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"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

It came second out of 3 people.

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Richoa said..

HappyG said..
Here we go again:
Hang it on BWS - Good Kites awesome in waves.
Hang it on Switch - Quality initiailly really good and cheap.
Buzz Kites - Jesus Shocking name guys and graphics really poor - Get a better web master and a good graphic designer and put your head down like BWS and Switch and make the brand work.

I will tell you I have ridden everything and I now ride BWS (I am not sponsored - I pay for everything). These kites are sadly underated. In Europe and the States the kite surfing (Wave Kiting) fraternity swear by them. I ride them with a TT and are smooth as F@#K. With a surfboard I have to say they are the best I have ever ridden and are way better than Ozone and North (I have had wave kites from both brands).

I have recently purchased Aneema's second hand from Seabreeze 13m, 9m, 7m... I have an Evo 5ft 3in Firewire and the 13 metre and 9 metre on this board from 12 - 25 knots for my size is awesome (I will review this setup in the next couple of weeks) the new bar from BWS is also going to be reviewed.

So I think everyone do what the Japanese do and support the different for once. Apple computers originally where the "buzz kites" of the computer world and look what happened there.

Got to bring this back to earth in my mind!
Apple and Buzz kites the same, that's a big reach.

Pretty sure apple have their own design and coding, its not a rebadged Microsoft product. actually I think apple claim Microsoft stole theirs

Bws and Buzz, marketing wise cant see the same originality and passion driven effort there either.


The only original thing they have done is to put a guy (Tom) on a low budget video make and would agree unfair some of the punters are ripping into him for his riding. That I would agree is harsh and id be guessing a personal agenda.

Richoa you are right I was wrong.

Just giving them credit for giving it a go. Like I said I ride BWS...

History is a funny thing though... I think there was a device that had a ball that you could scroll around the screen and then hit a select button to grab and point to code. I believe IBM developed it. I think a guy called "Steve Jobs" saw it and had another idea.

Design and execution is the difference between a great product and a bad product. Thats why Steve Jobs grabbed Jonathon Ive with both hands when he met him (Apple Imac)... the rest his history....

Yes Microsoft stole windows the concept not the operating software. Steve Jobs employed a young programmer for a while called "Bill Gates". There has been conjecture about that for a long time.

I have to say Steve Wozniak wrote the best bit of coding EVER. Thats why Apple is where it is at the people behind the flash and marketing if you have that passion and brilliance everything goes right.

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littlewing said..
naish slash, cabrinha chaos, slingshot rpm, switch nitro, fone bandit, ozone edge etc or a buzz harmony?

Naish park, Cabrinha drifter, Switch element, Airush Varial... Names, colours and graphics are always a matter of personal taste as you can hopefully appreciate. As the reviews here state, this kite is one that works in perfect harmony with the kiter and the wind, so its' name describes it well. :)

resale value * resale value * resale value * resale value !! FFS

If you want resale value, get a Flysurfer kite. They hold their price in weight alone, and for years longer than any LEI!

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Buzz Kites (Lee) said..
Hi Guys and thanks for the feedback on our Brand and Marketing. Many of you have yet to ride the kites and I will be interested to hear more from you when you have had that experience.
I am the CEO and founder of this company and I love this sport so be assured that I have the best interests of kiters and the sport of kite surfing in mind. I've done many sports over many years, but kiting is by far my favourite so when I had the opportunity to start a business in line with my passion, I jumped at it. It's almost been year since our first stock arrived and we are still here and growing stronger every day as people get to ride our gear, buy it and support it.
We also have expanded outside Australia and so we are building solid international support. This has been possible only because the gear delivers great performance.
I hope you don't mind if I address some of the points raised here:
"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

"Brand bashing of other brands" The web site points out a little-known fact - that a couple of major brands are owned by huge international Chinese companies and Swiss investors. Some people don't want to know this, and others do. I think it's important to know when huge profit driven corporations are creeping into a sport because we know how things go when corporations start to run things.and it's generally not well.
"Kite only package expensive" The challenge in this industry is as follows: The kite shops want to sell at a high price and a buy at a low wholesale price so they can make a good margin on the products they sell. That's fair enough as it enables them to stay in business. We have tried to give them the chance to support the brand, but very little support has been forthcoming. For those shops that did stock us, we had to show high prices on our web site so that those kiters that bought from them could see that if they bought directly there was no savings. In reality, the gear offers good value and that's why people are buying it. Talk to your local distributor or stockist and see what prices they can give you.
"unknown durability" This kite is made in a factory that has been making kites since 1998. It's made using good quality material and has a high build quality. Before we launched we got some of the country's top gear repairers to double checked over the build for any weak points. They found them to be very well made kites which will last as well as other top quality kites.
"A b grade website"Start ups are capital intensive and there has to be some savings somewhere. We had plans to upgrade it this year which we are now executing. "2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated."2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated if they wish.
"unknown long-term support" - One of the things we do for our customers is to provide low-cost spare parts and we have them available from our Sydney Warehouse. We want those see people back out on the water ASAP if they break something and we don't want to hold them to ransom for parts.more the opposite!
"Switch kites are in their 6-7th gen kited now" As some people know, this kite has come from 12 years of development of the Griffin kites. It's the same as the AX kite but with a different brand. The Griffin kites are only available on consignment at the moment, and in fact that's one of the reasons this brand started. Because Chris' design was awesome and we wanted to make his excellent kite available to more people. So we licensed his design. He's happy and you get to use the result of the culmination of his many years of dedicated hard work.
"another one bites the dust" We are a year on. Our overheads are very low. We have capital behind us and growing support. We have a enthusiastic nationwide team of wonderful people behind this brand. We will keep refining, innovating and developing while loving the adventurous kite trips we have together.
I know that no matter what we say or don't say, do or don't do, there will be people who go out of their way to find fault in it. That's not our problem or concern. As they say, it's not the critic that counts. We will focus instead on doing our very best to serve you - the kiting community.

Hi Lee

I'm responding to try clarify where people might see the issues and perhaps give some friendly advice. I run my own company (non-kiting related) so, based on my experience I'll try point out some flaws in your plans and perhaps give you some advice on how to rectify them rather than being the angel of death.

First off, you're selling kites at premium pricing. I get that, there is nothing wrong with trying to enter the market at the premium end but there are some flaws in your approach:

If you enter into the market on the premium end, you have to actually portray premium branding. That means the website has to be impeccable, the photos impeccable, the videos impeccable. First impressions count, and the first impressions with your website aren't great to be honest. When people look at a brand, it doesn't scream premium, it screams "mates who created a kite store to fund their kiting".

The photos look like they were taken by someone who doesn't do photography, the videos look like they were taking by someone on an iPhone and the website looks like you got a b grade template.

Some of these are easy fixes, if you go to wix.com, you can pick up a decent modern website template for $12/month, hardly the sort of overheads that are going to break the bank. Have a look at www.wix.com/website/templates?criteria=yellow&page=1 and you'll see an assortment of yellow sites that you can get free with the wax subscription and you can edit yourself. It even provides mobile templates so when you pick a site, it will give you a professional looking mobile version. Voila, all of a sudden you look 10x more professional.

For the photography side, find someone who actually knows photography and get them to do proper product shots, trade a kite for free photos or something that will get you the outcome at low cost. Go to airtasker and show them what you want and you might find a student who is cash strapped. Again, if you want to see premium, you have to portray premium. For rider profiles, you need a better quality photo. Some of them look like they were taken with a Nokia 2110. There is also no consistency in the photos. Different mixes of colours, different resolutions etc

For videos it may be harder, not my specialisation, but I would suggest getting a better quality of video done, maybe find some video students from uni.

