Where are production cues made ?
- Thread starter mjantti
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Good points Newton.
All I can say about your experience with the Fury is that it should have been taken care of by the distributer.
I could open up my books and show you our returns over the years and you would see that none of them were anywhere close to what you have described with yoru Fury.
I an sure that Norway is bitterly cold so I can't comment on how the climate may have affected the cues. I can tell you that I have been all over the Untied States in extremes of heat and cold with a carload of Fury cues and have displayed them at tournaments with no problems whatsoever.
One of my dealers does 40 weekends a year and stores all of his cues in a trailer. He is near the Canadian border and spends a lot of time traveling through freezing weather.
He is also very meticulous about the cues he sells. He has not reported any problems with the Fury cues his has sold nor the ones in stock. In fact he complimented me on the quality and how the cues have held up under the enviromental stress he puts them through. You can bet that I would have already had an earful had he had even a fraction of the problems you describe.
So I don't know what to tell you other than you got a Fury cue that has been terribly abused somehow. As I told you before we sell thousands of them every year and if they were bad then this board would be flooded with stories of poor quality Fury cues.
As for the economics of the people in the middle - welcome to the how the world works. If you are not going to be the one to source something as you did for your $455 kit - then be prepared to pay the fee of the people who did. And if they have marketing and infrastructure as well then the price goes up.
So I don't really see where you can begrudge the people who make it their business to supply the things you want for making money on it. If you don't like their prices then shop around - that is your duty as a consumer.
As for being personal, not really. I just thought it quite interesting that you would use the namesake of a person who dealt in science and facts while at the time making a highly speculative and accusatory post.
I have to ask however why you chose to use me and the fact that I make cases in China in your example if you weren't trying to be personal?
Xin Nian Kuai Le. Happy New Year.
All I can say about your experience with the Fury is that it should have been taken care of by the distributer.
I could open up my books and show you our returns over the years and you would see that none of them were anywhere close to what you have described with yoru Fury.
I an sure that Norway is bitterly cold so I can't comment on how the climate may have affected the cues. I can tell you that I have been all over the Untied States in extremes of heat and cold with a carload of Fury cues and have displayed them at tournaments with no problems whatsoever.
One of my dealers does 40 weekends a year and stores all of his cues in a trailer. He is near the Canadian border and spends a lot of time traveling through freezing weather.
He is also very meticulous about the cues he sells. He has not reported any problems with the Fury cues his has sold nor the ones in stock. In fact he complimented me on the quality and how the cues have held up under the enviromental stress he puts them through. You can bet that I would have already had an earful had he had even a fraction of the problems you describe.
So I don't know what to tell you other than you got a Fury cue that has been terribly abused somehow. As I told you before we sell thousands of them every year and if they were bad then this board would be flooded with stories of poor quality Fury cues.
As for the economics of the people in the middle - welcome to the how the world works. If you are not going to be the one to source something as you did for your $455 kit - then be prepared to pay the fee of the people who did. And if they have marketing and infrastructure as well then the price goes up.
So I don't really see where you can begrudge the people who make it their business to supply the things you want for making money on it. If you don't like their prices then shop around - that is your duty as a consumer.
As for being personal, not really. I just thought it quite interesting that you would use the namesake of a person who dealt in science and facts while at the time making a highly speculative and accusatory post.
I have to ask however why you chose to use me and the fact that I make cases in China in your example if you weren't trying to be personal?
Xin Nian Kuai Le. Happy New Year.
hondo said:
Dan Janes is a class act. When I was a kid I dreamed of owning a Joss. Dan Janes was one of the first industry people that I met and he was wonderful to me.
We traded a custom case for a custom cue. I sent him a case with no thought of what I might get for a cue. I would have been happy with the plainest model he had.
What I received about a year later was nothing short of stunning. It was a custom cue all the way with inlays and decorations not seen on any Joss cue before or since to my knowledge.
Joss Cues are truly an often overlooked icon among American cues. They all hit great and are well made.
I love my Joss.
JB Cases said:
It should be mentioned in this context that the cue is by far new, it's most likely one of you're early days cue. The only plan I have for it is to use it as a practice cue to practice new Linen grips, tearing it off, and then try leather wrap tearing it off. Except from this I may try put on some different types of finnish and possible let it rest.
