b0
Cloudy...
Have you seen the news from vapefiend on IG? It seems like they gonna have GH available soon:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BB96hd3HevC/
https://www.instagram.com/p/BB96hd3HevC/
How Grasshopper Labs should run their company
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tr33sPlease
Well-Known Member
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TokesandJokes
Active Member
I think they could take delaying preorders because if a few cancel it would be nothing compared to people who bought the retail kits canceling. Ive seen a number of people selling through eBay out of retail kits. Vapefiend is dropping hints on its IG about carrying it.
If they have been working since the last update to push out these retail kits (and process RMA's) it seems like they are starting to produce at a steady pace.
25 units in a Retail Kit. They sold 8 kits as backers. anybody know if they accepted preorders for the retail kit after the funding ended.
If they have been working since the last update to push out these retail kits (and process RMA's) it seems like they are starting to produce at a steady pace.
25 units in a Retail Kit. They sold 8 kits as backers. anybody know if they accepted preorders for the retail kit after the funding ended.
zymos
Well-Known Member
We are talking about a total of 100 GH here. That should have neglible effects on anyone getting a preorder.
That's either one day's worth of production, or maybe 4 days, depending on which information supplied by GHL you want to use.
I guess another possibility is that they accepted some large wholesale orders after backing ended, and are prioritizing those over individuals....
That's either one day's worth of production, or maybe 4 days, depending on which information supplied by GHL you want to use.
I guess another possibility is that they accepted some large wholesale orders after backing ended, and are prioritizing those over individuals....
Honestly, I'm starting to lose faith. I filed a warranty request about a month ago now. It took a week for them to respond and tell me they're sending me a new body and then 2 weeks later I e-mail them asking about the status. They said the hopper would go out that same day and that I'd get an e-mail with tracking info. A few days later, still no tracking info so I e-mail to ask if it went out as planned. Still no response to that one (that was 3 days ago). I just find it absurd that they keep giving these specific deadlines and consistently fail to meet them. You'd think after 2 years of missing deadlines they would have figured it out and stopped making any kinds of estimates. Seriously, a 5 year old can run a company better. If they make it through this, they need to bring in a COO that knows what he/she is doing. A company can't continue to run like this, constantly letting it's customers down and downright lying to their faces. I'm a big supporter of this company. I think they have an absolutely amazing product. However, having a great product doesn't mean shit if you run the company into the ground.
JJ420
chillin on the couch, sippin off a 22 ounce.
I bet you the company is in the process of folding at this point...
I'd like to see some actual pictures of their brick & mortar facility, should it even exist.
Still a great product though if you've got a working one! Mine is still kicking ass and gets a ton of use.
I'd like to see some actual pictures of their brick & mortar facility, should it even exist.
Still a great product though if you've got a working one! Mine is still kicking ass and gets a ton of use.
zymos
Well-Known Member
Now I feel lucky my replacement body only took 2 weeks to arrive. A month is pretty bad, but then on top of that the lying and lack of response is really bothersome. Seems like even a quick email saying sorry, we goofed, or whatever, would go a long way.
If you tell a customer straight up "it's going out today" then you should be sure you mean it, and if you can't meet that promise, at least own up to the mistake.
If you tell a customer straight up "it's going out today" then you should be sure you mean it, and if you can't meet that promise, at least own up to the mistake.
MoltenTiger
Well-Known Member
They have simply sold more than can be handled. They're running their company like the engineers they are. Hiring a Chief Operations Officer to recommend them to stop giving obviously false estimates would be far from cost effective, and then they'd need to hire a marketer to figure out how to create similar revenue flow. As it stands they needed massive cash flow to be able to afford the necessary machinery to streamline assembly, optimise throughput and increase reliability.
Really they should have increased the cost 4-fold and pre-sold significantly less... Or attracted rich investors instead of crowd funding (their business history really restricted them here).
But it's too late now, the price is set, the purchases have happened, so I'm afraid all we can do is wait.
You can keep faith, as they have purchased and installed a much more robust and rapid production line.
But make no mistake, thousands of units will take these guys a looong time to fulfill (as we have seen) and there is no way around that besides what they've achieved. Hiring bean counters will do them no favours, really. Pretty sure engineers know math better anyway. And a 5 year old really shouldn't have anything to do with a drug extraction device, even if they happen to be a reincarnation of Steve Jobs or something equally ludicrous.
You've already had the fairly exclusive pleasure of trying their product, unfortunately they're running way above capacity and that is going to limit their warranty ability (there are only so many hours in a day, and less employees at GHL than days in a week). March estimates or any time estimates are nothing but infeasible.
If I were you I'd be emailing them every day, it's understandable for retail customers to act like this, and this will speed up your case.
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I don't think so. If they bring in someone that knows how to run a business, sure, it's an extra expense in the sense that they obviously have to pay the guy. However, keep in mind that that person wouldn't just say "stop giving bullshit estimates" and then sit back and collect his paychecks. That person can help to streamline the whole process, meaning that something that used to take a week to do can possibly be done in 2-3 days. That potentially means more time to dedicate towards things like quality control. Better quality control means less warranty claims which means less money literally going out the door for nothing. He can also help them in developing better estimates which would lead to better customer relations. Companies that have good relationships with their customers tend to have more customers coming back for repeat purchases which means more revenue in the future. The combination of those 3 things would lead to pre-order sales being completed much faster which means they can work on getting their product into retail outlets all over the country or even the world. I don't think I have to explain what happens to your company when your product is being sold worldwide.
