The Refill "Market" is dead!!

[jonheal]

Since 2008, my refill sales have declined and when the PUF closed, they came to a halt with the exception of maybe one or two sales a month.

This would certainly point to direct negative monetary impact to the community as a result of Propellerhead closing the forum.

Honestly, after all this time, I still don't buy Propellerhead's official line as to why they closed the forums. To me, it seems like a case of sour grapes, pure and simple. They got fed up with all the whining on the forums and decided to pick up their toys and go home.

Of course in their defense, there was a tremendous amount of bile spewed in their direction on the forums, which anyone and everyone would have trouble stomaching.

But yeah, the end result has been steps backward for everyone.

It's a shame, really.

As far as the forums go, I'd say we have seen an improvement. We have more involvement here and more positive involvement at that. I'd say most of the negative traffic before did a disservice to the forum and anybody trying to advertise via the forum. But only those who sell independently of the shop and advertise via the forum can attest to the impact of the change.

I'm happy Propellerhead closed it. It was horrible and a conflict of interest with managing it. A forum for the users should be run by the users. They don't need to be wasting their time managing a forum, trying to keep it positive and productive, while tip-toeing a line of potential censorship accusations (which is a conflict of interest when you yourself as the developer are the ones moderating).

ReasonTalk has grown so much and will continue to grow.

Yeah, well I could easily be full of crap with my opining. Wouldn't be the first time.

[GeiddE]

Sorry for the delay .....

I can, and will, (in the future) show evidence in my music - they continue to inspire me to write beyond my abilities in ways I never thought
as I surf through and get inspiration from the sounds. SO yes to question one!

I dont have copies of the sales charts - you're right about that

OH I see now its 'the market'

Well, I haven't gone through all of my refills yet, so you may be right regarding the market of them
not selling from PH or your website, but as far as PH I dont know
I haven't bought any recently but have bought a few REs
I think I have everything I need right now
It IS alive to me, for me, right now, still and endless sea to me

Thanks for asking

Sorry
This may be a dead thread

an endless sea of innovation and inspiration for You and Me

https://shop.propellerheads.se/browse/? ... &view=grid

Hello GeiddE,

Can you show me any evidence to your statement.

Do you have a personal copy of the Props sale charts?

No, i dident think so.

Just because people are selling Refills, doesent mean people are actually buying them.

[eXode]

I didn't notice any decline in sales of my ReFills in the propellerhead shop when they closed the PUF.

[kitekrazy]

I buy refills more than REs. Refills can be bought anywhere.

[mreese80]

First....Refill sales have gone through the floor since the PUF closed, there is no longer a single place were dedicated Reason users can go and hang out, the community has been broken up and now advertising to Reason users is really hard for Refill/soundpack producers.

Second.... The Closed refill format is absolutely F shit..... You are not allowed to change, rearrange or delete anything inside a refill, so you end up with a whole heap of content clogging up your hard drive, stuff you will never use, or if like me, you like organising all you evil synths into one folder and all your best subs into another folder, you cant grab them as a whole, you have to individually save each patch, copy wav files, re assign presets so they know where the corresponding samples are located etc etc etc

BUT.... if i go to Loopmasters, one of the most successful sample companies (ever) and download one of their sample packs, they come packed or unpacked, so i can tailor the pack to fit my needs.

So in a nutshell, nobody's buying refills anymore, Propellerhead have literally destroyed themselves by force feeding us there refill technology.

Refills need to be completely redesigned so they are easier to use, i dont want to open Reason everytime i want to see whats inside the refill, if i buy a sample CD, i take what i want and delete the rest but you cant do that with a refill, not even close.

Not happy

I agree. I wish they would just open the doors all the way and let us use vsts easily. the external mide device is shit. i would love to use my trillian bass 33 gb of bass easily in reason

[gak]

[sinnerfire]

I didn't notice any decline in sales of my ReFills in the propellerhead shop when they closed the PUF.

Your sales havent slowed down at all?

Wow, thats amazing!!

But the rest of us who dont make Re's or have a big user following like you are only surviving on one or two refill sales a week.

[sinnerfire]

I agree. I wish they would just open the doors all the way and let us use vsts easily. the external mide device is shit. i would love to use my trillian bass 33 gb of bass easily in reason

Totally agree but not going to happen unless Spectrasonics make a Re version of trillian.

I want a Kontakt Re, that would make my year!!

[esselfortium]

I want a Kontakt Re, that would make my year!!

Kontakt in the rack would make my life.