I take it that it's just the cue I have and I guess the quality is so high theses day's that we would see pro players use them. I have a impression that over here it's a entry cue which people use for a while and change to something else.
JB Cases said:
I'll do shop around and I do ever so often compare prices. So when a "US - made" cue is sold for the same price as a Chinese cue, I guess they have the same income....? Or is there someone which earns more than the other? And if I understand you correct, US cue makers could actually just shut down their shops, because the quality from you're country is now the same or even better?
JB Cases said:
I think you should forget great Newton in this story and keep you're head out of the speculations and deal with the facts. What kind of interesting thoughts do you get reading posts from "ShortMan", "Iamrich" or "Skunkboy" ? Leave it.
JB Cases said:
Well, if you read my post I was saying " If I was producing cue cases ---..." The fact that you feel that this is something which fit's you position like a glove, do not mean that I'm attacking YOU. Read that again.. I would do the same if I was producing a product BUT I would find it hard to price the product in the same way as a product produced in a high cost country, simply because my customers would understand that the cost of production is not the reason for the price, specially if I'm honest and labeling it with "Made in China"........... That's the whole point in this story. Could it be the reason for the "Made in China" stickers not proudly placed on the cue?
JB Cases said:
It did pass my ears that you had some "bitter could" experiences back in you're country as well, where there was a lot of snow
Have a nice celebration and hopefully the snow would leave you're area to let the celebration go on.
I'll herby pull from further arguments in this thread and let you others continue. If someone would like to se that Fury, PM and I'll drop some pictures.
Heading for some constructive scientific thinking and I guess I have to watch out for that Apple which should drop in my head
Have a nice "Rats" year (It's the year of the Rat now ?).
N
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Newton said:
Well still something has happened to the cue that is well beyond the normal treatment for all that to go wrong. That said it still should have been taken care of by the distributer. As has been mentioned there are professionals who do use Fury cues and pros who have used them in the past and done very well with them. I am NOT saying that Fury is the greatest cue ever. The lower priced ones are entry level cues. I was just defending the quality as I have a lot of experience with them and my experience over thousands of cues proves that yours is the exception rather than the rule.
I think you mean is their profit the same? If two cues are sold at the same price then revenue is the same. I wouldn't know if the profit is the same. I don't know McDermott's per cue cost. I am happy for them if they are making what they want to earn on each cue. It's not my job to decide what they are allowed to earn. Why should you care what any company earns on the products they sell? I think you should only care insofar as it affects how much money you are willing to spend.
You don't understand me correctly on the quality points. I merely said that the quality of Chinese imports is getting to the level where it's on par with American quality. In some instances the quality level is superior to the American made brand. In large part thanks to the Americans who provided the knowledge and guidance. The American cuemakers offer top notch cues at good price points coupled with in country service. Not one of them has gone under due to import cues and by all appearances they are stronger than ever.
Should I? Well I agree with you that we should deal with facts instead of speculation.
Well you accidentally picked exactly my occupation to use as your example. How utterly coincidental.
The whole point of this story is that you wish to dictate how much profit one is allowed to make. Your view is altruistic but I am quite sure that it would change IF you actually were in business and had to support many families across the globe. (And yes I am assuming that you are not in business for yourself and do not produce anything.) You would find that pricing is a mixture of production costs, market situations, distribution channels, and marketing costs among other things. In very rare cases is it as simple as buying low and selling high. In most cases there are plenty of people in the chain from idea to retail sale with their hand out wanting to get paid for their part in getting that product to the consumer.
Made in China stickers are put on every cue that leaves our factory. Perhaps the people who take the stickers off before they sell the cues just want the cues to be judged on the merits of their quality rather than where the cue was made. I get your point though. So would I be justified in making shitty cues in the USA and charging high prices for them simply because they are "made in the USA"? Does "made in the USA" guarantee that something is going to be a quality product?
It did pass my ears that you had some "bitter could" experiences back in you're country as well, where there was a lot of snow
Have a nice celebration and hopefully the snow would leave you're area to let the celebration go on.
