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New Laser Rag
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jeffers View Drop Down
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    Posted: 12 Oct 15 at 12:05pm
Originally posted by zippyRN

Originally posted by davidyacht

Hard enough for the RO telling a Radial from a Standard imo

other than the reversed  window  and  didn;t they introduce  coloured corners when they stopped the coloured leech panels  on radials

Nope I had a radial sail that simply had 5.7 printed on it with no blue corners. I think the blue corners came in when they got to Mk4 or 5 of the radial.
Paul
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Riv View Drop Down
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Posts: 353 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Riv Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 Oct 15 at 8:52pm
My Rooster Radial has ble corners but only on one side.
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Oatsandbeans View Drop Down
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Posts: 382 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Oatsandbeans Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12 Oct 15 at 9:16pm
A bit of light reading if anyone is interested in the what the new laser sail is all about ( or anyway what they stuck in their patent).

https://patents.google.com/patent/US8739721B2/en?q=laser&q=sail
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Dickieh View Drop Down
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Posts: 8 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Dickieh Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Oct 15 at 8:40pm
Having come back to the thread it is interesting to see where it has meandered.

A key feature is of replica sails being endemic in the fleet.  The only reason for this is that the purchaser perceives value and the manufacturer sees a market opening where he can make an acceptable margin. Classic supply and demand in action.

Laser sails are over priced and the market is now supplied with a near identical product at half the price. The class has missed the opportunity to control the use of replicas and have effectively reduced their market share - again classic economics of greed and monopolistic behaviour.

Selling sails at 9 x their landed price (where profit margin for the sailmaker is already paid) is obscene.

I constantly hear complaints about sail quality and price at national and international events, from the sailors, their funders (parents) and, if you promise not to quote them, the dealers.

All that needs to happen is for Laser to drop the RRP to a sensible price of £250 or so, and they will make the same overall profit as the replica market will shrink.  This way the whole fleet will move towards equilibrium with sole supply over a period of a couple of years or so.  The sailors may even buy more sails.

It isnt rocket science. Laser just need to grow a pair.
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jeffers View Drop Down
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Posts: 3048 		Post Options Post Options   Quote jeffers Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 15 at 1:12pm
Originally posted by Dickieh


All that needs to happen is for Laser to drop the RRP to a sensible price of £250 or so, and they will make the same overall profit as the replica market will shrink.  This way the whole fleet will move towards equilibrium with sole supply over a period of a couple of years or so.  The sailors may even buy more sails.

It isnt rocket science. Laser just need to grow a pair.



If they did that many years back then replicas would not be an issue now as most people will not quibble paying that for the sail. I certainly would have paid that.
Paul
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JimC View Drop Down
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Posts: 6662 		Post Options Post Options   Quote JimC Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 15 at 2:43pm
Originally posted by Dickieh

Selling sails at 9 x their landed price

You keep making that assertion, but I've never seen any evidence to back it. There are not many other classes that have 250 quid sails.

My limited understanding of basic economics suggests that if you halve the price you have to sell an awful lot more than double the quantity to make up for it.

The accuracy of economic forecasting worldwide suggests that it must be a lot more difficult than rocket science since the rocket engineers hit their targets an awful lot more often than the economists do.
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jeffers View Drop Down
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Posts: 3048 		Post Options Post Options   Quote jeffers Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 15 at 3:26pm
I wouldnt say it was 9 x the landed price but if they can offer a near £200 discount on a volume of around 10 then you do the maths.... someone somewhere was making a huge profit (and likely still is as others can produce a quality copy of the sail at a fraction of the price so even taking in royalty payments there is still a lot of meat there IMO).
Paul
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piglet View Drop Down
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Posts: 514 		Post Options Post Options   Quote piglet Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 15 at 3:44pm
Originally posted by jeffers

as others can produce a quality copy of the sail at a fraction of the price
And in some case producing comparable quality sails in small (=cost inefficient) volumes.
 
I spoke to a sailor who had to have a replcement boat this year, because the new replacement hull had a different plaque number LP offered a new rolled rad for £125, I wonder where that figure comes from?
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laser193713 View Drop Down
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Posts: 889 		Post Options Post Options   Quote laser193713 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 15 at 4:16pm
Why would he not just peel the sail numbers off and match them to the hull...? That would be the sensible move. I have already said that I once got a free sail from Laser because the material and stitching of one was not perfect, not bad, but not perfect. I have never had any issues with quality on any other of my sails from Laser.
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Dickieh View Drop Down
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Posts: 8 		Post Options Post Options   Quote Dickieh Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15 Oct 15 at 7:09pm
I got the figure from a sailmaker.  There aren't many other classes with a sail spec and weight of cloth that is quite so low, let alone with as many boats being sailed.  If they churn the sails out at a lower price they will kill off the replica market to a large extent and end up with a similar profit.  
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