[selig]

I didn't notice any decline in sales of my ReFills in the propellerhead shop when they closed the PUF.

Your sales havent slowed down at all?

Wow, thats amazing!!

But the rest of us who dont make Re's or have a big user following like you are only surviving on one or two refill sales a week.

Not that it matters, 'cause you're free to say what you want here, but…

The only question I would then have is to ask what is the evidence there's a direct connection between RE introduction and your experience of dropped sales? While there is a correlation: the RE was introduced, and then your ReFill sales dropped, you have mentioned no causality (and it would appear this is quite common, fwiw).
Causality: the area of statistics that is commonly misunderstood and misused by people in the mistaken belief that because the data shows a correlation that there is necessarily an underlying causal relationship.
http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/a31211 ... +causation

There are lots of great graphs showing funny examples of this effect. Simply insert "RE Sales" and your "ReFill Sales" into this graph and you'll see my point:


My observation is that the only point you've made is that you observed these two things happening (but not everyone has seen the same thing), and you've concluded they must be related. Now I can't say that they are NOT related any more than you CAN - but that's my point. Without evidence of causality, your thread title (even though you changed it) still doesn't make a supportable argument.

[avasopht]

Yes, but I don't think the possible relation between IE and murders in US should be shot down so quickly (see what I did there )

[mreese80]

I agree. I wish they would just open the doors all the way and let us use vsts easily. the external mide device is shit. i would love to use my trillian bass 33 gb of bass easily in reason

Totally agree but not going to happen unless Spectrasonics make a Re version of trillian.

I want a Kontakt Re, that would make my year!!

you are right about that. but that trillian would be huge. i either rewire with ableton or the mpc software to use it with reason. than i bounce the audio and import into reason. the rewire vst makes it possible with the mpc software. simple

[sinnerfire]

Not that it matters, 'cause you're free to say what you want here, but…

The only question I would then have is to ask what is the evidence there's a direct connection between RE introduction and your experience of dropped sales? While there is a correlation: the RE was introduced, and then your ReFill sales dropped, you have mentioned no causality (and it would appear this is quite common, fwiw).

Actually i already said "in my first comment" that

First....Refill sales have gone through the floor since the PUF closed, there is no longer a single place were dedicated Reason users can go and hang out, the community has been broken up and now advertising to Reason users is really hard for Refill/soundpack producers.

So from my quote, you can see that i havent mentioned any "correlation" between the introduction of Re's and Refill sales.

And my "causality" would be that refill sales have suffered since the PUF was closed, although in my opinion, this is only one half of why Refill sales have declined. The other being that the refill format is rubbish for reasons that i have already covered in this thread.

Causality: the area of statistics that is commonly misunderstood and misused by people in the mistaken belief that because the data shows a correlation that there is necessarily an underlying causal relationship.
http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/a31211 ... +causation

Interesting read but missing the point of this thread i think.

There are lots of great graphs showing funny examples of this effect. Simply insert "RE Sales" and your "ReFill Sales" into this graph and you'll see my point:

No idea what your trying to point out with this graph?

My observation is that the only point you've made is that you observed these two things happening (but not everyone has seen the same thing), and you've concluded they must be related. Now I can't say that they are NOT related any more than you CAN - but that's my point. Without evidence of causality, your thread title (even though you changed it) still doesn't make a supportable argument.

Well thanks for pointing that out but your argument holds no wait either without hard evidence "a copy of the Props yearly sales record would be great right about now" and while i value your opinion, you being another very successful Re developer and Refill maker which probably has a big user base, i cant help but think that your opinion on Refill sales has no wait either as the Props do a majority of your hard selling for you, I personally do all my own work and have been at the front end of Refill sales since the start of 2008 and from my experience, Refill sales have steadily declined to the point now that i am unwilling to make anything with "Refill" in the title which in my opinion makes my argument very supportable.

Cheers.

[eXode]

I didn't notice any decline in sales of my ReFills in the propellerhead shop when they closed the PUF.

Your sales havent slowed down at all?

Wow, thats amazing!!

But the rest of us who dont make Re's or have a big user following like you are only surviving on one or two refill sales a week.

I don't make RE's and I don't have a big user following, I just happen to sell through the propellerhead shop because they reach alot more users than I could ever hope to reach, even if I worked full time with marketing.

So you see, It's real simple. There's a market for refills out there, it's just that currently you aren't a part of it.

You can spend your time moaning on a forum about it, or you could spend your time doing something about it. It's up to you.

Good luck, whatever you decide to do!