Now, my concerns on the bar. Yes, it works, but it's not premium and that's the brand direction you're going for. You're either premium or you are cheap and simple, you can't be expensive and simple unless you have a brand name behind you already. Apple can go for expensive and simple, Nike, etc. They all have established brands, but for your company to go premium, I'd expect you to be marketing a premium bar and sorry to say, your bar isn't premium. It's not a BMW of bars, it's the daihatsu or hyundai of bars right now. If you want to go simple and still be premium, it has some have something unique, some level of innovation that grabs people's attention. Or it has to be so damn perfect that simple is all it needs to be. Sorry to say, yours doesn't fall into that category.

Now, on to the marketing approach. You've gone premium, I get that. I personally think it's extremely hard to get into the market via that approach, because you're an unknown. You can play on the Aussie brand thing, but to be honest, people will say they support Aussie, but what they really support is their back pockets. In reality, we are all a bunch of selfish hypocrites when it comes to the crunch. 99% of people will "give a sad emoji" to a photo of some kid dying of starvation and comment on how disgusting it is but about 5% of them will actually do anything to change it, put their own hard earned money to work to change it. People will say they don't want computers made by slave labour in China but they won't pay $5,000 for a laptop. They will do it for a bottle of shampoo thats organic because it costs $12, but not for a $2000 kite. That's reality unfortunately. Thats why switch and similar companies came in at the bottom end. They come in cheaper, try take some of the market share by accessing the lower end of the market that can't afford premium. They show people they can get the same quality kite for a lower price and then once you have built a reputation in the market, established a presence, proved yourself, you can afford to lift your pricing slightly. Thats my take on it. If you are worried about devaluing the price, find some way to get around it, offer trade in's that are over market value etc.

Finally, people can say that resale value isn't important, but for most kiters it is, if I buy a kite and replace it after 2 years and I can't get a decent price, that impacts my ability to buy another kite so resale is important. For people to spend 2-4 grand ever couple of years on a couple of kites is hard for a lot of people.

If they are as good as the hype suggests then sell them at a reasonable price and you will see a heap of converts. Kites on the water = new sales. Theres a heap of one brand getting flown around here and that is simply because people see them and assume they are the goods. Perfect example is Toyota. Yes you can get better cars but people go with what is "proven" and popular.

Select to expand quote

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..
Hi Guys and thanks for the feedback on our Brand and Marketing. Many of you have yet to ride the kites and I will be interested to hear more from you when you have had that experience.
I am the CEO and founder of this company and I love this sport so be assured that I have the best interests of kiters and the sport of kite surfing in mind. I've done many sports over many years, but kiting is by far my favourite so when I had the opportunity to start a business in line with my passion, I jumped at it. It's almost been year since our first stock arrived and we are still here and growing stronger every day as people get to ride our gear, buy it and support it.
We also have expanded outside Australia and so we are building solid international support. This has been possible only because the gear delivers great performance.
I hope you don't mind if I address some of the points raised here:
"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

"Brand bashing of other brands" The web site points out a little-known fact - that a couple of major brands are owned by huge international Chinese companies and Swiss investors. Some people don't want to know this, and others do. I think it's important to know when huge profit driven corporations are creeping into a sport because we know how things go when corporations start to run things.and it's generally not well.
"Kite only package expensive" The challenge in this industry is as follows: The kite shops want to sell at a high price and a buy at a low wholesale price so they can make a good margin on the products they sell. That's fair enough as it enables them to stay in business. We have tried to give them the chance to support the brand, but very little support has been forthcoming. For those shops that did stock us, we had to show high prices on our web site so that those kiters that bought from them could see that if they bought directly there was no savings. In reality, the gear offers good value and that's why people are buying it. Talk to your local distributor or stockist and see what prices they can give you.
"unknown durability" This kite is made in a factory that has been making kites since 1998. It's made using good quality material and has a high build quality. Before we launched we got some of the country's top gear repairers to double checked over the build for any weak points. They found them to be very well made kites which will last as well as other top quality kites.
"A b grade website"Start ups are capital intensive and there has to be some savings somewhere. We had plans to upgrade it this year which we are now executing. "2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated."2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated if they wish.
"unknown long-term support" - One of the things we do for our customers is to provide low-cost spare parts and we have them available from our Sydney Warehouse. We want those see people back out on the water ASAP if they break something and we don't want to hold them to ransom for parts.more the opposite!
"Switch kites are in their 6-7th gen kited now" As some people know, this kite has come from 12 years of development of the Griffin kites. It's the same as the AX kite but with a different brand. The Griffin kites are only available on consignment at the moment, and in fact that's one of the reasons this brand started. Because Chris' design was awesome and we wanted to make his excellent kite available to more people. So we licensed his design. He's happy and you get to use the result of the culmination of his many years of dedicated hard work.
"another one bites the dust" We are a year on. Our overheads are very low. We have capital behind us and growing support. We have a enthusiastic nationwide team of wonderful people behind this brand. We will keep refining, innovating and developing while loving the adventurous kite trips we have together.
I know that no matter what we say or don't say, do or don't do, there will be people who go out of their way to find fault in it. That's not our problem or concern. As they say, it's not the critic that counts. We will focus instead on doing our very best to serve you - the kiting community.

Hi Lee

I'm responding to try clarify where people might see the issues and perhaps give some friendly advice. I run my own company (non-kiting related) so, based on my experience I'll try point out some flaws in your plans and perhaps give you some advice on how to rectify them rather than being the angel of death.

First off, you're selling kites at premium pricing. I get that, there is nothing wrong with trying to enter the market at the premium end but there are some flaws in your approach:

If you enter into the market on the premium end, you have to actually portray premium branding. That means the website has to be impeccable, the photos impeccable, the videos impeccable. First impressions count, and the first impressions with your website aren't great to be honest. When people look at a brand, it doesn't scream premium, it screams "mates who created a kite store to fund their kiting".

The photos look like they were taken by someone who doesn't do photography, the videos look like they were taking by someone on an iPhone and the website looks like you got a b grade template.

Some of these are easy fixes, if you go to wix.com, you can pick up a decent modern website template for $12/month, hardly the sort of overheads that are going to break the bank. Have a look at www.wix.com/website/templates?criteria=yellow and you'll see an assortment of yellow sites that you can get free with the wax subscription and you can edit yourself. It even provides mobile templates so when you pick a site, it will give you a professional looking mobile version. Voila, all of a sudden you look 10x more professional.

For the photography side, find someone who actually knows photography and get them to do proper product shots, trade a kite for free photos or something that will get you the outcome at low cost. Go to airtasker and show them what you want and you might find a student who is cash strapped. Again, if you want to see premium, you have to portray premium. For rider profiles, you need a better quality photo. Some of them look like they were taken with a Nokia 2110. There is also no consistency in the photos. Different mixes of colours, different resolutions etc

For videos it may be harder, not my specialisation, but I would suggest getting a better quality of video done, maybe find some video students from uni.

Now, my concerns on the bar. Yes, it works, but it's not premium and that's the brand direction you're going for. You're either premium or you are cheap and simple, you can't be expensive and simple unless you have a brand name behind you already. Apple can go for expensive and simple, Nike, etc. They all have established brands, but for your company to go premium, I'd expect you to be marketing a premium bar and sorry to say, your bar isn't premium. It's not a BMW of bars, it's the daihatsu or hyundai of bars right now. If you want to go simple and still be premium, it has some have something unique, some level of innovation that grabs people's attention. Or it has to be so damn perfect that simple is all it needs to be. Sorry to say, yours doesn't fall into that category.

Now, on to the marketing approach. You've gone premium, I get that. I personally think it's extremely hard to get into the market via that approach, because you're an unknown. You can play on the Aussie brand thing, but to be honest, people will say they support Aussie, but what they really support is their back pockets. In reality, we are all a bunch of selfish hypocrites when it comes to the crunch. 99% of people will "give a sad emoji" to a photo of some kid dying of starvation and comment on how disgusting it is but about 5% of them will actually do anything to change it, put their own hard earned money to work to change it. People will say they don't want computers made by slave labour in China but they won't pay $5,000 for a laptop. They will do it for a bottle of shampoo thats organic because it costs $12, but not for a $2000 kite. That's reality unfortunately. Thats why switch and similar companies came in at the bottom end. They come in cheaper, try take some of the market share by accessing the lower end of the market that can't afford premium. They show people they can get the same quality kite for a lower price and then once you have built a reputation in the market, established a presence, proved yourself, you can afford to lift your pricing slightly. Thats my take on it. If you are worried about devaluing the price, find some way to get around it, offer trade in's that are over market value etc.

