Just thought I'd commemorate this landmark occasion...

You should commemorate it with a special offer or 2!!!

not allowed - it'll cost me £115 a year to make offers!!

HOW MUCH

Yeah - that's what trader's are charged for posting in the 'Marketplace' section. That's the cheap option...

If you pay for a year up front it will cost less than £10/month to post trade advertisments. I consider that very reasonable compared with other forms of advertising, especially considering the cost of other forms of reaching such a target audience.

Chris

When you put it like that it doesn't seem a lot, but not all manufacturers are producing 7 style kits and if they're not making much markup on items they are selling on here at near trade prices from their suppliers to keep stock turning over surely its in the forum members interests to allow them to continue to offer their deals? its the forum members who will miss out in these instances, not you or the respective reseller.

Are these resellers still going to be able to post under the bargains elsewhere section, say for example a link to their own websites where they advertise their deals if they're not allowed to post in the special traders section?

I'm not askingyou to change things chris, i just don't want people on here to lose out from the genuine friendly faces who offer bits from time to time tha don't make masses out of it.

cheers,

Ned.

Hi Ned

Glad you agree on the pricing. As said in various other posts, if a 'trader' is genuinely not making a profit from selling parts, either directly or indirectly, they can get in touch and I will consider switching them back to being a regular user. I do find it hard to believe in this case, however, that with the number of brand new parts that Steve advertises he is not able to spare £10/month, or even a donation towards the running cost of the site. Why not just add £1 on to everything he sells to cover advertising?

I'm sure you recall this discussion has come up at various meetings, but just to reiterate the situation. I set up this site for Locost enthusiasts, like myself, to share advice and ideas about their cars. I will never charge any individual to use the site in this way, even though the upkeep of the site costs me each month in both time and money. What I do object to is anyone regularly making money out of my generosity.

This is certainly not a 'get rich quick' scheme. If I rented the server this site runs on out, even as a bare Linux system, with a bandwidth allowance to cover our current usage, I would expect it to return around £100/month and require far less effort on my part to keep it maintained! This is *much* more than I have ever made out of Locostbuilders!

Chris

[Edited on 9/30/2005 by ChrisW]

Chris,

Thanks for the clarification. I appreciate the cost side of the running of the site, I guess I'll leave it to yourselves if Steve wants to get in touch to try and arrange something but I think it would be a shame if something can't be sorted as I feel he is a valued contributor to the forum.

Ned.