Wetlook World Forum

Message # 34582.1.1.1.1

Subject: Re: higher oil prices could hurt Liquidladies

Date: Fri 07/03/08 20:28:55 GMT

Name: mytwocents

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By MK - wamtec@comcast.net Fri 07/03/08 13:26:51 GMT

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When I stand in line at the post office, watching their counter staff work....it is like watching paint dry...or watching the grass grow....ha ha...and I can't help thinking of that old joke "what do you call a postal worker with half a brain ......LUCKY !!!".....ha ha

By Waterspaniel - Thu 06/03/08 20:53:38 GMT

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By MK - wamtec@comcast.net Thu 06/03/08 17:31:10 GMT

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Love that line "people won't use pubic transportation" ....

...gee...if there was such a thing as "pubic transportation" ....just make a website showing that, and you will get a lot of subscribers....ha ha

Seriously though....as the world evolves, technologies evolve and as economies change, and rising inflation happens......it will not cause any of us to stop doing what we are doing. It just means that we have to evolve too... and change our methods of making media.

For example, apart from oil, look at the rising cost of postage stamps over the last 16 years. When I first starting making in videos in Florida in 1992, the price of a postage stamp was 19 cents for a letter, or $2 to mail a tape via Priority Mail (and gasoline was 89 cents per gallon)....and in the last 15 years the Post Office have raised their prices 10 times (and they are going up again in the next 2 months too)...and now it will cost 43 cents to mail a letter and $6 to mail a priority mail package etc (and gasoline is now $3.50 per gallon).   So basically postage stamps and oil prices have risen by 300% in the last 15 years. In the early 90's.. you could cover the costs for your video projects, cos there were only 3-4 wetlook producers, and so people were willing to pay $60 for a tape. These days there are over 300 wet and messy producers, and Youtube and Webshots and numerous other source of free media for the fans, so it is very hard to cover costs on most projects these days.

But times change...and we must change too. But here is an interesting fact for you......the people who raise prices on us.....do not win.....they end up being the losers. For example, back in the 1990s I was spending approx $15,000 per year on shipping and postage costs to send out my media to my customers, but as the Post Office kept raising and raising prices on me....they did not get more income (certainly not from me)....cos then some other evolution happened, and new technlogies emerged, and the VHS tape and DVD market dried up, as it became more and more feasible to offer our media to customers via ONLINE downloads instead. So last year, I only actually spent $3000 on shipping costs....cos now there is very little need for the Post Office any more...cos 90% of my media is now delivered to people "online" instead of by mail.

So...thats a lesson for the oil companies to learn....be careful not to keep sticking it to the consumer, cos otherwise new technologies will emerge in future and cause people to use OTHER means and they will change they way they do business.

The Post Office are the big losers now...cos they raised rates so much over the last few years....that people gladly embraced the new "online" methods to get their media instead. The post office raised rates by 300% over the last decade.....but all they succeeded in doing....was to lose 80% of my business now.

Don't forget....you can change your methods too.....if your models do not like to pay high gas prices to travel to your location.....no sweat.....get them a webcam...and get them to do their own webcam shows from their own home, and feed those webcam links into your site.

regards

MK

By waterloggedproductions/Liquidladies - liquidladies@bellsouth.net Thu 06/03/08 14:56:45 GMT

Website: waterloggedproductions.com

We have 1 lawyer per less than 10 people I believe here...  Totall ruined this country whewn they were allowed to advertise on TV...

But to my point...Higher fuel prices here means  many of my models living  40 miles away or more  are just not going to work for $35 per shoot or $70 per (2)shoots....They say it cost them too much in petrol to come here....My asst.  Crystal hauls them up here and now charges them for gass money from their pay!

   It is totally NUTS!...   Because this country is so vast, people won't use pubic transportation or it is not yet deloped, we are hurting and this takes it toll on Waterlogged productions and I am sure other Wetlook businesses in the States.

   If these model and new ones complain they want morer money because gas has gone to $4 or more a gallon,  I either pay it or  close down due to now models.

   They  have us by the balls...(any suggestions)   I pay them and in return we all know what that means to the consumer..

shit never runs up hill, but down......So higher fuel prices can mean  less shoots and models or price increases this summer.

either way it is terrible for us and U,  thanks  to our great leaders of greed in this country...(WK)