Paintball

[Dusty Bottoms]

Originally Posted by maggot

Compare this to the badass guns of the 90's: Eclipse cockers and mags, High end BBT cockers. Some. of these still sell for close to what their original retail price was.

Not really. Nothing really holds value in paintball, save for a few very rarifide guns. I see plenty of awesome custom cockers on the sales forums that sell for a fraction of their original cost. I like mags, and its funny to me that a bone stock Automag RT can be had for $150-200 depending on condition, and that was a $800 gun in '96-'98. If you factor in inflation since back then it would look even worse.

Even fully equipped Eclipse RT's or Minimag's MAY fetch $300-400, for what were $1000+ guns factory new back in the day.

To me it's awesome because now these guns are within my feeble reach!

People who look at a paintball gun collection as an 'investment' are for the most part dreaming.

[Axel]

The only common gun I can think of off-hand that increased in value from the retail price is the SMG-68. Factor in inflation and I'm not even sure if that's true.

[Lead-Foot]

Can you do dye matrix's now?

[DocsMachine]

Actually, up until somewhere around 2002 or 2003, most markers held their value reasonably well.

As of '99 or 2K, a decently-equipped slide-trigger 'Cocker was still worth $300 or more. In somewhere around 2000 or so, I bought an LED Angel as a box of parts, for something like $450, and I thought I got a deal! (Working LEDs were still selling for $600 to $800 in good shape.)

Two things, in my opinion, killed the resale market: One, the aforementioned "gun-o'-the-month" thing, implemented by (among others) Bob Long with the early Intimidator variants, and later picked up by WDP who were trying to cash in on the "specialty Angel" market that had been previously exploited by third-party shops like Adrenalin and Eclipse.

And second, the advent of reasonably good quality budget markers like the Ion. Previous to the Ion, the budget marker market consisted of cheap blowbacks (Spyders and various clones) and Tippmanns- which while reliable, were fairly large and relatively speaking, heavy. Ions (and later, others in the same price range) gave you a reliable E-marker with eyes and tourney modes (or "cheat modes", depending on your point of view ) in a lightweight package for a pretty decent price.

Once introduced, they started selling like hotcakes, and more than a few players started thinking, hey, why should I blow $800 on this used Electroblastemflatter, when I can get a brand-new Ion for $200?

So much like anything else- especially electronics like iPhones and laptops- don't buy it hoping to useit for a couple of years and then resell it for 90% of what you paid. You might be able to do that with a house or certain rare sportscars, but not paintball guns.

Doc.

[Painthappy]

What Doc said above is exactly what I feel happened. There was a technology boom. The prices were high, but at the same time killed the mech market. Sure one offs still held their value, but a generic autococker that wasn't ebladed wasn't worth anything so-to-speak.

New model years (a new one every year) definitely force down the price of the older models. Another factor that we haven't accounted for is the phasing out of the parts issue. The older models stopped being serviced by the company. This made the parts expensive (rare), but the guns cheap.

right now it's cheaper for me to buy a 2005 eclipse ego for the solenoid, then to actually go out and find and buy a new solenoid.

A little off track, but the point is, with the parent company no longer caring about one of their guns, they've disavowed it, and forced the price down, as the gun is now obsolete.

Now the Eclipse Ego has definitely become one of my favorite guns. But as someone with disposable income (who can afford their new stuff), I have a hard time paying for a new gun right now when their 2008's sell for $350 or so right now.

The 2008 compared to the new gun (at least to me) is the same thing. Sure an eclipse expert can point out a few differences, but I don't see them when I'm looking on my own and don't know enough about those differences. Maybe it's a marketing thing that eclipse is missing out on?

Then there are the colors. I'm not a fan of all the funky colors. I like them plain and in black. Eclipse caught on eventually and started offering them all in black now along with the colors. Dangerous Power (for example) with their Rev-i, did not do that. There were only specific colors, you had no choice but to get some color on the gun, and I feel that was a poor marketing decision and I believe partially the sales of that gun reflect that decision.

Lastly: Competition. There needs to be competition. I think competition is what makes a gun better. What I mean is this; Think of the autococker. It spawned 20 different companies making better pneumatics, grip frames, bolts, bodies, etc, etc. They could do this because the gun was NOT constantly changing. WGP still sold the guns, and the players could get the upgrades they wanted.

Now the guns change so often, and they are so customized in colors, that putting on add-ons are near impossible. Sure there is no one making new whatevers, so you must buy from the company, but I honestly think this hurts the gun company in the long run.


... I could keep rambling, but for value to be retained, old guns needs to be serviced by the company, the gun of the month idea needs to go, and companies need to allow competition.

[Lohman446]

I think one of the overlooked things is the cost of adding a "year" to the marker. A Matrix before the DM___ series was a Matrix. An Automag of whatever flavor was an automag. There was no E-mag2000 and then E-mag2001. No marketing about why this years color was a better marker then last years (for that matter there was no color change).

Once you started putting a year in there you created a situation where yearly depreciation was to be expected. Where an Automag 68 from 1995 was the same as one from 1993 there was a major (perceived) difference between a DM3 and a DM5.

That being said with AGD in particular the value of new mags was influenced by the existance of an excess of used ones in the market. If I purchased a mag in 1995 I had no reason to buy a new one in 1996. With those who are paying their own way to be "at a high level" in the sport there is a stigma with using last years marker in today's environment. "OMG you are so the suxxors, thats a DM8. You should have a DM12"

[elraido]

They realized what the car industry realized in the 50's. Make constant changes to a product so people will rebuy it later on because the old one will look outdated. Apple does it with their iphone as well. It is a good business model if you can keep updating things just enough to make people think there is a decent change....and over time the little changes do add up to large changes.

[No Mercy Ever]

Although this doesn't have anything to do with the value of the 05 and 06 models in the first couple of years, partially why they have dropped sub $200 in the most recent years is because when PE was introducing the GEO, they gave people a $250 trade in value if they sent in an 05 or 06. Either or both may be worth closer to $250 or even $200 now, if only PE hadn't done that. Afterall, nothing devalues the worth of an item when the parent company/manufacturer sets it's value at a certain price.

[Hobbes]

I think it may be because the 07 model is significantly more desirable than the 05/06. They really made a big jump IMO in terms of pretty much perfecting the Ego at that point.

[Marmaduke]

Originally Posted by elraido

They realized what the car industry realized in the 50's. Make constant changes to a product so people will rebuy it later on because the old one will look outdated. Apple does it with their iphone as well. It is a good business model if you can keep updating things just enough to make people think there is a decent change....and over time the little changes do add up to large changes.

The only exception to this is that PE didn't release an Ego12. I think that has helped Ego resale.