Orbit Balls - For Sale

[Brandon Holley]

Originally Posted by jamie_1930

Not to shoot down your idea, but for most teams they can buy the real game pieces at Walmart for 10 bucks instead of 30.

Not true.

There is no walmart within a reasonable driving distance (2-3 hours) of our team that we could buy orbit balls from. New england more or less has been cleaned out of them.

I'm sure this is true in other parts of the country as well, where teams are very densely packed.

[jamie_1930]

Exactly why I said most teams, I've already had people say things like this to me, about how there's no walmart by them or that their already cleaned out, when I try to give some good information to fellow FIRSTers. Next time you need to realize that this is what happens with game pieces commercially available, and you need to get them right after kickoff, we had purchased about 10 by the day after kick off.

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by jamie_1930

Next time you need to realize that this is what happens with game pieces commercially available, and you need to get them right after kickoff, we had purchased about 10 by the day after kick off.

I don't recall a situation like the shortage of orbit balls as a game piece before in FRC. There may be and hopefully, someone will enlighten us and explain how they handled the shortage then. The game piece/game impacts teams globally. Wal-Marts may be hard to come by in different regions and areas of the world. One can think locally when it comes to FRC but it is wise to think globally and how the teams and venues are impacted.

An example: I had a conversation with Greg Needel when he was visiting Austin this fall. He shared a little bit of the challenges that teams in Israel face. Things that teams in the US wouldn't even give a 2nd thought to. There is not the same access across the board and teams and event planners find ways to compensate by being innovative and creative, making it work.

[jamie_1930]

FIRST challenges change every year and in response to this FIRSTers around the globe are always trying to anticipate what new challenges await us at the next kickoff, so a shortage of a commercial item not usually in popularity is likely to happen when all the sudden people are ripping them off the shelfs. Also I tried to help some people out so why do I need to be told I didn't help everyone.

[Brandon Holley]

Originally Posted by jamie_1930

Exactly why I said most teams, I've already had people say things like this to me, about how there's no walmart by them or that their already cleaned out, when I try to give some good information to fellow FIRSTers. Next time you need to realize that this is what happens with game pieces commercially available, and you need to get them right after kickoff, we had purchased about 10 by the day after kick off.

Jamie,
You think we didn't try to run and get them as soon as we saw what they were and where we could by them?? Believe me we tried...a lot. It wasn't like there were some of these balls in every store, and the teams who got there first got them. Some store simply didn't have any.....none of the stores near us did. The ones we did get, we had to find through walmarts inventory system.

Why most teams were able to grab a few from their local wal-mart, there were a signfigant amount of teams that were unable to get any, besides the 3 that FIRST offered up and the 1 that came in the kit.



I'm just trying to put things in perspective for you...not every team had the same scenario as yours.

[jamie_1930]

Ok it's just I don't see why people keep telling me that this information isn't good when I'm just trying to help out another team.

[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by xitaqua

Hey artdutra04,

Is your team thinking about selling those balls after the competition is over ?

Cheers,
Marcos.

Of the balls we have left (we've already dispersed some out to other teams), they probably wouldn't be available for about 9-12 months from now (we are a year-round team), and the students on the team have already been given first priority to buy them after this season.

[Cynette]

Originally Posted by jamie_1930

we had purchased about 10 by the day after kick off.

Hey Jamie! Who is using the 10 balls you purchased?

[jamie_1930]

I guess we are, I didn't really know we were even getting any but the next day most of the mentors showed up with one thinking they were the only one.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by JaneYoung

I don't recall a situation like the shortage of orbit balls as a game piece before in FRC. There may be and hopefully, someone will enlighten us and explain how they handled the shortage then. The game piece/game impacts teams globally. Wal-Marts may be hard to come by in different regions and areas of the world. One can think locally when it comes to FRC but it is wise to think globally and how the teams and venues are impacted.

2006 was better only because the company made more immediately. Can't do that this time around.

[Rick Wagner]

After the kickoff, team members went to Walmarts around LA and couldn't find any. We phoned relatives in other cities and all they could find is broken ones. At the time we didn't know they might be repairable, so we didn't get them. We have the one from the kit and the three from FIRST for testing our robot. We use some team-made ones for practice throwing.

[Bongle]

Originally Posted by jamie_1930

Ok it's just I don't see why people keep telling me that this information isn't good when I'm just trying to help out another team.

Because the first thing you said in the thread was "you know you can get them at wal-mart, right?", and people were trying to tell you that that was not the case for a large number of teams, including every single foreign team (Orbit Balls were not sold outside of the USA, ever).

I think $20 is a fair price, though really any price is fair, some just might be poorer selections than others. If you priced them at $1000 apiece thats your decision, but you probably wouldn't sell many. Its all about finding the right price point to sell the maximum number.

That's a ridiculous price to ask teams in need who may have not found balls

If they don't offer the balls to other teams at all, then the price is essentially infinity, and that would be even worse. Given the labour required to make them, offering to sell them at all when that labour could be put towards actually building a bot is very generous of them.

[Fish2977]

Haha we have 9 real ones.

[Pelicano234]

After taking in all of your comments, our team has learned a lot about economics, but have decide that we will not be selling Orbit Balls, although we will make as many as possible this weekend and may sell a few to needy teams.

[David Brinza]

A couple of parents from Team 980 with LOTS of manufacturing experience have come up with an alternative solution to the game piece shortage. They've spend a couple of weeks looking for the lowest cost approach to getting more balls to the teams. They've contacted Blip and determined that the delivery time and minimum order quantity was not going to work.

The plan is to sell Lunacy game ball kits to teams, perhaps as soon as this weekend. The kits include pre-sown fabric tubes (essentially identical as that used in the Orbit balls with no batting as found in the GUS ball), pre-cut lexan strips (far more durable than the plastic in the Orbit ball), high-strength adhesive patches to bond the strips together and instructions for assembly. To simplify and reduce cost of shipping and handling, only kits of 20 - 25 balls will be shipped via Priority Mail box to teams. The cost per ball will be on the order of $10 to $11 each (still working this number, however, there won't be much margin in this cost). Lunacy game ball sales will be done through a special web-site using Paypal.

We will post a new thread on CD in the next day or so announcing when the web-site is going up and sales will commence. Based on initial response, the quantity of kits manufactured can be increased pretty quickly.

What do you think about this approach?