Thank you. Luckily the ice and snow and bitter cold has not reached where I live. But it is affecting millions here in a bad way.
I'll herby pull from further arguments in this thread and let you others continue. If someone would like to se that Fury, PM and I'll drop some pictures.
Heading for some constructive scientific thinking and I guess I have to watch out for that Apple which should drop in my head
Have a nice "Rats" year (It's the year of the Rat now ?).
N
I would like those pictures. I will blow them up and put them in every corner of the factory to remind my people WHY we should be concious of quality all the time.
JB Cases said:
Since this seems to be a case between you and me, do you want me to post the pictures here or should I email them? I can shoot some high res tomorrow and send on email if this is preferred or post some lower res here. You can PM the answer if you prefer.
N
I disagree with subsidizing farm prices.
IMO they went about it ass backwards. They didn't protect the American companies and workers by introducing import tariffs and in the fear of lowering export prices on high volume exports, they created the subsidizing programs for farms. I disagree with both things. I'm not a hypocrite I don't believe that they should do both in order to make America richer and the world poorer, I'm not about that. I am about not destroying Americas future by making us so dependent on foreign nations for oil, tech components etc. that we are at the mercy of foreign nations that then force us to prevent or start wars etc to preserve various perceptions of the American way of life. The American way of life I was referring to was what we had before the corporations became globalized. We may be richer as a nation because of it, but not as individuals as the disparity of wealth has transfered from middle class americans and small business owners to mutlinational corporations.
JB Cases said:
IMO they went about it ass backwards. They didn't protect the American companies and workers by introducing import tariffs and in the fear of lowering export prices on high volume exports, they created the subsidizing programs for farms. I disagree with both things. I'm not a hypocrite I don't believe that they should do both in order to make America richer and the world poorer, I'm not about that. I am about not destroying Americas future by making us so dependent on foreign nations for oil, tech components etc. that we are at the mercy of foreign nations that then force us to prevent or start wars etc to preserve various perceptions of the American way of life. The American way of life I was referring to was what we had before the corporations became globalized. We may be richer as a nation because of it, but not as individuals as the disparity of wealth has transfered from middle class americans and small business owners to mutlinational corporations.
Newton said:
I don't mind getting them in private. I don't mind having them posted here. If you ended up with a crappy cue then it's a fact. How it got to that stage however is something that neither of us can know.
I have been around the cue game a long time. I have seen crappy cues made by Americans, Germans, Taiwanese, Chinese, and Filipinos, among others. I have also owned many great ones that held up under all kinds of seemingly adverse conditions, from hot and humid to freezing and dry.
I once took a long road trip from South Florida to Ontario and had more than $50,000 worth of cues with me. During that three weeks the cues went from 80 degrees to below freezing and back again. None of them were harmed and they were a mixture of about $40,000 in high end cues and $10,000 in low end to mid range cues. I think that there are plenty of people left in the USA who remember all the road trips we took in the mid 90's selling cases and cues. Mostly selling cases and trading for cues.
It takes some doing in my mind to get a cue to such a destructed state as you describe.
The only point is that the cue you have is an isolated example and is not enough to generalize a whole category of cues. Still though, my goal is to never ever sell a cue that ends up in that state. I can only think that the reason it wasn't taken care of is that it wasn't valued. These days I guess most people don't really value a hundred dollars worth of cue. Who knows?
I will be happy to send you a replacement if you will agree to use it as you would any other cue and tell us in three months what the quality level is like.
my email is john@sterling-gaming.com if you would like to send the pictures to me privately please include your address.
Thank you,
john
Send me one of those sweet Tai-Can cues,i will treat it like gold and play with it non stop and write it up too,haha,but on a serious note i think the cues i have seen from them online are awesome.JB Cases said:
Jaden said:
The American way of life is that America provides free opportunity for all of it's citizens. And this is more true than not. Of course due to racism that still exists overtly and covertly, stereotypes that persist, and bigotry it is definitely harder for some Americans than others to achieve the American dream. Still though, every American has the right to choose their path in life and opportunity is there for any American willing to look for it and grab it.
