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Skyshark kit prices

Old 08-09-2006, 05:11 PM
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P-40 DRIVER
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Default Skyshark kit prices

Is it me or did Skysharks kit prices just about go up a $100 a kit.[X(]
Old 08-09-2006, 05:40 PM
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Jeremy300
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Wow, did they ever. I was going to do the ME109E this winter as my project. Not anymore.
Old 08-09-2006, 07:12 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Yeah, I just emailed them and told them that will just throw a few hundred more in and get a Nick Zeroli kit. I was going to make the Skyshark Dauntless my next project but not now. Their price is a bit unreasonable considering you can get any Top Flight giant scale kit which is a bigger plane for the same price or less.
Old 08-09-2006, 08:55 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

May I suggest that you all email Mike at Skyshark and in a nice fashion relate your
feelings on this.

I too am a bit taken aback by the large jump in prices.

Old 08-09-2006, 09:48 PM
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tailskid
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

But you have to admit...they are quality kits......
Old 08-10-2006, 08:03 AM
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BankYank
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Yes they are great kit's ,,, BUT DA** thats just to much as they were a little pricey to start with for there size
Old 08-10-2006, 09:22 AM
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tailskid
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

I wonder what caused such a drastic jump in prices....maybe he wants to actually turn a profit...........Naw, not in this hobby!
Old 08-10-2006, 09:26 AM
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ticketec
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

I agree! Wow, that is a huge jump.

I was thinking of building their stuka, but for those prices, i'd rather build a ziroli instead!

With the dive in the cost of decent quality ARF's, i think that they have priced themself's out of the market a little. I can buy an ARF, kit bash it, and still be near the purchase price of their kits....... H9 P-47, $259 including retracts.

Thanks
Old 08-10-2006, 10:00 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Could be that they now include a spinner, or maybe he needs to recoup some loss on the expensive P-40 arf?



They are nice kits, but that price just took them off my list. I still have a 109E in the box to build though!
Old 08-10-2006, 10:15 AM
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Johnny_Zero
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

I was also going to build one of their BF-109's this winter.....There is no way that i will pay $349.00 for a .60 size kit.
Old 08-10-2006, 10:25 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Price jump is big I agree, but skyshark kits are about the best stand-off scale you can get. I know they are expensive, but many of us in the building community complain endlessly about kit manufactures going out of business or moving to ARFs. You know if everyone here had bought one when they where lower price, maybe Mike could have kept the prices where they are at.

I built a great 40 size Yak-3 kit from Redstar RC. Laser cut top quality wood just a great kit. Priced good too. I started up a relationship with Mike from Redstar only to find out that after two years even with great reviews and an awsome product, they only sold about 40 of them. So you take Skyshark who may sell 100 or so kits of each version a year (probably way less). Lets say they make 35% on a kit (not at the prices they where selling, has anyone priced balsa these days). So thats less than 500 kits.

1000 x $250 = $250,000 * 35% = $87,500 gross margin (then equipment, people, benifits). Boy, I have 5 employees and we just skimp by doing about $1M a year. I would rather pay a little more for a kit that's available then to buy a plane pre-assembled in China!

Complain, but if you want a great kit and what is still a great price. Buy Skyshark! The best way to keep prices down, is volume!
Old 08-10-2006, 10:56 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices



I picked up an older Heritage Hellcat kit that needed a few parts. I discovered they were now produced by Skyshark so I called and placed an order. I was so impressed with the service and quality that I was compelled to write them and tell them they had earned a new customer. I had planned on purchasing three more of their war bird kits. The total a few months ago was $547.00 it is now $847.00. WOW! All I have to do now is get my boss (the wife) to give me a 36% increase in my hobby budget

I can get all five of the popular .60 size Top Flight warbird kits plus fiberglass cowls for each for about $900. I guess time will tell what the market will bare. I still love Skyshark kits I just have to decide which one instead of three I "might" buy.
Old 08-10-2006, 11:08 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Yes, like someone else mentioned: maybe they would like to make this a profitable business. Keep in mind: these kits are designed AND manufactred in the good ole U.S.A.. They simply cannot compete with 3rd world and communist labor costs.
And they (Skyshark) cannot afford to offer these kits without making a profit: they are not a charity.
I have a feeling that Top Flite is not making much money these day, and their days may be numbered. Like so many other great kit makers, they are suffering from the flood of imported ARFs.