So, yeah, initially it may seem like it wouldn't be cost effective to bring in an expert to help run the business but over time it will be more than worth it. Just because engineers know how to build a product, that doesn't mean they can run a business. As an accountant, I can attest to this fact. I have many clients that are absolute GENIUSES when it comes to what they do but they have absolutely no idea how to run their businesses (and if it weren't for me a lot of them would have gone under by now). I'm talking doctors, engineers, musicians, artists, contractors, etc. They're great at what they do but they don't know how to run a business. Same thing goes for HL. They may be great engineers but that doesn't mean they can run a company which is why they need to bring in someone that does.
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MoltenTiger
Well-Known Member
I think they've done an extremely good job considering who they are and what they're trained in. I don't believe it'd be worth the massive gamble to pay some manager to try and optimise something that has obviously been optimised to the extent it can be already (you may argue this is not the case, but I work in this industry and I can't see it). It would require outsourcing to increase production rates, either to a bigger workshop or overseas assembly to facilitate more assembly/testing workers. It all costs time and money, which they just don't have.
It would take a massive amount of GH sales to pay a COO their wage, this is basically what Trevor/Matt have become now they have hired assemblers. Similar to my boss and my position as an assembler/tester/prototype builder/machine operator. Where they will struggle is customer relations, but you may recall they hired someone for that too. They're on the ball, all I'm saying is it's going to take a few months longer than what they'd ideally like and what they've aimed for. It's infeasible because of the complexity of the device, the difficulty of late part shipments and the sheer number on order. All these things affect the business I work in very similarly, and whilst having someone overwatching will make me work harder and faster, it would also lead to more failures and stress. A 10% failure rate or above will kill them in this industry, they are very close to that as it is.
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You can't see their process inside the warehouse so you can't possibly say everything's been optimized. However, you can see their consistent failures to meet self imposed deadlines (Pre-orders will ship in February...but not a single address confirmation has gone out), false statements (your body is shipping today...but not really), bad customer communication (it shouldn't take a week to answer an e-mail), and, finally, poor quality control. These are all things that can be fixed but you need someone that knows what he's doing. Just because they know how to build the product doesn't mean they know how to optimize the manufacturing process and, based on everything we've seen, the process is far from optimized. Here's a question, what happened to producing 1300 units/month? They said that that's where their capacity was at in an update a couple of months ago. However, it took nearly 2 months to send out 300 hoppers. That seems like a far cry away from 1300/month. Maybe that's what their capacity is with their current equipment but they haven't figured out how to actually get to that number yet. Just look at this. Lets call it a month and a half to send out 300 units (even though I'm fairly sure it's closer to 2), so we'll say 45 days. That means they manufactured less than 7 units per day. Wtf are they doing over there? Everything comes in pre-manufactured and they just assemble it. How long could that possibly take? What should be the most time consuming part of the process is already outsourced to China. They keep making seemingly shitty decisions and are unnecessarily spending money (buying more equipment and hiring more people...supposedly), which is yet another problem that can be solved by bringing in someone that actually understands how to run a business. You can only keep up this optimism for so long before you start asking questions. What the fuck is going on, HL?
No offense to those speculating about the hierarchy of GHL, but what the f@ck does it have to do with the Grasshopper vape? I still have not received my 2 SS cases or my oils front end just to stay on point about the vape itself..... Who really gives a shit about the internal structure of their company. Just keep making grasshoppers and keep fucking sending warranty replacements. This thread is an abject waste of time with all the back and forth about company structure.....Super glad I sold both my Ti hoppers, and I really hope not to deal with any more warranty bullshit after 8+ returns.
MoltenTiger
Well-Known Member
Their extrapolated production estimates are as accurate as their extrapolated time estimates. There are a fuckng huge amount of variables in this game. They know what they're doing, and they can't afford to pay the wages of someone that knows it better, do you know how much that costs?
It is possible to see inside their workshop, and I am very familiar with what goes on in that kind of environment.
It can take a very long time to assemble pre-fab items, and every piece is unique and has its own potential problems. There is good reason that most vaporisers are much larger than the GH.
I don't think many understand just how hard a project like this is. It's really, ridiculously difficult and immensely time consuming. It's not a simple case of plugging Lego bricks together, it is insanely involved at every stage. Even packing them in boxes would takes ages. It's a long, multi-step process. To reiterate I don't believe they have somehow reached perfection in their optimisation, but I really think they're as close as their budget allows. This is crowd funded all the way still.
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Forums are a waste of time (apart from entertainment) so simply overlook shit you don't want to read. All I'm saying is, no matter what they do, we all have to wait for an unknowable amount of time. Their estimates are best case scenario, and that's not how the world works.
It is possible to see inside their workshop, and I am very familiar with what goes on in that kind of environment.
