@jalil this is another big misconception... you can never have pound to pound (apple to apple) comparison... vendors used different raw materials and we know tweaking the distillation parameters can also result in different outcome. We judge the end result and based on experience we get satisfied or unsatisfied for the price we've paid.
As a general comment, since basenotes I've seen vendors claiming that they have done back breaking work, worked tirelessly day and night to bring the product. Well!!! customers who are affording this hobby also work 8 to 10 hours a day to earn for their families and supporting their hobby... therefore I always disregard and give less importance to this statement from vendors. I think this statement should be avoided, just my opinion.
Coming back to the point I raised, customers are the driving force here... since we have linked higher price tag to higher quality therefore we see pricing like this. I was very mindful of not starting this debate as I don't want to reflect bad on the vendors. I urge my post should not be linked to any specific vendor.
As a consumer I consider that a normal oud lover is penalised because of buying power of rich oud lovers. How many times we have seen if a customer raise his concern that why a product is 3-4 times more in pricing when it is only 20% better? We then see fan boys in action trying to convince that it is because of nuances. We actually disregard the fact that the poor guy would have went through lot of sacrifices to save the money for the bottle, to find out it was actually the subtle difference that makes the product 2-3 times higher.
This is some serious money involved in this hobby and we don't need to be protective and sensitive about the vendors... we should ask:
- If an artisan claims to have 3X higher yield - Why the price is not three times cheaper?
- If these artisans are real artisans why can't they continually produce beautifully smelling product using ordinary product and show the audience their capability?
- Why is that beautiful smelling product always comes from expensive raw materials?
- Artisan is the one who can convert ordinary into extra ordinary but why the prices are extra ordinary?
I have a strong feeling that oud market pricing is heavily based on end product experience. If a vendor achieves a great result using the ordinary product he will still put his product on the higher premium regardless of cost. I am not trying to accuse anybody here, as a consumer these are opinions that I've formed.
In my opinion Online market will need a price correction and more vendors coming online will improve that slowly. Current online vendors should take low and middle tier segment of customers seriously as I believe there is a demand out there... producing artisan stuff in lower price range doesn't hurt the business... it will show capabilities of the vendor and will encourage customers to buy full bottles rather than the samples.
My suggestion to the website administrator is that we should create a separate thread for each product and then do the poll on following:
- Silage
- Lasting
- Quality
- Price
- Any other
Doing poll will give opportunity to all of us (including silent members) to cast our vote without being bashed
, this will also provide a very useful data to the Vendors to see where they are standing in the market. We can do product sub grouping as:
- Malaysian Oils
- Indian Oils
- Burmese Oils
- Etc.
Under each category, we should list the products and then do the polls.
Sorry for the long post again
Cheers!