Finally, people can say that resale value isn't important, but for most kiters it is, if I buy a kite and replace it after 2 years and I can't get a decent price, that impacts my ability to buy another kite so resale is important. For people to spend 2-4 grand ever couple of years on a couple of kites is hard for a lot of people.

Wow - thanks so much for taking the time to write such a comprehensive response and for all your thoughts and ideas on how we can make this work better. (And for not being an angel of death! :) ) We really do appreciate it. Just to clarify a couple of points: - When deciding on pricing, we were influenced by our desire to sell through retailers. We were hoping they would support this brand, so we needed to price it in such a way as to offer them a decent margin. To do this, we looked through all the kite prices on many sites and settled on prices that were just below average at the time. We did not price the gear at premium prices. - It's been a real challenge to get decent videos done. The weather has been unsettled around Sydney, especially at the time when we had our first stock back last Feb. Even this season, it's very hard to plan for wind and sunshine and a good location and for models and photographers and top riders and everything to be in the same place when the weather is on. (Where's the Freo Doctor when you need him!) I don't have the budget required for a three-day shoot in a constantly windy location, but everything is teed up for a shoot - except of course the weather! - We have done about 4 iterations of the web site to get to this point and we are currently working on the fifth which should bring it up to speed. - We could make a premium bar, but the bar we have works perfectly well, is simple, easy to use, durable, comfortable and not a premium price. (well short of it actually!) We investigated a PU line because there are some that want this however instead of this, we make our spare parts inexpensive, so if lines require replacing, it is not going to be an issue at all.- We have collected a lot of much better photographs taken by some professionals, over the last 12 months (see below) showing what the gear is capable of. These will be included in the latest web site. (whoops one extra one sneaked in there and I don't know how to take it out!)Once again - thanks very much for your input! We will keep refining and tweaking what we do and listening to those who we serve.

Buzz kites are making huge profit the difference between distributor cost and retail sale for any other major brand is approximately 35 percent so cutting out the middleman and selling from the manufacturer buzz kites making a lot of money on kite sales in my opinion support your local stores and by the big brands

Pretty sure that Resale value is very important as we are spending quite a large sum of money on kites

I got to test out the Buzz Harmony 9m yesterday at the pond thanks to Andy. It's a great kite really light bar pressure and as it is a wave kite really responsive. It was great for carving turns. I would love to take it out in the waves one day I can imagine it would be perfect. Might also get Andy to lend me a C style buzz kite one day as this is what I'm used to riding at the pond. Anyway a bit of a limited review but the gear seems solid and makes me keen learn more about this brand.

There's only one "good" picture in there and I'm sure we all know which one. It's not good in a photography aspect. Just good subject matter.

Select to expand quote

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..
Hi Guys and thanks for the feedback on our Brand and Marketing. Many of you have yet to ride the kites and I will be interested to hear more from you when you have had that experience.
I am the CEO and founder of this company and I love this sport so be assured that I have the best interests of kiters and the sport of kite surfing in mind. I've done many sports over many years, but kiting is by far my favourite so when I had the opportunity to start a business in line with my passion, I jumped at it. It's almost been year since our first stock arrived and we are still here and growing stronger every day as people get to ride our gear, buy it and support it.
We also have expanded outside Australia and so we are building solid international support. This has been possible only because the gear delivers great performance.
I hope you don't mind if I address some of the points raised here:
"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

"Brand bashing of other brands" The web site points out a little-known fact - that a couple of major brands are owned by huge international Chinese companies and Swiss investors. Some people don't want to know this, and others do. I think it's important to know when huge profit driven corporations are creeping into a sport because we know how things go when corporations start to run things.and it's generally not well.
"Kite only package expensive" The challenge in this industry is as follows: The kite shops want to sell at a high price and a buy at a low wholesale price so they can make a good margin on the products they sell. That's fair enough as it enables them to stay in business. We have tried to give them the chance to support the brand, but very little support has been forthcoming. For those shops that did stock us, we had to show high prices on our web site so that those kiters that bought from them could see that if they bought directly there was no savings. In reality, the gear offers good value and that's why people are buying it. Talk to your local distributor or stockist and see what prices they can give you.
"unknown durability" This kite is made in a factory that has been making kites since 1998. It's made using good quality material and has a high build quality. Before we launched we got some of the country's top gear repairers to double checked over the build for any weak points. They found them to be very well made kites which will last as well as other top quality kites.
"A b grade website"Start ups are capital intensive and there has to be some savings somewhere. We had plans to upgrade it this year which we are now executing. "2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated."2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated if they wish.
"unknown long-term support" - One of the things we do for our customers is to provide low-cost spare parts and we have them available from our Sydney Warehouse. We want those see people back out on the water ASAP if they break something and we don't want to hold them to ransom for parts.more the opposite!
"Switch kites are in their 6-7th gen kited now" As some people know, this kite has come from 12 years of development of the Griffin kites. It's the same as the AX kite but with a different brand. The Griffin kites are only available on consignment at the moment, and in fact that's one of the reasons this brand started. Because Chris' design was awesome and we wanted to make his excellent kite available to more people. So we licensed his design. He's happy and you get to use the result of the culmination of his many years of dedicated hard work.
"another one bites the dust" We are a year on. Our overheads are very low. We have capital behind us and growing support. We have a enthusiastic nationwide team of wonderful people behind this brand. We will keep refining, innovating and developing while loving the adventurous kite trips we have together.
I know that no matter what we say or don't say, do or don't do, there will be people who go out of their way to find fault in it. That's not our problem or concern. As they say, it's not the critic that counts. We will focus instead on doing our very best to serve you - the kiting community.

Hi Lee

I'm responding to try clarify where people might see the issues and perhaps give some friendly advice. I run my own company (non-kiting related) so, based on my experience I'll try point out some flaws in your plans and perhaps give you some advice on how to rectify them rather than being the angel of death.

First off, you're selling kites at premium pricing. I get that, there is nothing wrong with trying to enter the market at the premium end but there are some flaws in your approach:

If you enter into the market on the premium end, you have to actually portray premium branding. That means the website has to be impeccable, the photos impeccable, the videos impeccable. First impressions count, and the first impressions with your website aren't great to be honest. When people look at a brand, it doesn't scream premium, it screams "mates who created a kite store to fund their kiting".

The photos look like they were taken by someone who doesn't do photography, the videos look like they were taking by someone on an iPhone and the website looks like you got a b grade template.

Some of these are easy fixes, if you go to wix.com, you can pick up a decent modern website template for $12/month, hardly the sort of overheads that are going to break the bank. Have a look at www.wix.com/website/templates?criteria=yellow and you'll see an assortment of yellow sites that you can get free with the wax subscription and you can edit yourself. It even provides mobile templates so when you pick a site, it will give you a professional looking mobile version. Voila, all of a sudden you look 10x more professional.

For the photography side, find someone who actually knows photography and get them to do proper product shots, trade a kite for free photos or something that will get you the outcome at low cost. Go to airtasker and show them what you want and you might find a student who is cash strapped. Again, if you want to see premium, you have to portray premium. For rider profiles, you need a better quality photo. Some of them look like they were taken with a Nokia 2110. There is also no consistency in the photos. Different mixes of colours, different resolutions etc

For videos it may be harder, not my specialisation, but I would suggest getting a better quality of video done, maybe find some video students from uni.

