on top of this like we used to be". 

So we're going to get all the things we need whether it's people or equipment or whatever so that we can properly service every buyer who wants to purchase from us and we can give them service that is equal to the reputation that we've built so far.  No more 5 days waiting for an answer to a pm.  That's not Pharmville quality service.  And if we stayed open, selling at the rate we've been selling,  we wouldn't have had anything to sell in a few more days and being out of stock on half our items isn't the Pharmville way either. 

This all might take 2 weeks or it might take a month.  There are some factors that we can't control as to timing, so we don't know how long they'll take.    But you can be assured that when we return we will have an excellent range of items, that the prices will be reasonable, and that the packaging and service will be top notch. 

It occurs to me that with the stealth mode and stealth items that this might be just what was needed to bring about a much more orderly and well disciplined market at SR.  Older vendors could stay in stealth mode and that way moderate the total number of buyers that they service so that they have maximum control over how many orders they receive every day and need to ship.  And it gives newer vendors a chance to work with the absolute flood of new buyers coming on line every week and develop their own regular customer base.  As a salesman it hurts to ever have to turn down someones order but this is the reason that football teams build bigger stadiums and retailers build bigger stores: so they can handle more customers and not have a degradation in their service.  Well, this business isn't any different and, for us at least, it's time for us to stop and assess exactly what it is that we want to be in the world of SR and then how we can best achieve that.

I will tell you that a BIG part of our future status is that we will continue to be a 24/7/365 availability vendor to all our loyal customers who have supported us up to now and that if we can we'll be that to a lot of new buyers as well, but we're not going to be chasing after the #1 spot or have one bit of concern where we stand in the vendor rankings.  Our goals are all based around giving the best service, at the best prices, every day, to the people who depend on us for the products.  That is by far and away the main goal.  If we are able to find ways to do that AND be the largest vendor, well, then that's just a bonus.  But if you've been buying from us for any period of time at all then you're our focus and you're the people we are most wanting to take care of and you'll be the ones that are going to *definitely* be on our buyer list when we reopen.  Even if you've only had one order, you're eligible.  Whether or not the new model will allow for all new buyers to order from us depends on a *lot* of factors and if the model won't allow for it then we're going to "close the gates" so to speak and only open them on a very intermittent basis when it's clear that we've increased capacity and can handle more volume than we're doing. 

We hope everyone is able to manage well buying from our competitors during our absence and we'll be back with you as quickly as we can but only when we're absolutely sure that everything is in place to do the kind of job you've seen us do from the beginning.  As far as Ben and I are concerned, it's either do it absolutely correctly and at a fair price or don't do it at all.  And that's what you'll get from us when we come back.

Everyone take care and I want to say as a personal note that I hope over the coming weeks that the buyers and vendors start talking to each other on the forums about ways to better work together and ensure that SR stays in place and prospers and not have so many threads and subjects devoted to adversarial situations.  If you're one of the people who was here when the "old forum' was in place, you know exactly what I'm talking about: the main topics were not scamming, slamming vendors, complaints, and tons of redundant threads because people weren't willing to even try to find out if their questions had already been asked and answered a dozen times before on the forum.  The threads back then were informative, enlightening, instructional and sometimes incredibly entertaining.   And the 4,000 or so people that were members then had a VERY strong sense of community about this place and they supported and encouraged each other at every opportunity.  That's the way a really great forum works and it's the way that the SR forums *should* work and the way that they would be of the most value to the people who are reading them.  So, if we can, let's work together instead of against one another, and find a way to, thread by single thread, bring back that outstanding sense of community that existed when this place was just a small dot in the .onion ocean. 

A person would have to be a fool to deny the benefits of getting a small package in the mail containing exactly the products you desire vs calling around to a bunch of dealers to see who's holding and then running around town trying to score and sometimes even eventually ending up in places you'd thought you'd never find yourself, wondering how you got there, and being very concerned about whether you're going to be leaving in the same condition you arrived.  Doing business on SR avoids ALL of that.  So it is worth something in the way of pricing for all that convenience and safety.   But I'd still like to see the fees lowered and I know that this is a very contentious issue and that DPR has made it clear to me, at least, that it's not going to happen.  Well folks, this place works like any other place that you shop.  IF you think that something should be changed, you write to the management.  DPR may have a new name, but he's still user #1 and if you want to talk to him directly about it, then please do because that's the only way you'll get a situation changed that you don't feel is correct.  Telling the vendors, as so many buyers have told me, that we've raised our prices and how could we go and do that without telling them, isn't the answer.  We DIDN'T raise our prices folks, that's all either bitcoin devaluation or SR fee increases.  I am a firm believer that DPR can make a huge amount of money based on the volume of this site and charge much less in fees than he does at this time.  I wouldn't even be saying this publicly if I thought I had *any* chance of convincing him of this through private conversation.  But I know that's not going to happen and now it's up to you, the buyers and the vendors, to voice yourself and voice yourself loudly if you think the fees are too high.

I will give you the same example I gave DPR: I think that buyers who are buying over $1000 of product should have a fee of 3%.  He pointed out to me that the current fee was 3.8% and that did I believe the less than one percent difference really mattered.  But it was not the answer to the question I was asking.  I was talking about a person buying $1000 of say $3.00 items, a quite common occurrence, and he was talking about a person buying one $1000 item.  Something that I don't think happens very often.  The person buying $1000 of $3.00 items is currently paying, I THINK, closer to 8% in fees, but I haven't been able to find a commission schedule to check this out and confirm it, one of the many things I plan to do while we reorganize.

As an innovator and for his amazing responsiveness to the needs of the community I have nothing but respect and admiration for DPR.  We vendors know that the improvements have come fast and furious ever since Day One and that sometimes they even were instituted within 24 hours of being first mentioned.  THAT'S great vendor support and that's worth paying for.  But I don't think that using Ebay as your comparative is proper because Ebay rapes it's customers on fees and when you add in the cost of using PayPal on top of it it's plain highway robbery.   Amazon, on the other hand, charges no fees, has the lowest prices in the universe, and gives free shipping on all orders over $25.  I think that if you're really here to serve the buyer community then you've got to look at the Amazon model and ask "how close can I get to that and still make a reasonable profit for myself".  Ok, that's MY opinion and that's what I'm going to leave you all with.

We'll see you soon and when we do, we'll have some new things that people will be really happy to see,
take care,
Alex & Ben
Title: Re: ***PHARMVILLE: GOING ON VACATION, DETAILS ENCLOSED***
Post by: Richards1991 on March 12, 2012, 03:45 pm
Pharmville is truly the best in the business, and this thread is only a tiny part of the reason why. Take the time you guys need. Looking forward to Pharmville 5.0 :D
Title: Re: ***PHARMVILLE: GOING ON VACATION, DETAILS ENCLOSED***
Post by: msween27 on March 13, 2012, 09:56 am
It was nice while it lasted.  Good luck guys.  Eagerly awaiting your return...
Title: Re: ***PHARMVILLE: GOING ON VACATION, DETAILS ENCLOSED***
Post by: oldgregg2808 on March 13, 2012, 10:44 am
thanks for being awesome vendors! come back soon!
Title: Re: ***PHARMVILLE: GOING ON VACATION, DETAILS ENCLOSED***
Post by: USdirectforyou on March 13, 2012, 11:12 am
Best of luck to you guys! I'm sure you guys deserve some much needed rest and relaxation so hopefully you get some. I will be awaiting your return with coins in wallet :-)