SO, if you want to build a quality, U.S.A. made kit, I suggest you just 'bite the bullet'. From my experience, the cost of the kit is usually a relatively minor cost compared to the overall cost of the project anyways. Retracts and engines usually cost more (each) than the cost of the kit. Then add in all the the other stuff (radio, adhesives, finish, accessories and details, etc) the the kit will likely be about 1/5 or less of the total cost.
Old 08-10-2006, 11:26 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices


Corsair Jock, You are absolutely right! I would much rather pay more for quality made in the USA products with great support than some of the junk I have seen coming in from other countries. I just hate not being able to buy all the ones I wanted at one time without getting caught
Old 08-10-2006, 11:52 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Well, it would seem now is the time to buy your Skyshark kit. Because they may soon become collectors items on fleabay.
Old 08-10-2006, 11:57 AM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Biting the bullet is one thing, but that large an increase is WHY people are flocking to arfs.

$350 for a 60 size plane, plus finishing materials, etc...that leads me to the kit cutters for a larger plane like a vailly or a ziroli where I can re-coupe the difference in fuel cost savings ...even at $3.50 a gallon.
Old 08-10-2006, 12:59 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

ORIGINAL: FlinVR

May I suggest that you all email Mike at Skyshark and in a nice fashion relate your
feelings on this.

I too am a bit taken aback by the large jump in prices.

I did and all they said was " In order to make a profit and due to high material costs blah, blah, blah " .

I am sure I will eventually give in and buy the kit I wanted anyway. I just have to try and get over the shock and I will be ok. That Dauntless kit is too nice.

I did notice the 2 pricing method they have. The high price included a 1 year crash replacement garentee. If you crash you plane within 1 year of buying the kit you can buy a new one at half price.

You don't hear that every day.
Old 08-10-2006, 01:27 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices


ORIGINAL: actionjackson



I picked up an older Heritage Hellcat kit that needed a few parts. I discovered they were now produced by Skyshark so I called and placed an order. I was so impressed with the service and quality that I was compelled to write them and tell them they had earned a new customer. I had planned on purchasing three more of their war bird kits. The total a few months ago was $547.00 it is now $847.00. WOW! All I have to do now is get my boss (the wife) to give me a 36% increase in my hobby budget

I can get all five of the popular .60 size Top Flight warbird kits plus fiberglass cowls for each for about $900. I guess time will tell what the market will bare. I still love Skyshark kits I just have to decide which one instead of three I "might" buy.
Better hurry up an buy a P-39 or a Fw-190D ---- oh, they don't make those any more, like the Zero and the ...... Topflite is a Hobbico company, and soon, all you'll get from them is ARFs. What about the Pica Kits, or Royal, or all of the others that us kit builder pay big $$$ for on ebay because we just wished they where still available. I've got my eye on an A8 even if its 30% price increase, all I every hear about Skyshark is excellent customer service and great products. I'm currently build a plane from scratch and I've got over $300 in balsa and ply and a hundred hours in cutting .... boy I wish there were more kits out there, especial US made and well engineered.

And besides, who else offers a Year crash guarantee! What a great first warbird kit that allows you to fly without the fear of loosing everthing!
Old 08-10-2006, 01:52 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices



Marc, decent kits are getting rarer. I was simply illustrating bang for the buck compared to the other popular similarly sized warbird kits.

I will certainly keep Skyshark high on my list of kit manufactures. My big fear is that pricing will discourage newer modelers from giving these great kits a try. Some people can't fully understand the differences in kit quality until they try one. I guess I will continue and do my part to keep good kit manufactures in business by buying as many as I can afford and raving about them to all that I can. The hardcore builders can only buy so many. With ARF quality going up and prices coming down kit building in general is getting to be a harder sell to any of the newer fliers.
Old 08-10-2006, 02:01 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

I agree -- enough discussion here on this forum on Kits vs. ARFs. It really highlights the fact that Flying is a sport and modeling is a hobby, unfortunate that there are not more modelers. Some people just love to build. I build plastic models with my 7 year old son. He glues and paints everything and I sand glue globs and touch up. We just purchased a pretty nice 1/32 scale Mig-3 plastic model as a reference for my scratch built Mig-3. The 1/32 plastic kit was $49.00! But the fun of building it ourselves ..... "Priceless" (sorry couldn't help myself LOL).