Now, my concerns on the bar. Yes, it works, but it's not premium and that's the brand direction you're going for. You're either premium or you are cheap and simple, you can't be expensive and simple unless you have a brand name behind you already. Apple can go for expensive and simple, Nike, etc. They all have established brands, but for your company to go premium, I'd expect you to be marketing a premium bar and sorry to say, your bar isn't premium. It's not a BMW of bars, it's the daihatsu or hyundai of bars right now. If you want to go simple and still be premium, it has some have something unique, some level of innovation that grabs people's attention. Or it has to be so damn perfect that simple is all it needs to be. Sorry to say, yours doesn't fall into that category.

Now, on to the marketing approach. You've gone premium, I get that. I personally think it's extremely hard to get into the market via that approach, because you're an unknown. You can play on the Aussie brand thing, but to be honest, people will say they support Aussie, but what they really support is their back pockets. In reality, we are all a bunch of selfish hypocrites when it comes to the crunch. 99% of people will "give a sad emoji" to a photo of some kid dying of starvation and comment on how disgusting it is but about 5% of them will actually do anything to change it, put their own hard earned money to work to change it. People will say they don't want computers made by slave labour in China but they won't pay $5,000 for a laptop. They will do it for a bottle of shampoo thats organic because it costs $12, but not for a $2000 kite. That's reality unfortunately. Thats why switch and similar companies came in at the bottom end. They come in cheaper, try take some of the market share by accessing the lower end of the market that can't afford premium. They show people they can get the same quality kite for a lower price and then once you have built a reputation in the market, established a presence, proved yourself, you can afford to lift your pricing slightly. Thats my take on it. If you are worried about devaluing the price, find some way to get around it, offer trade in's that are over market value etc.

Finally, people can say that resale value isn't important, but for most kiters it is, if I buy a kite and replace it after 2 years and I can't get a decent price, that impacts my ability to buy another kite so resale is important. For people to spend 2-4 grand ever couple of years on a couple of kites is hard for a lot of people.

Wow - thanks so much for taking the time to write such a comprehensive response and for all your thoughts and ideas on how we can make this work better. (And for not being an angel of death! :) ) We really do appreciate it. Just to clarify a couple of points: - When deciding on pricing, we were influenced by our desire to sell through retailers. We were hoping they would support this brand, so we needed to price it in such a way as to offer them a decent margin. To do this, we looked through all the kite prices on many sites and settled on prices that were just below average at the time. We did not price the gear at premium prices. - It's been a real challenge to get decent videos done. The weather has been unsettled around Sydney, especially at the time when we had our first stock back last Feb. Even this season, it's very hard to plan for wind and sunshine and a good location and for models and photographers and top riders and everything to be in the same place when the weather is on. (Where's the Freo Doctor when you need him!) I don't have the budget required for a three-day shoot in a constantly windy location, but everything is teed up for a shoot - except of course the weather! - We have done about 4 iterations of the web site to get to this point and we are currently working on the fifth which should bring it up to speed. - We could make a premium bar, but the bar we have works perfectly well, is simple, easy to use, durable, comfortable and not a premium price. (well short of it actually!) We investigated a PU line because there are some that want this however instead of this, we make our spare parts inexpensive, so if lines require replacing, it is not going to be an issue at all.- We have collected a lot of much better photographs taken by some professionals, over the last 12 months (see below) showing what the gear is capable of. These will be included in the latest web site. (whoops one extra one sneaked in there and I don't know how to take it out!)Once again - thanks very much for your input! We will keep refining and tweaking what we do and listening to those who we serve.

I'll repeat my previous post:

7 M Harmony Kite only $A1567 (Special offer = free postage)
2018 7M North Dice $1,579.00
2018 7M Naish Pivot $1,499.00

Switch, who are more established than you are selling a 7m direct for $906, $650 cheaper. I can get a switch kite with a bar for less than the cost of your kite, and their bar has a PU line coating. That's some perspective for you.

You're also more expensive than the Naish Pivot and about 12 bucks cheaper than the 2018 North Dice. Sorry, you may not think you are premium, but that puts you in premium territory.

Now have a look at northkites.com and have a look at naishkites.com, compare it with your website, pictures, videos and tell me if you were a person who was new to kiting, didn't know any of the brands, which one you would rather buy? I'm not trying to be nasty here, I'm being brutally honest.

As for the photos above, those aren't professional photos. That's a friend with a DSLR. Any pro worth their weight in salt would produce far better photos than this. I do sports photography so I can tell you that emphatically, the time of day is wrong (any pro would know that), position of rider to the sun is wrong (any pro would know that) and the quality is mediocre. The white balance on the first is terrible, the faces are all shaded, etc. And before you ask, no, this isn't an attempt to drum up work, I don't do paid photo work, I have new kites and I don't have time with my business, it's simply pointing out the obvious.

Select to expand quote

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..
Hi Guys and thanks for the feedback on our Brand and Marketing. Many of you have yet to ride the kites and I will be interested to hear more from you when you have had that experience.
I am the CEO and founder of this company and I love this sport so be assured that I have the best interests of kiters and the sport of kite surfing in mind. I've done many sports over many years, but kiting is by far my favourite so when I had the opportunity to start a business in line with my passion, I jumped at it. It's almost been year since our first stock arrived and we are still here and growing stronger every day as people get to ride our gear, buy it and support it.
We also have expanded outside Australia and so we are building solid international support. This has been possible only because the gear delivers great performance.
I hope you don't mind if I address some of the points raised here:
"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

"Brand bashing of other brands" The web site points out a little-known fact - that a couple of major brands are owned by huge international Chinese companies and Swiss investors. Some people don't want to know this, and others do. I think it's important to know when huge profit driven corporations are creeping into a sport because we know how things go when corporations start to run things.and it's generally not well.
"Kite only package expensive" The challenge in this industry is as follows: The kite shops want to sell at a high price and a buy at a low wholesale price so they can make a good margin on the products they sell. That's fair enough as it enables them to stay in business. We have tried to give them the chance to support the brand, but very little support has been forthcoming. For those shops that did stock us, we had to show high prices on our web site so that those kiters that bought from them could see that if they bought directly there was no savings. In reality, the gear offers good value and that's why people are buying it. Talk to your local distributor or stockist and see what prices they can give you.
"unknown durability" This kite is made in a factory that has been making kites since 1998. It's made using good quality material and has a high build quality. Before we launched we got some of the country's top gear repairers to double checked over the build for any weak points. They found them to be very well made kites which will last as well as other top quality kites.
"A b grade website"Start ups are capital intensive and there has to be some savings somewhere. We had plans to upgrade it this year which we are now executing. "2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated."2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated if they wish.
"unknown long-term support" - One of the things we do for our customers is to provide low-cost spare parts and we have them available from our Sydney Warehouse. We want those see people back out on the water ASAP if they break something and we don't want to hold them to ransom for parts.more the opposite!
"Switch kites are in their 6-7th gen kited now" As some people know, this kite has come from 12 years of development of the Griffin kites. It's the same as the AX kite but with a different brand. The Griffin kites are only available on consignment at the moment, and in fact that's one of the reasons this brand started. Because Chris' design was awesome and we wanted to make his excellent kite available to more people. So we licensed his design. He's happy and you get to use the result of the culmination of his many years of dedicated hard work.
"another one bites the dust" We are a year on. Our overheads are very low. We have capital behind us and growing support. We have a enthusiastic nationwide team of wonderful people behind this brand. We will keep refining, innovating and developing while loving the adventurous kite trips we have together.
I know that no matter what we say or don't say, do or don't do, there will be people who go out of their way to find fault in it. That's not our problem or concern. As they say, it's not the critic that counts. We will focus instead on doing our very best to serve you - the kiting community.

Hi Lee

I'm responding to try clarify where people might see the issues and perhaps give some friendly advice. I run my own company (non-kiting related) so, based on my experience I'll try point out some flaws in your plans and perhaps give you some advice on how to rectify them rather than being the angel of death.

First off, you're selling kites at premium pricing. I get that, there is nothing wrong with trying to enter the market at the premium end but there are some flaws in your approach:

If you enter into the market on the premium end, you have to actually portray premium branding. That means the website has to be impeccable, the photos impeccable, the videos impeccable. First impressions count, and the first impressions with your website aren't great to be honest. When people look at a brand, it doesn't scream premium, it screams "mates who created a kite store to fund their kiting".