As for America becoming dependent on foreign oil. We already are. If you own a car then you are contributing to America's dependence on fossil fuels. If everything you own is made of plastic then you are contributing to America's dependence on foreign oil. Every time you don't conserve and recycle you are contributing to America's dependence on foreign oil.
Wealth has transfered to multinational corporations???? Who do you think works for these corporations? Where do you think the money goes. The money goes to the people who work in these corporations.
If you truly believe that corporations rule the world then it seems to me that the more multinationals the better. Why? Well if GM has plants in every country in the world then I would think that it would want to prevent war.
Globalization is such an overused word. The economic cycles that the world goes through are dictated by market forces beyond the control of any single government or company. What companies and industries do try to do is to have government enact laws to protect their interests, and depending on how much of the government owes them at that time determines whether they are successful or not.
If you look at the market dynamics of any area you will most often find a large employer surrounded by a multitude of small businesses who serve the labor force of the large employer. More large employers equals more small businesses and more medium sized businesses who sell to the large employers. That's how it works. Without the large employer the area cannot support very many people unless each has a distinct skill that they can trade for the other necessities of life.
There is so much that can written on these subjects that it already fills hundreds of books and essays.
However the main point is that we as a race are still evolving. It wasn't so long ago that we believed the world was flat. Think about the things you believe to be true about market dynamics and then consider what future historians will say about those beliefs when they have the perspective of being able to look back on this time from 200 years in the future.
What I think is that in our lifetime, I am 40, in our lifetime my generation will have to contend with the reality of global environmental crises and that this will alter everyone's "way of life" dramatically. It's not about whether America is dependent or self sufficient, it's about whether we kill the planet and ourselves in the process chasing trinkets and driving to the store for a candy bar. We don't think about that when we are making $20 an hour and looking at that $42 a month payment on the 500" plasma tv at Best Buy. Might as well pick up a surround sound while you are there, it's only $23 a month more.
Me. Just as guilty.
Fast Lenny said:Send me one of those sweet Tai-Can cues,i will treat it like gold and play with it non stop and write it up too,haha,but on a serious note i think the cues i have seen from them online are awesome.
Taican builds some nice cues. Kao Kao is their main competitor and I work for Sterling Gaming and consult to Kao Kao.
Most of Kao Kao's production goes to North America and Europe. I can't tell you all the brands that Kao Kao makes because of privacy issues. I can tell you that they sell hundreds of thousands of cues per year.
You won't see a lot of Kao Kao's cues on Asian Ebay. Taican sells cues to smaller distributers who don't have the same overhead as those who must support a wider network of dealers and spend more to market their brands.
Kao Kao sells to larger dealers who have their own brands and support the products through their own networks.
That is why you won't see a lot of penetration of brands like those you find on HK Ebay into the American market. No support structure. All sales final.
JB Cases said:
i buy american whenever posable. quality has little to do with it, you can usually find an american made product of equal or greater quality if you look.
Thats interesting,from looking at the cues i have seen they look like high quality,i havent seen Kao Kao cues yet but if they are like the Tai Can cues i am impressed,nice quality for the money.I wouldnt be suprised if someone doesnt import them and sign them and mark them up 3-4 fold,some of the cues look like Carmelli.JB Cases said:
Lucasi and Adams cues are,im sure there are alot of others.WesleyW said:
Fast Lenny said:Thats interesting,from looking at the cues i have seen they look like high quality,i havent seen Kao Kao cues yet but if they are like the Tai Can cues i am impressed,nice quality for the money.I wouldnt be suprised if someone doesnt import them and sign them and mark them up 3-4 fold,some of the cues look like Carmelli.
Oh, you have seen plenty of Kao Kao cues. You just don't know it.
Cue and Case Sales is the largest and perhaps only importer of Taican cues in America.
Taican also now produces Predator cues.
Kao Kao makes many many many more brands than Taican does.
I could show you plenty of butterfly spliced cues from Kao Kao's showroom. Full splice cues, multiple veneered cues, butterfly spliced and full spliced spliced together, basically every technique you can think of to construct a cue or decorate one is on display in Kao Kao's showroom.
In fact since full splice cues are back in vogue I am now making some new ones for the Fury brand.