[kitekrazy]

I think I only bought one from the Prop Shop. Most of mine came from esoundz, Producer Loops, Loop Master, Fat Loud.

[selig]

I didn't notice any decline in sales of my ReFills in the propellerhead shop when they closed the PUF.

Your sales havent slowed down at all?

Wow, thats amazing!!

But the rest of us who dont make Re's or have a big user following like you are only surviving on one or two refill sales a week.

I don't make RE's and I don't have a big user following, I just happen to sell through the propellerhead shop because they reach alot more users than I could ever hope to reach, even if I worked full time with marketing.

So you see, It's real simple. There's a market for refills out there, it's just that currently you aren't a part of it.

You can spend your time moaning on a forum about it, or you could spend your time doing something about it. It's up to you.

Good luck, whatever you decide to do!

This is probably the biggest point anyway. But I still don't see any relation to the PUF closing and ReFills sales dropping other than that they happened at the same general time for one vendor. For others there was never a change. Just don't know that anyone (myself included) has enough market data to either call the market for ReFills dead or to venture a guess as to why.

[Marco Raaphorst]

Don't depend too much on stuff of others when it comes down to marketing. The Props might help, but maybe they won't.

Selling ReFills is just work. Make something good. Market it right. Don't be lazy.

[decibel]

i think before rack extensions came along and offered so many new options for creating sounds in reason, that refills where definitely a way many reason users gravitated towards to expand their sonic palletes, its easy to imagine that money that would have been spent in the past purchasing decent refills is now being re directed towards purchasing rack extensions yeah

[eXode]

Don't depend too much on stuff of others when it comes down to marketing. The Props might help, but maybe they won't.

Selling ReFills is just work. Make something good. Market it right. Don't be lazy.

My point is that you need to be in the shop really. You automatically get a much wider target group just by being there.

[Marco Raaphorst]

Don't depend too much on stuff of others when it comes down to marketing. The Props might help, but maybe they won't.

Selling ReFills is just work. Make something good. Market it right. Don't be lazy.

My point is that you need to be in the shop really. You automatically get a much wider target group just by being there.

I have my own shop and am also using the Propellerhead Shop. Promoting the product yourself is also very important because the Props won't promote all products via their newsletters. But today we have so many options to get noticed, using Facebook, Twitter, SoundCloud etc. You need to use them all for the best promotion imo.

[eXode]

I have my own shop and am also using the Propellerhead Shop. Promoting the product yourself is also very important because the Props won't promote all products via their newsletters. But today we have so many options to get noticed, using Facebook, Twitter, SoundCloud etc. You need to use them all for the best promotion imo.

Again, I'm not talking about promotion, I'm taling about range and target group.

Just by being in the shop you get exposure to many Reason users, probably more than you could hope to reach on your own, even through social media (for one, you actually need followers or similar that receive your message in the first place). Also, new Rack Extensions and ReFills usually get expore on the shop first page.

[Marco Raaphorst]

I have my own shop and am also using the Propellerhead Shop. Promoting the product yourself is also very important because the Props won't promote all products via their newsletters. But today we have so many options to get noticed, using Facebook, Twitter, SoundCloud etc. You need to use them all for the best promotion imo.

Again, I'm not talking about promotion, I'm taling about range and target group.

Just by being in the shop you get exposure to many Reason users, probably more than you could hope to reach on your own, even through social media (for one, you actually need followers or similar that receive your message in the first place). Also, new Rack Extensions and ReFills usually get expore on the shop first page.

I agree. The only thing I wanted to add is that any professional will never depend fully on another company. You need to promote stuff you want to sell professionally. You need your own webshop too. The Prop Shop is fine. Use both.

[deepndark]

There is a way, you can create a refill about a refill. Explore a refill and save the patches on your harddrive then just create a refill, that has these patches inside it. I might do this to all my refills. It sure takes shitloads of time to do it, but when It's done, you feel good about it.

And yes, the refill market has almost died in my case too.

[jfrichards]

I think Ed Hydlide will help kill the refill market, and many RE synth sales, singlehandedly with this free refill:

http://www.reasonexperts.com/refills-an ... son-5.html

What a masterpiece.

[gak]

Here's a thought: Don't you think this arena (regardless of the format) is pretty freaking saturated? There are only so many times you can do the 808, the juno, and the few things that people seem to want.

We have all the compressors, all the eq's, all the sounds, a fabulous host that allows you to "roll your own" in every way imaginable.

What else is there to get????

Only an influx of new users can help that imho. Oh, that's being bashed on too