The photos look like they were taken by someone who doesn't do photography, the videos look like they were taking by someone on an iPhone and the website looks like you got a b grade template.

Some of these are easy fixes, if you go to wix.com, you can pick up a decent modern website template for $12/month, hardly the sort of overheads that are going to break the bank. Have a look at www.wix.com/website/templates?criteria=yellow&page=1 and you'll see an assortment of yellow sites that you can get free with the wax subscription and you can edit yourself. It even provides mobile templates so when you pick a site, it will give you a professional looking mobile version. Voila, all of a sudden you look 10x more professional.

For the photography side, find someone who actually knows photography and get them to do proper product shots, trade a kite for free photos or something that will get you the outcome at low cost. Go to airtasker and show them what you want and you might find a student who is cash strapped. Again, if you want to see premium, you have to portray premium. For rider profiles, you need a better quality photo. Some of them look like they were taken with a Nokia 2110. There is also no consistency in the photos. Different mixes of colours, different resolutions etc

For videos it may be harder, not my specialisation, but I would suggest getting a better quality of video done, maybe find some video students from uni.

Now, my concerns on the bar. Yes, it works, but it's not premium and that's the brand direction you're going for. You're either premium or you are cheap and simple, you can't be expensive and simple unless you have a brand name behind you already. Apple can go for expensive and simple, Nike, etc. They all have established brands, but for your company to go premium, I'd expect you to be marketing a premium bar and sorry to say, your bar isn't premium. It's not a BMW of bars, it's the daihatsu or hyundai of bars right now. If you want to go simple and still be premium, it has some have something unique, some level of innovation that grabs people's attention. Or it has to be so damn perfect that simple is all it needs to be. Sorry to say, yours doesn't fall into that category.

Now, on to the marketing approach. You've gone premium, I get that. I personally think it's extremely hard to get into the market via that approach, because you're an unknown. You can play on the Aussie brand thing, but to be honest, people will say they support Aussie, but what they really support is their back pockets. In reality, we are all a bunch of selfish hypocrites when it comes to the crunch. 99% of people will "give a sad emoji" to a photo of some kid dying of starvation and comment on how disgusting it is but about 5% of them will actually do anything to change it, put their own hard earned money to work to change it. People will say they don't want computers made by slave labour in China but they won't pay $5,000 for a laptop. They will do it for a bottle of shampoo thats organic because it costs $12, but not for a $2000 kite. That's reality unfortunately. Thats why switch and similar companies came in at the bottom end. They come in cheaper, try take some of the market share by accessing the lower end of the market that can't afford premium. They show people they can get the same quality kite for a lower price and then once you have built a reputation in the market, established a presence, proved yourself, you can afford to lift your pricing slightly. Thats my take on it. If you are worried about devaluing the price, find some way to get around it, offer trade in's that are over market value etc.

Finally, people can say that resale value isn't important, but for most kiters it is, if I buy a kite and replace it after 2 years and I can't get a decent price, that impacts my ability to buy another kite so resale is important. For people to spend 2-4 grand ever couple of years on a couple of kites is hard for a lot of people.

Wow - thanks so much for taking the time to write such a comprehensive response and for all your thoughts and ideas on how we can make this work better. (And for not being an angel of death! :) ) We really do appreciate it. Just to clarify a couple of points: - When deciding on pricing, we were influenced by our desire to sell through retailers. We were hoping they would support this brand, so we needed to price it in such a way as to offer them a decent margin. To do this, we looked through all the kite prices on many sites and settled on prices that were just below average at the time. We did not price the gear at premium prices. - It's been a real challenge to get decent videos done. The weather has been unsettled around Sydney, especially at the time when we had our first stock back last Feb. Even this season, it's very hard to plan for wind and sunshine and a good location and for models and photographers and top riders and everything to be in the same place when the weather is on. (Where's the Freo Doctor when you need him!) I don't have the budget required for a three-day shoot in a constantly windy location, but everything is teed up for a shoot - except of course the weather! - We have done about 4 iterations of the web site to get to this point and we are currently working on the fifth which should bring it up to speed. - We could make a premium bar, but the bar we have works perfectly well, is simple, easy to use, durable, comfortable and not a premium price. (well short of it actually!) We investigated a PU line because there are some that want this however instead of this, we make our spare parts inexpensive, so if lines require replacing, it is not going to be an issue at all.- We have collected a lot of much better photographs taken by some professionals, over the last 12 months (see below) showing what the gear is capable of. These will be included in the latest web site. (whoops one extra one sneaked in there and I don't know how to take it out!)Once again - thanks very much for your input! We will keep refining and tweaking what we do and listening to those who we serve.

I'll repeat my previous post:

7 M Harmony Kite only $A1567 (Special offer = free postage)
2018 7M North Dice $1,579.00
2018 7M Naish Pivot $1,499.00

Switch, who are more established than you are selling a 7m direct for $906, $650 cheaper. I can get a switch kite with a bar for less than the cost of your kite, and their bar has a PU line coating. That's some perspective for you.

You're also more expensive than the Naish Pivot and about 12 bucks cheaper than the 2018 North Dice. Sorry, you may not think you are premium, but that puts you in premium territory.

Now have a look at northkites.com and have a look at naishkites.com, compare it with your website, pictures, videos and tell me if you were a person who was new to kiting, didn't know any of the brands, which one you would rather buy? I'm not trying to be nasty here, I'm being brutally honest.

As for the photos above, those aren't professional photos. That's a friend with a DSLR. Any pro worth their weight in salt would produce far better photos than this. I do sports photography so I can tell you that emphatically, the time of day is wrong (any pro would know that), position of rider to the sun is wrong (any pro would know that) and the quality is mediocre. The white balance on the first is terrible, the faces are all shaded, etc. And before you ask, no, this isn't an attempt to drum up work, I don't do paid photo work, I have new kites and I don't have time with my business, it's simply pointing out the obvious.

Hey Saffer why do you care so much??, why don't you go for a kite, for someone with so many aspiring interests you sure have a lot of time on your hands

Select to expand quote

Falco said..

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..
Hi Guys and thanks for the feedback on our Brand and Marketing. Many of you have yet to ride the kites and I will be interested to hear more from you when you have had that experience.
I am the CEO and founder of this company and I love this sport so be assured that I have the best interests of kiters and the sport of kite surfing in mind. I've done many sports over many years, but kiting is by far my favourite so when I had the opportunity to start a business in line with my passion, I jumped at it. It's almost been year since our first stock arrived and we are still here and growing stronger every day as people get to ride our gear, buy it and support it.
We also have expanded outside Australia and so we are building solid international support. This has been possible only because the gear delivers great performance.
I hope you don't mind if I address some of the points raised here:
"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

"Brand bashing of other brands" The web site points out a little-known fact - that a couple of major brands are owned by huge international Chinese companies and Swiss investors. Some people don't want to know this, and others do. I think it's important to know when huge profit driven corporations are creeping into a sport because we know how things go when corporations start to run things.and it's generally not well.
"Kite only package expensive" The challenge in this industry is as follows: The kite shops want to sell at a high price and a buy at a low wholesale price so they can make a good margin on the products they sell. That's fair enough as it enables them to stay in business. We have tried to give them the chance to support the brand, but very little support has been forthcoming. For those shops that did stock us, we had to show high prices on our web site so that those kiters that bought from them could see that if they bought directly there was no savings. In reality, the gear offers good value and that's why people are buying it. Talk to your local distributor or stockist and see what prices they can give you.
"unknown durability" This kite is made in a factory that has been making kites since 1998. It's made using good quality material and has a high build quality. Before we launched we got some of the country's top gear repairers to double checked over the build for any weak points. They found them to be very well made kites which will last as well as other top quality kites.
"A b grade website"Start ups are capital intensive and there has to be some savings somewhere. We had plans to upgrade it this year which we are now executing. "2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated."2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated if they wish.
"unknown long-term support" - One of the things we do for our customers is to provide low-cost spare parts and we have them available from our Sydney Warehouse. We want those see people back out on the water ASAP if they break something and we don't want to hold them to ransom for parts.more the opposite!
"Switch kites are in their 6-7th gen kited now" As some people know, this kite has come from 12 years of development of the Griffin kites. It's the same as the AX kite but with a different brand. The Griffin kites are only available on consignment at the moment, and in fact that's one of the reasons this brand started. Because Chris' design was awesome and we wanted to make his excellent kite available to more people. So we licensed his design. He's happy and you get to use the result of the culmination of his many years of dedicated hard work.
"another one bites the dust" We are a year on. Our overheads are very low. We have capital behind us and growing support. We have a enthusiastic nationwide team of wonderful people behind this brand. We will keep refining, innovating and developing while loving the adventurous kite trips we have together.
I know that no matter what we say or don't say, do or don't do, there will be people who go out of their way to find fault in it. That's not our problem or concern. As they say, it's not the critic that counts. We will focus instead on doing our very best to serve you - the kiting community.