It can take a very long time to assemble pre-fab items, and every piece is unique and has its own potential problems. There is good reason that most vaporisers are much larger than the GH.
I don't think many understand just how hard a project like this is. It's really, ridiculously difficult and immensely time consuming. It's not a simple case of plugging Lego bricks together, it is insanely involved at every stage. Even packing them in boxes would takes ages. It's a long, multi-step process. To reiterate I don't believe they have somehow reached perfection in their optimisation, but I really think they're as close as their budget allows. This is crowd funded all the way still.
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Forums are a waste of time (apart from entertainment) so simply overlook shit you don't want to read. All I'm saying is, no matter what they do, we all have to wait for an unknowable amount of time. Their estimates are best case scenario, and that's not how the world works.
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zymos
Well-Known Member
Who gives a shit?
Anyone who has given them money or ever plans to. Anyone who has ever sent them an email that they took a week to reply to, or just blew off entirely. Anyone who has ever had to use their lifetime warranty.
Etc. etc....
Also, stop saying "we don't know how hard it is". We don't need to know how hard it is. WE aren't the ones that have been making false promises for years now. All we are responding to is what THEY have been telling us. Most people aren't saying we know better, they are just tired of feeling like they are being jerked around.
Anyone who has given them money or ever plans to. Anyone who has ever sent them an email that they took a week to reply to, or just blew off entirely. Anyone who has ever had to use their lifetime warranty.
Etc. etc....
Also, stop saying "we don't know how hard it is". We don't need to know how hard it is. WE aren't the ones that have been making false promises for years now. All we are responding to is what THEY have been telling us. Most people aren't saying we know better, they are just tired of feeling like they are being jerked around.
MoltenTiger
Well-Known Member
I was as disgruntled as anyone until I finally got a job again very recently. Fresh insight (I'm working for a tiny electronics start up with 9 others) made me realise with great sadness that my March estimate as a July pre-order is infeasible. It's not impossible, but I would bet my life that I won't see it in March.
PS an estimate is not a promise, no one has lied to you. Just tactically mislead, because not even GHL want to face the realities of the insane amount of work ahead of them. No one deserves to work that much. Just be patient.
PS an estimate is not a promise, no one has lied to you. Just tactically mislead, because not even GHL want to face the realities of the insane amount of work ahead of them. No one deserves to work that much. Just be patient.
zymos
Well-Known Member
Fair point about estimate vs. promise. I still don't believe many of their estimates have been made in good faith however.
And if they have "tactically misled" people, then I think they DO deserve to work as hard as they have to- they owe it to the people they have misled. They voluntarily put themselves in the situation they are in.
And if they have "tactically misled" people, then I think they DO deserve to work as hard as they have to- they owe it to the people they have misled. They voluntarily put themselves in the situation they are in.
YungLeaner
Well-Known Member
This forum avoids manufacturer bashing for very good reasons. However at this point defending GHL's honesty is simply absurd. This company has run the entire gamut of irresponsible business practices, has most likely violated the PayPal TOS, and has begun to ward off warranty requests. Calling their shipping estimates a "best-case" scenario is ludicrous.
Any other industry and these guys would be dead in the water. Vaporizing herbs happens to be a niche community with heavy emphasis on acquiring new tech so a company like GHL is capable of floating along in the face of borderline illegal corporate behavior because their heater tech is so great. That doesn't make what they're doing okay, and the forum needs to be allowed to discuss that because FC is one of the best online resources for herb vape prospective buyers. And they need to know that they may never get a grasshopper.
Any other industry and these guys would be dead in the water. Vaporizing herbs happens to be a niche community with heavy emphasis on acquiring new tech so a company like GHL is capable of floating along in the face of borderline illegal corporate behavior because their heater tech is so great. That doesn't make what they're doing okay, and the forum needs to be allowed to discuss that because FC is one of the best online resources for herb vape prospective buyers. And they need to know that they may never get a grasshopper.
MoltenTiger
Well-Known Member
Maybe you could say the do deserve what they've gotten themselves into. But they're doing it. So I have no qualms about saying: good on them and good luck.
It's not a case of possibly never receiving a unit, it's a case of waiting until you get one. Shipping estimates are exactly "best case" scenario, that's why they're estimates and not ETA (This is the same thing and I'm not even high... Y'know what I mean.. It's not an absolute figure it's an estimate not a 'time of arrival'
). If you spend hundreds without investigating what you're buying into... Well... Apply for a refund? They offer that service. If you're a backer, tough shit. I will at least thank you for enabling this to get momentum, but that's all you paid for.
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I haven't been watching this thread very closely since selling my GH, but what do you mean by this? Have I missed something?
YungLeaner
Well-Known Member
Several reports of users sending warranty requests and being strung along for weeks at a time, in worst cases up to around a month it seems.
Edit: Also have received an email from Caroline promising that pre-orders will start shipping in the next few days.
zymos
Well-Known Member
You have no way of knowing that. Companies go bankrupt all the time. Whoops, the money's all spent! For all we know, the power company is coming Monday to shut of their electricity, and their new machines are being repossesed due to non payment.
I don't think that's going to happen, but since none of us know their financial situation, how could we be sure either way?