I love the Rostock Max so much, I now sell them :)

[McSlappy]

Hi guys,

Not sure if this is best location to put this (mods let me know if there's a more appropriate location, and apologies if this isn't kosher).

Being in Australia is fun for lots of things, but a hassle if you want to buy cool stuff from the USA. Our purchase of the Rostock was a 3 week long journey with paperwork, dealing with customs and dumb shipping.
Once we bought one and put it together, we loved the design so much that I decided I'd like to sell them here in Oz. I've spent the past few months (which explains my sporadic attendance rate here) putting together stock and our site and we went live a week ago.

http://www.doodaddoes.com

Our (my wife and I) hope is that we can remove the hassle of buying the Rostock from the USA as well as supply parts and support here in Australia. Our goal for product stocking is only choosing products that we ourselves use and know are really awesome. Which is why we have the Rostock Max (of course) and the Australian made filament that we stock. We hope to grow and have a LOT more parts for other reprap machines - it's a process so it'll take some time.

Please check out the size and give feedback. Honest harsh feedback is good, I wont be offended I promise

Also give me a list of things you'd like to see in our store (some lovely hot-ends will be there soon )

Cheers,
Isaac

[McSlappy]

Oh, and the site is called doodad does, as in "lets see what this doodad does!"

[Captain Starfish]

A few comments, then, seeing as you asked.

1. I love the site. Clean, bright, colourful and easy to navigate. Very nicely done.

2. Filament - you don't mention the size of the spools anywhere that can be easily seen.

3. Spares - be good to see the thicker tube due that sits inside the hot-end available as a spare. Otherwise a nice range of goodies, particularly the connectors.

4. Pricing - I am a horrible horrible skinflint. I didn't have any dramas getting my RMax shipped direct and, for me, the idea of spending 50% more for a printer sourced locally than from the manufacturer direct AND having to probably wait longer for Australia's shitty couriers to get it here than I did from the states, that idea is moderately grim. Same with the filament - assuming your spools are 1kg I personally will be trying a lot of other suppliers around the $30-$40 mark and they'd all have to be rubbish for me to start throwing over fifty bucks at each spool.

But (hopefully) that's just me. Hopefully you will find a market of people who are happy to drop a little extra cash to keep it local and easy. Hopefully as an importer you've gone through all the ACMA and Office of Safety compliance pain and there are nice little C ticks being added to the kits somewhere as is required by law in Australia, or better yet that as a kit you've been able to get around that. Hopefully this will run smooth and be a nice little side earner for you!

[McSlappy]

Good comments, thanks for taking the time mate! I appreciate the honesty. Really.

Yes I've not even mentioned that they're 1kg spools! Silly me, I'll fix that.

Do you mean the thicker PFTE tubing that fits within the stock hot end?

Pricing. This has been a tough one for us, and it's still a work in progress.

When we bought our Max, the total cost to get it here was a shade of $1500, it took 3 weeks, plus a few phonecalls and a faxing paperwork back and forth to the customs office. It was a pain. For a lot of printer owners this isn't a big deal, but for myself I would have gladly paid a little extra to just get my machine the same week I ordered it, with an Aussie plug and be done with the BS.
When we bought our first 3d printer here in Oz, I paid a little extra to get it locally because I believed that I'd benefit from a local contact and support. Turns out they just drop shipped direct from Romania to us, and the seller had never even seen one in person. It was a disaster and a pretty big disappointment because he really couldn't support the machine. As a result of that debacle I would like our customers to be able to buy a machine (or filament), know that I use the machine (and filament) daily and can call me up or email me knowing that I'll do my best to help them in any way possible... Hmmm I say this, but I don't believe I have ever conveyed this on the site, perhaps I should do that!

Filament, yes this is expensive filament, but having used it a lot, I really really like it. Whether it's worth the premium cost for most users I can't say. I am in the process of testing some other cheaper filaments, and I'll get them up once I find some I'm happy with. This does go back to my own desire to sell things that I really love, and finding decent cheap filament isn't that easy . It was really tempting to launch with $30 rolls, but then I'd feel like I was selling something I didn't fully believe in. I'd really like to add Taulman and other cooler filaments asap... Oh man there's so much I want to add asap...

Starfish, I really appreciate you taking the time, I'll let you know when I add more thingies and you can give me some more feedback.

Isaac

[Captain Starfish]

Wow. I got it lucky. My unit came in within a week or so of purchase, customs had the day off or something because I didn't even get stung for GST. It was perfect.