Hi Lee

I'm responding to try clarify where people might see the issues and perhaps give some friendly advice. I run my own company (non-kiting related) so, based on my experience I'll try point out some flaws in your plans and perhaps give you some advice on how to rectify them rather than being the angel of death.

First off, you're selling kites at premium pricing. I get that, there is nothing wrong with trying to enter the market at the premium end but there are some flaws in your approach:

If you enter into the market on the premium end, you have to actually portray premium branding. That means the website has to be impeccable, the photos impeccable, the videos impeccable. First impressions count, and the first impressions with your website aren't great to be honest. When people look at a brand, it doesn't scream premium, it screams "mates who created a kite store to fund their kiting".

The photos look like they were taken by someone who doesn't do photography, the videos look like they were taking by someone on an iPhone and the website looks like you got a b grade template.

Some of these are easy fixes, if you go to wix.com, you can pick up a decent modern website template for $12/month, hardly the sort of overheads that are going to break the bank. Have a look at www.wix.com/website/templates?criteria=yellow&page=1 and you'll see an assortment of yellow sites that you can get free with the wax subscription and you can edit yourself. It even provides mobile templates so when you pick a site, it will give you a professional looking mobile version. Voila, all of a sudden you look 10x more professional.

For the photography side, find someone who actually knows photography and get them to do proper product shots, trade a kite for free photos or something that will get you the outcome at low cost. Go to airtasker and show them what you want and you might find a student who is cash strapped. Again, if you want to see premium, you have to portray premium. For rider profiles, you need a better quality photo. Some of them look like they were taken with a Nokia 2110. There is also no consistency in the photos. Different mixes of colours, different resolutions etc

For videos it may be harder, not my specialisation, but I would suggest getting a better quality of video done, maybe find some video students from uni.

Now, my concerns on the bar. Yes, it works, but it's not premium and that's the brand direction you're going for. You're either premium or you are cheap and simple, you can't be expensive and simple unless you have a brand name behind you already. Apple can go for expensive and simple, Nike, etc. They all have established brands, but for your company to go premium, I'd expect you to be marketing a premium bar and sorry to say, your bar isn't premium. It's not a BMW of bars, it's the daihatsu or hyundai of bars right now. If you want to go simple and still be premium, it has some have something unique, some level of innovation that grabs people's attention. Or it has to be so damn perfect that simple is all it needs to be. Sorry to say, yours doesn't fall into that category.

Now, on to the marketing approach. You've gone premium, I get that. I personally think it's extremely hard to get into the market via that approach, because you're an unknown. You can play on the Aussie brand thing, but to be honest, people will say they support Aussie, but what they really support is their back pockets. In reality, we are all a bunch of selfish hypocrites when it comes to the crunch. 99% of people will "give a sad emoji" to a photo of some kid dying of starvation and comment on how disgusting it is but about 5% of them will actually do anything to change it, put their own hard earned money to work to change it. People will say they don't want computers made by slave labour in China but they won't pay $5,000 for a laptop. They will do it for a bottle of shampoo thats organic because it costs $12, but not for a $2000 kite. That's reality unfortunately. Thats why switch and similar companies came in at the bottom end. They come in cheaper, try take some of the market share by accessing the lower end of the market that can't afford premium. They show people they can get the same quality kite for a lower price and then once you have built a reputation in the market, established a presence, proved yourself, you can afford to lift your pricing slightly. Thats my take on it. If you are worried about devaluing the price, find some way to get around it, offer trade in's that are over market value etc.

Finally, people can say that resale value isn't important, but for most kiters it is, if I buy a kite and replace it after 2 years and I can't get a decent price, that impacts my ability to buy another kite so resale is important. For people to spend 2-4 grand ever couple of years on a couple of kites is hard for a lot of people.

Wow - thanks so much for taking the time to write such a comprehensive response and for all your thoughts and ideas on how we can make this work better. (And for not being an angel of death! :) ) We really do appreciate it. Just to clarify a couple of points: - When deciding on pricing, we were influenced by our desire to sell through retailers. We were hoping they would support this brand, so we needed to price it in such a way as to offer them a decent margin. To do this, we looked through all the kite prices on many sites and settled on prices that were just below average at the time. We did not price the gear at premium prices. - It's been a real challenge to get decent videos done. The weather has been unsettled around Sydney, especially at the time when we had our first stock back last Feb. Even this season, it's very hard to plan for wind and sunshine and a good location and for models and photographers and top riders and everything to be in the same place when the weather is on. (Where's the Freo Doctor when you need him!) I don't have the budget required for a three-day shoot in a constantly windy location, but everything is teed up for a shoot - except of course the weather! - We have done about 4 iterations of the web site to get to this point and we are currently working on the fifth which should bring it up to speed. - We could make a premium bar, but the bar we have works perfectly well, is simple, easy to use, durable, comfortable and not a premium price. (well short of it actually!) We investigated a PU line because there are some that want this however instead of this, we make our spare parts inexpensive, so if lines require replacing, it is not going to be an issue at all.- We have collected a lot of much better photographs taken by some professionals, over the last 12 months (see below) showing what the gear is capable of. These will be included in the latest web site. (whoops one extra one sneaked in there and I don't know how to take it out!)Once again - thanks very much for your input! We will keep refining and tweaking what we do and listening to those who we serve.

I'll repeat my previous post:

7 M Harmony Kite only $A1567 (Special offer = free postage)
2018 7M North Dice $1,579.00
2018 7M Naish Pivot $1,499.00

Switch, who are more established than you are selling a 7m direct for $906, $650 cheaper. I can get a switch kite with a bar for less than the cost of your kite, and their bar has a PU line coating. That's some perspective for you.

You're also more expensive than the Naish Pivot and about 12 bucks cheaper than the 2018 North Dice. Sorry, you may not think you are premium, but that puts you in premium territory.

Now have a look at northkites.com and have a look at naishkites.com, compare it with your website, pictures, videos and tell me if you were a person who was new to kiting, didn't know any of the brands, which one you would rather buy? I'm not trying to be nasty here, I'm being brutally honest.

As for the photos above, those aren't professional photos. That's a friend with a DSLR. Any pro worth their weight in salt would produce far better photos than this. I do sports photography so I can tell you that emphatically, the time of day is wrong (any pro would know that), position of rider to the sun is wrong (any pro would know that) and the quality is mediocre. The white balance on the first is terrible, the faces are all shaded, etc. And before you ask, no, this isn't an attempt to drum up work, I don't do paid photo work, I have new kites and I don't have time with my business, it's simply pointing out the obvious.

Hey Saffer why do you care so much??, why don't you go for a kite, for someone with so many aspiring interests you sure have a lot of time on your hands

I wrote it in the lounge at the airport flying back to Melbourne. At least I'm trying to help. What are you doing?

Enjoying life!! ...........