Keep building, keep'm flying, and hopefully we will continue to have choices over the long run. Not so sure though!

Kind regards to everyone on this thread who obviously just looooves this insanity!
Old 08-10-2006, 02:03 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

.
Old 08-10-2006, 02:25 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Our kits are something that we never made money on from the start. The only reason we started making them in the first place is because Heritage was out of business and I hated to see a kit of that quality be lost from the marketplace. We never planned on making money from the kits because we knew it would not be possible while keeping the price somewhat in line with other kits. Due to increased costs of everything from labor to materials to equipment maintenance, we are at the point now where we can do one of two things: 1. Discontinue the kits because we don’t even make enough on them to pay for maintenance on the equipment or 2. Raise the prices so we can afford to at least pay for the equipment and labor used to make them.

It would be a lot easier for us just to discontinue the kit line and not have to deal with complaints, technical support, missing parts, and plain unhappy people in general! I will say that it is a lot easier to design, produce, sell and support an ARF than a kit.

Stopping kit production is something I really don’t want to do because there are people in the hobby who don’t mind paying what it actually costs for a quality product. Not to mention that we have a lot of loyal customers who have supported our products over the past few years in need of decent quality kits.

When you look at our kits in detail, they are a value even at our new pricing. I can cut an average Ziroli kit in about half the time it takes to cut one of ours. This is due to the number of laser cut parts and lightening holes in our kits. You would have a hard time finding laser cut parts for a Ziroli for under $400.00. When you factor in our pre-cut vinyl decals, fiberglass cowls, individually printed color plans, cockpit kits, crash free program quality of wood, and instruction manual, it’s a bargain. If you tried to put that kind of quality in making a Ziroli kit, the cost would easily exceed $1000.00.

I am aware that our line of kits and ARFs don’t fit into the bargain basement mentality of many guys here and in the hobby today. They never really have because that has never been our target customer base. The bottom line is that is costs money to make a quality product – kit or ARF. The only reason I got into this business in the first place was because I felt there was a lack of quality and service in the kits and ARFS available to the select few, like myself, who wanted that type of product.

Sure, we could easily put out kits and ARFS for under 100 bucks. They would be comparable to everything else that is out there now and, like many other companies, knowledgeable customer service would be non-existent. We could probably make pretty good money doing that in the short term. Of course, that is something I have absolutely no interest in because selling, building or flying junk is not something I enjoy doing! I have been burned by false claims and hype more than my share of times before I got into the business so I know how aggravating it is!

I do appreciate everyone’s input on the subject. Unfortunately, some of the comments above are 100% correct. If you want kits to be available and affordable, people have to actually buy them. Otherwise, everything will go the direction of the ARF – which may or may not be a bad thing.

Mike Grey
Skyshark R/C Corporation
Old 08-10-2006, 02:37 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

As I said in my emails to you Mark,

Good Luck! and I hope you are able to continue to make these kits available.
I do understand your situation and will continue to be a customer.

Also IMO an all ARF market is a bad thing!
The magic of seeing a three dimensional object come together from a box of flat sheets and sticks of wood is something
that I think too many people miss out on. Then to take that which you have actually built and see it fly thru the air...
well theres not much bad that can be said about it.
Keep at it! I'm going to get that short nose butcher bird from you pretty soon.

Tom
Old 08-10-2006, 02:58 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

I agree that when you think about it, the cost of a kit is only a minor part of the total cost of any project. Its amazing how you can turn a $159.95 Top Flite kit into a $1200 dollar airplane. I hope that you will be able to maintain your business because if we loose you and Top flite; That will be it for the .60 warbird in a kit form at least. When a Top Flite Zero which were terrible kits go's for almost $300 dollars on Ebay, it has to make you wonder.
Old 08-10-2006, 03:37 PM
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Default RE: Skyshark kit prices

Mike, the cost of your kit is one thing we quickly forget when we have a problem. Your # 1 product (IMHO) is SERVICE and you have a excellent handle on it. Keep making those kits and it the long run, it will me the Modelers who are the final winners (even if you don't make any $$ )

Jerry

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