Hmmm I say this, but I don't believe I have ever conveyed this on the site, perhaps I should do that!

If your experiences are commonplace then your price for the unit starts looking a heck of a lot more reasonable - as you say - for people who don't want the hassle. What the site doesn't make obvious at the moment is why anyone should look at $999 from SeeMe and then spend $1649 from Doodad for exactly the same thing. You've now answered that question here, but it needs to be on the Rostock page on your site. Given that most of us will read the first couple of lines then get distracted by the pikchers, it needs to be fairly obvious somewhere.

Again, I'd probably take the punt but that's captain mothwallet speaking here


"Why Doodad" page. You could drop this in there with a bit of language massage and it would do you very well:

When we bought our Max, the total cost to get it here was a shade of $1500, it took 3 weeks, plus a few phonecalls and a faxing paperwork back and forth to the customs office. It was a pain. For a lot of printer owners this isn't a big deal, but for myself I would have gladly paid a little extra to just get my machine the same week I ordered it, with an Aussie plug and be done with the BS.
When we bought our first 3d printer here in Oz, I paid a little extra to get it locally because I believed that I'd benefit from a local contact and support. Turns out they just drop shipped direct from Romania to us, and the seller had never even seen one in person. It was a disaster and a pretty big disappointment because he really couldn't support the machine. As a result of that debacle I would like our customers to be able to buy a machine (or filament), know that I use the machine (and filament) daily and can call me up or email me knowing that I'll do my best to help them in any way possible...

Definitely worth making a bit of a song and dance about people being able to buy (and be supported by) people who use the printer they're selling every day, too.

You're in the unfortunate but not uncommon position of your main supplier being your main competitor and if you're going to shift gear you need to make it blindingly obvious why local punters should choose you. It's an honest value-add so promote it like that and have happy customers and a bit of income.

I do mean the thicker PTFE tube, yes. I switched mine over today after discovering a bit of a meltdown and was lucky to have the spare ez-struder which I still haven't installed to pillage for bits. Otherwise I might have been in trouble!

On the filament, I'm still going through the original batch of gear I bought with my Max from SeeMe. So I've yet to experience how bad truly rubbish filament can be to work with. But the price difference per spool has a new E3D paid off in 5 spools so I can start running trimmer nylon or the big cheap blue boy from Amazon etc. So, again - can see why you've elected to go for the expensive stuff but you need to make that clear. Have a "why we chose our filament" page maybe showing some comparison prints of cheap crap vs your stuff to make it EASY for me to look at your site and say "No way am I wasting my time with cheap crap, I'm getting the good stuff".

[McSlappy]

Wow, excellent advice, I really appreciate the time and care you've taken. Thanks!

Ok, now I've got some work to do!!

[apostoly]

Happy to say i was officially the first customer to make a purchase.

I was in need of a few spares and just thinking about the long wait for parts to be shipped from the states just made me cringe.I then remembered that this site had recently launched and honestly couldn't be happier with the service thus far.

To have the option of sourcing actual SeeMe parts in Australia and delivered to you in the a couple of days (heres hoping Aus post pull through) is worth every penny in my opinion.

I ended up buying a roll of the lymina ABS also. Yes its 50 odd dollars, but i have heard good things about it and would personally like to have something to compare to the cheaper filament i recently purchased from another site which i have been relatively happy with.

Over all really glad we have a local supplier and could not praise Issac enough. Top genuine bloke who actually wants to help.

Paul.

[forrie]

I think I'm customer 3

Got me some spares for when I break something...lol...and nice 3.5mm nozzle.

[wozzie]

I'll probably be up for some stuff soon Max has been ordered but not on it's way yet hopefully it won't be too long,definitely will be nice to have spares available locally.

[McSlappy]

Thanks Woz

Please let me know if there are things you'd like / problems with the site / things you don't like etc. I appreciated Capt Starfish and his comments, I'm happy for you to be brutally honest. Really.

Isaac

[forrie]

Awesome McSlappy!!!

Parts arrived quick and intact. Especially the Rambo nano fuses as I accidentally blewed one up installing a fan today......

The PLA sample and the Minties was a nice touch Om nom nom nom

[JohnStack]

Change your tagline to include the link!

Personally, I'm happy that others are selling the machine. You've got a mostly green field in AU - so good on you!

I'm also happy that you're making a contribution to the forum - as well as selling something (instead of, errr.....others.)

The site's great. WooCommerce is a good product.