The truth is all the haters really want a Buzz/Griffin kite - they are just trying to drive the price down.
It would be nicer just to contact Buzz direct and negotiate.
Otherwise waste your time elsewhere or keep giving Buzz kites free promotion here.

Haha epic!!

Forum open Mr Buzz!! How much super hater price for a 9m?

I'm not sure I get it. Kites are available through Griffin directly through their website. The prices as I recall are similar to a Switch, maybe a bit more but similar
. Why bother with the Buzz when you can just buy the Argox directly from Griffin?
I was just in contact with Griffin a few weeks ago and all seemed well.
Just go to their site, what's the buzz all about?

Select to expand quote

gorgemay said..
I'm not sure I get it. Kites are available through Griffin directly through their website. The prices as I recall are similar to a Switch, maybe a bit more but similar
. Why bother with the Buzz when you can just buy the Argox directly from Griffin?
I was just in contact with Griffin a few weeks ago and all seemed well.
Just go to their site, what's the buzz all about?

Hi, Actually Chris (who founded the Griffin brand) is a friend of mine. I started Buzz kites after a conversation with him in July 2016. You see, I've been flying his kites for about 6 years and I was at his place picking up a 17M kite on my way to Bali. I asked him what his plans were for the coming season. He told me he had none as the financial backer behind his business has pulled out, so he had no capital to buy stock. I said "That's a shame as the AX is such a great kite. Maybe I can help out." After I came back, we had a few discussions and agreed that the best way forward was for me to start a new brand and license his design. So I started Buzz Kites.Chris doesn't really like the business side and prefers instead to concentrate on design and IT work. I like the business side. So we are working together and Chris is passing his orders on to me.
We have stock, we have spare parts, we have distributors, we have demo kites in most states and we can help out anyone who has an open mind and wants to demo our gear.I hope this clears up any confusion.

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bjw said..
Haha epic!!

Forum open Mr Buzz!! How much super hater price for a 9m?

I think it's best that you take one for a test ride and see if you like it. You can also take a closer look at the build quality. Then you can consider it's value to you and suggest a price you would be willing to pay. We are negotiable. If you would like to PM me your location in NSW, I can see if we can organize a ride for you through an ambassador or distributor.

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Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Saffer said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..
Hi Guys and thanks for the feedback on our Brand and Marketing. Many of you have yet to ride the kites and I will be interested to hear more from you when you have had that experience.
I am the CEO and founder of this company and I love this sport so be assured that I have the best interests of kiters and the sport of kite surfing in mind. I've done many sports over many years, but kiting is by far my favourite so when I had the opportunity to start a business in line with my passion, I jumped at it. It's almost been year since our first stock arrived and we are still here and growing stronger every day as people get to ride our gear, buy it and support it.
We also have expanded outside Australia and so we are building solid international support. This has been possible only because the gear delivers great performance.
I hope you don't mind if I address some of the points raised here:
"would only suit the casual punter/learner" - this kite was recently used for a second place in the NSW freestyle championships. It has consistently been used to jump over 10M. Because it has two different bridles it is also used in schools for teaching. It's also used by some of the country's top wave riders. So it's actually suitable for a wide range of kiters. You can see the kite in action here:

"Brand bashing of other brands" The web site points out a little-known fact - that a couple of major brands are owned by huge international Chinese companies and Swiss investors. Some people don't want to know this, and others do. I think it's important to know when huge profit driven corporations are creeping into a sport because we know how things go when corporations start to run things.and it's generally not well.
"Kite only package expensive" The challenge in this industry is as follows: The kite shops want to sell at a high price and a buy at a low wholesale price so they can make a good margin on the products they sell. That's fair enough as it enables them to stay in business. We have tried to give them the chance to support the brand, but very little support has been forthcoming. For those shops that did stock us, we had to show high prices on our web site so that those kiters that bought from them could see that if they bought directly there was no savings. In reality, the gear offers good value and that's why people are buying it. Talk to your local distributor or stockist and see what prices they can give you.
"unknown durability" This kite is made in a factory that has been making kites since 1998. It's made using good quality material and has a high build quality. Before we launched we got some of the country's top gear repairers to double checked over the build for any weak points. They found them to be very well made kites which will last as well as other top quality kites.
"A b grade website"Start ups are capital intensive and there has to be some savings somewhere. We had plans to upgrade it this year which we are now executing. "2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated."2010 bar" Simplicity and optimal functionality are our focus. If it works perfectly well then why mess with it? People can always spend more money on something more complicated if they wish.
"unknown long-term support" - One of the things we do for our customers is to provide low-cost spare parts and we have them available from our Sydney Warehouse. We want those see people back out on the water ASAP if they break something and we don't want to hold them to ransom for parts.more the opposite!
"Switch kites are in their 6-7th gen kited now" As some people know, this kite has come from 12 years of development of the Griffin kites. It's the same as the AX kite but with a different brand. The Griffin kites are only available on consignment at the moment, and in fact that's one of the reasons this brand started. Because Chris' design was awesome and we wanted to make his excellent kite available to more people. So we licensed his design. He's happy and you get to use the result of the culmination of his many years of dedicated hard work.
"another one bites the dust" We are a year on. Our overheads are very low. We have capital behind us and growing support. We have a enthusiastic nationwide team of wonderful people behind this brand. We will keep refining, innovating and developing while loving the adventurous kite trips we have together.
I know that no matter what we say or don't say, do or don't do, there will be people who go out of their way to find fault in it. That's not our problem or concern. As they say, it's not the critic that counts. We will focus instead on doing our very best to serve you - the kiting community.

Hi Lee

I'm responding to try clarify where people might see the issues and perhaps give some friendly advice. I run my own company (non-kiting related) so, based on my experience I'll try point out some flaws in your plans and perhaps give you some advice on how to rectify them rather than being the angel of death.

First off, you're selling kites at premium pricing. I get that, there is nothing wrong with trying to enter the market at the premium end but there are some flaws in your approach:

If you enter into the market on the premium end, you have to actually portray premium branding. That means the website has to be impeccable, the photos impeccable, the videos impeccable. First impressions count, and the first impressions with your website aren't great to be honest. When people look at a brand, it doesn't scream premium, it screams "mates who created a kite store to fund their kiting".

The photos look like they were taken by someone who doesn't do photography, the videos look like they were taking by someone on an iPhone and the website looks like you got a b grade template.

Some of these are easy fixes, if you go to wix.com, you can pick up a decent modern website template for $12/month, hardly the sort of overheads that are going to break the bank. Have a look at www.wix.com/website/templates?criteria=yellow&page=1 and you'll see an assortment of yellow sites that you can get free with the wax subscription and you can edit yourself. It even provides mobile templates so when you pick a site, it will give you a professional looking mobile version. Voila, all of a sudden you look 10x more professional.

For the photography side, find someone who actually knows photography and get them to do proper product shots, trade a kite for free photos or something that will get you the outcome at low cost. Go to airtasker and show them what you want and you might find a student who is cash strapped. Again, if you want to see premium, you have to portray premium. For rider profiles, you need a better quality photo. Some of them look like they were taken with a Nokia 2110. There is also no consistency in the photos. Different mixes of colours, different resolutions etc

For videos it may be harder, not my specialisation, but I would suggest getting a better quality of video done, maybe find some video students from uni.

Now, my concerns on the bar. Yes, it works, but it's not premium and that's the brand direction you're going for. You're either premium or you are cheap and simple, you can't be expensive and simple unless you have a brand name behind you already. Apple can go for expensive and simple, Nike, etc. They all have established brands, but for your company to go premium, I'd expect you to be marketing a premium bar and sorry to say, your bar isn't premium. It's not a BMW of bars, it's the daihatsu or hyundai of bars right now. If you want to go simple and still be premium, it has some have something unique, some level of innovation that grabs people's attention. Or it has to be so damn perfect that simple is all it needs to be. Sorry to say, yours doesn't fall into that category.

Now, on to the marketing approach. You've gone premium, I get that. I personally think it's extremely hard to get into the market via that approach, because you're an unknown. You can play on the Aussie brand thing, but to be honest, people will say they support Aussie, but what they really support is their back pockets. In reality, we are all a bunch of selfish hypocrites when it comes to the crunch. 99% of people will "give a sad emoji" to a photo of some kid dying of starvation and comment on how disgusting it is but about 5% of them will actually do anything to change it, put their own hard earned money to work to change it. People will say they don't want computers made by slave labour in China but they won't pay $5,000 for a laptop. They will do it for a bottle of shampoo thats organic because it costs $12, but not for a $2000 kite. That's reality unfortunately. Thats why switch and similar companies came in at the bottom end. They come in cheaper, try take some of the market share by accessing the lower end of the market that can't afford premium. They show people they can get the same quality kite for a lower price and then once you have built a reputation in the market, established a presence, proved yourself, you can afford to lift your pricing slightly. Thats my take on it. If you are worried about devaluing the price, find some way to get around it, offer trade in's that are over market value etc.

Finally, people can say that resale value isn't important, but for most kiters it is, if I buy a kite and replace it after 2 years and I can't get a decent price, that impacts my ability to buy another kite so resale is important. For people to spend 2-4 grand ever couple of years on a couple of kites is hard for a lot of people.

Wow - thanks so much for taking the time to write such a comprehensive response and for all your thoughts and ideas on how we can make this work better. (And for not being an angel of death! :) ) We really do appreciate it. Just to clarify a couple of points: - When deciding on pricing, we were influenced by our desire to sell through retailers. We were hoping they would support this brand, so we needed to price it in such a way as to offer them a decent margin. To do this, we looked through all the kite prices on many sites and settled on prices that were just below average at the time. We did not price the gear at premium prices. - It's been a real challenge to get decent videos done. The weather has been unsettled around Sydney, especially at the time when we had our first stock back last Feb. Even this season, it's very hard to plan for wind and sunshine and a good location and for models and photographers and top riders and everything to be in the same place when the weather is on. (Where's the Freo Doctor when you need him!) I don't have the budget required for a three-day shoot in a constantly windy location, but everything is teed up for a shoot - except of course the weather! - We have done about 4 iterations of the web site to get to this point and we are currently working on the fifth which should bring it up to speed. - We could make a premium bar, but the bar we have works perfectly well, is simple, easy to use, durable, comfortable and not a premium price. (well short of it actually!) We investigated a PU line because there are some that want this however instead of this, we make our spare parts inexpensive, so if lines require replacing, it is not going to be an issue at all.- We have collected a lot of much better photographs taken by some professionals, over the last 12 months (see below) showing what the gear is capable of. These will be included in the latest web site. (whoops one extra one sneaked in there and I don't know how to take it out!)Once again - thanks very much for your input! We will keep refining and tweaking what we do and listening to those who we serve.

I'll repeat my previous post:

7 M Harmony Kite only $A1567 (Special offer = free postage)
2018 7M North Dice $1,579.00
2018 7M Naish Pivot $1,499.00

Switch, who are more established than you are selling a 7m direct for $906, $650 cheaper. I can get a switch kite with a bar for less than the cost of your kite, and their bar has a PU line coating. That's some perspective for you.

You're also more expensive than the Naish Pivot and about 12 bucks cheaper than the 2018 North Dice. Sorry, you may not think you are premium, but that puts you in premium territory.

Now have a look at northkites.com and have a look at naishkites.com, compare it with your website, pictures, videos and tell me if you were a person who was new to kiting, didn't know any of the brands, which one you would rather buy? I'm not trying to be nasty here, I'm being brutally honest.

As for the photos above, those aren't professional photos. That's a friend with a DSLR. Any pro worth their weight in salt would produce far better photos than this. I do sports photography so I can tell you that emphatically, the time of day is wrong (any pro would know that), position of rider to the sun is wrong (any pro would know that) and the quality is mediocre. The white balance on the first is terrible, the faces are all shaded, etc. And before you ask, no, this isn't an attempt to drum up work, I don't do paid photo work, I have new kites and I don't have time with my business, it's simply pointing out the obvious.

Once again, your feedback may be direct and somewhat brutal, but it is appreciated. We are striving to do better.Keep an eye out for our new web site launching soon and then if you still feel you would like to help, then we would welcome your feedback. PM me any time. :)

So I just looked at the site for the first time. F@ck. If you have sold one item through that website alone I feel sorry for the parent who lent their dyslexic child their credit card.

I need to get a life and stop following this and so should all you haters.
Your talents or lack there of would be best elsewhere.
If I was Lee I would keep sucking you in for the free exposure.
I do not know Lee but am a solid Griffin Kite supporter for many years.
So in your negative minority view keep being haters or grow up.

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LittleFella said..
So I just looked at the site for the first time. F@ck. If you have sold one item through that website alone I feel sorry for the parent who lent their dyslexic child their credit card.

Hahaha yeap, +1 on that!

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warwickl said..
I need to get a life and stop following this and so should all you haters.
Your talents or lack there of would be best elsewhere.
If I was Lee I would keep sucking you in for the free exposure.
I do not know Lee but am a solid Griffin Kite supporter for many years.
So in your negative minority view keep being haters or grow up.

Probably because youve never riden and Ozone Enduro V2

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Chris_M said..

LittleFella said..
So I just looked at the site for the first time. F@ck. If you have sold one item through that website alone I feel sorry for the parent who lent their dyslexic child their credit card.

Hahaha yeap, +1 on that!

Here's your chance...Perhaps you'd care to share the URL of your own business' so we can see how it's done?

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Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Chris_M said..

LittleFella said..
So I just looked at the site for the first time. F@ck. If you have sold one item through that website alone I feel sorry for the parent who lent their dyslexic child their credit card.

Hahaha yeap, +1 on that!

Here's your chance...Perhaps you'd care to share the URL of your own business' so we can see how it's done?

come on man, dont pay out on potential customers, seems like common sense. Perhaps one time littlefella woulda been drinking, found his folks credit card and picked up a buzz kite

I bit the bullet and took the gamble and bought one from the web site.
Now my friends laugh at me when I launch my kite.
Its pretty cool though, it actually makes a "buzzzzzzzzzz" sound when you loop it.
I have attached a pic below.

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Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Chris_M said..

LittleFella said..
So I just looked at the site for the first time. F@ck. If you have sold one item through that website alone I feel sorry for the parent who lent their dyslexic child their credit card.

Hahaha yeap, +1 on that!

Here's your chance...Perhaps you'd care to share the URL of your own business' so we can see how it's done?

Nah mate look, all the best for your business and all. I always want to see the little guy win, but don't throw your toys when I agree with somebody that your website is a turd.

Take the feedback (like you said you appreciate) and get it sorted, or just don't listen to the feedback and carry on as you are.

What would I know about looking for kites and kite gear from kite company websites??? I just purchase most of my gear through them, don't own a kite business though so I guess that voids my opinion.

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Chris_M said..

Buzz Kites (Lee) said..

Chris_M said..

LittleFella said..
So I just looked at the site for the first time. F@ck. If you have sold one item through that website alone I feel sorry for the parent who lent their dyslexic child their credit card.

Hahaha yeap, +1 on that!

Here's your chance...Perhaps you'd care to share the URL of your own business' so we can see how it's done?

Nah mate look, all the best for your business and all. I always want to see the little guy win, but don't throw your toys when I agree with somebody that your website is a turd.

Take the feedback (like you said you appreciate) and get it sorted, or just don't listen to the feedback and carry on as you are.

What would I know about looking for kites and kite gear from kite company websites??? I just purchase most of my gear through them, don't own a kite business though so I guess that voids my opinion.

There is a big difference between helpful feedback, and flat out rude criticism. As I mentioned previously we are upgrading our website at the moment. Is that not enough for you guys on this topic?This post was originally about the kites which are reviewed as being pretty good.That is the basis on which we are building our business.We will refine the rest of what we do as time and funds permit.