All posts created by wookeywarn – Forums

# 7 years ago
wookeywarn Member	I think that's the end for me now. I have two orders to fulfil then I am going to pull these products from my offering. Sorry - it's just not costing in for me now.

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	This is verging on the ridiculous now. By all means go after people that violate your terms but please don't further reduce the quality to those of us that subscribe.

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	Sorry if am not being clear, I will try and clarify - 1) I cannot send a 1mp PNG to a client which has a list of things I 'will' change later such as a list of words that appear in stupid places that I will remove. This may seem acceptable but it really isn't - people expect a higher quality of service than that! I also incorporate clouds into wider designs and add custom backgrounds. A proof has to be a file that closely resembles the final design or its not a proof. 2) I use inkscape for exactly the purpose you describe BEFORE I send it (still in low res actually) to my client, or I then put it into photoshop to add a background or whatever I'm doing. If the client then comes back (actually they almost always do) to say they don't like a word where it is or can I make this bigger or this smaller or turn it around then I of course come back to Tagul to change the same design and then start the process again. Sometimes they decide they want to remove or add a word completely. Are you suggesting I do all of that manually in inkscape from now on to avoid more than one download - or are you saying inkscape does it all for me and I've missed it? 3) if I have a placemat at 23x19cm or a mug area of 8x20cm a standard 'rectangle' does not represent the design when I send it to a client. To try and mitigate that, I therefore created some different clipart rectangles which are more representable of the sizes but still do not come out as they will appear when resized. Not being funny but if I resize a rectangle as it comes out of tagul to 8x20cm I'm never going to sell it! It is not properly scaled in proportion and all squashed. Finally it is wholly incorrect to assume that each download equals a juicy £10+ profit (I wish!) the reality is that 80% of my downloaded designs in SVG never result in any income whatsoever - I spend many, many hours playing with different things, trying to make something new and unique. The cloud market in the UK is very saturated and looking on ebay yesterday most were on sale for £2.99 - I cannot match that even before the price hike! Some things such as fridge magnets and single coasters sell for a few pounds each because frankly you cannot charge more than that - even if the amount of work is the same - the client doesn't care! For those and many other reasons I think the new download cap will kill off much of your small business trade here but as you seem set on this model, it would at least help if Tagul could do some of the things upfront that require us to repeat download in the first place? Cheers Steph

# 8 years ago

wookeywarn

Member

Sorry if am not being clear, I will try and clarify -

1) I cannot send a 1mp PNG to a client which has a list of things I 'will' change later such as a list of words that appear in stupid places that I will remove. This may seem acceptable but it really isn't - people expect a higher quality of service than that! I also incorporate clouds into wider designs and add custom backgrounds. A proof has to be a file that closely resembles the final design or its not a proof.
2) I use inkscape for exactly the purpose you describe BEFORE I send it (still in low res actually) to my client, or I then put it into photoshop to add a background or whatever I'm doing. If the client then comes back (actually they almost always do) to say they don't like a word where it is or can I make this bigger or this smaller or turn it around then I of course come back to Tagul to change the same design and then start the process again. Sometimes they decide they want to remove or add a word completely. Are you suggesting I do all of that manually in inkscape from now on to avoid more than one download - or are you saying inkscape does it all for me and I've missed it?
3) if I have a placemat at 23x19cm or a mug area of 8x20cm a standard 'rectangle' does not represent the design when I send it to a client. To try and mitigate that, I therefore created some different clipart rectangles which are more representable of the sizes but still do not come out as they will appear when resized. Not being funny but if I resize a rectangle as it comes out of tagul to 8x20cm I'm never going to sell it! It is not properly scaled in proportion and all squashed.

Finally it is wholly incorrect to assume that each download equals a juicy £10+ profit (I wish!) the reality is that 80% of my downloaded designs in SVG never result in any income whatsoever - I spend many, many hours playing with different things, trying to make something new and unique. The cloud market in the UK is very saturated and looking on ebay yesterday most were on sale for £2.99 - I cannot match that even before the price hike! Some things such as fridge magnets and single coasters sell for a few pounds each because frankly you cannot charge more than that - even if the amount of work is the same - the client doesn't care!

For those and many other reasons I think the new download cap will kill off much of your small business trade here but as you seem set on this model, it would at least help if Tagul could do some of the things upfront that require us to repeat download in the first place?

Cheers
Steph

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	Most of my SVG downloads are to enable me to make them look perfect before sending to a client. This includes resizing to fit a specific product (a mug or placemat for example where the standard sizes or clipart I might import do not correctly represent the actual size when downloaded as PNG) and also, to remove erroneous words that look stupid, e.g a single word that appears in a flower petal Unicode icon or in the middle of a letter e, p or O. When people are paying for these prints they expect them to be removed and I could not send them with a list of things I will remove 'later'. After I have removed them and sent them a proof they inevitably make changes which require me to come back to Tagul and repeat the process again - sometimes many, many times for the same print. I cannot charge extra for this - it's just the process that is required because Tagul does not allow me to do these things. If I have to use a credit each time I go through this process then with your new pricing structure I have already indicated that this makes it un-viable for very small hobbyists like me and people will just do it themselves for free. If Tagul allowed me to remove single words from a design where they don't belong (and I mean remove, not just move and have it replaced by something else!) and allowed me to manually change the size of a rectangle to x cm then at least I wouldn't need to download my many proofs in vector format and use what are now very expensive credits.

# 8 years ago

wookeywarn

Member

Most of my SVG downloads are to enable me to make them look perfect before sending to a client. This includes resizing to fit a specific product (a mug or placemat for example where the standard sizes or clipart I might import do not correctly represent the actual size when downloaded as PNG) and also, to remove erroneous words that look stupid, e.g a single word that appears in a flower petal Unicode icon or in the middle of a letter e, p or O. When people are paying for these prints they expect them to be removed and I could not send them with a list of things I will remove 'later'. After I have removed them and sent them a proof they inevitably make changes which require me to come back to Tagul and repeat the process again - sometimes many, many times for the same print. I cannot charge extra for this - it's just the process that is required because Tagul does not allow me to do these things.

If I have to use a credit each time I go through this process then with your new pricing structure I have already indicated that this makes it un-viable for very small hobbyists like me and people will just do it themselves for free.

If Tagul allowed me to remove single words from a design where they don't belong (and I mean remove, not just move and have it replaced by something else!) and allowed me to manually change the size of a rectangle to x cm then at least I wouldn't need to download my many proofs in vector format and use what are now very expensive credits.

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	@ricochet64 ok same question I guess - is $499 a typo?! this doesn't even cover my income from this stuff, let alone profit! If anyone makes this much profit I'd love to hear from you! With so many free options out there people just wont pay as much as I would need to charge. I have just got home and looking at an alternative as we speak, if no good I will be removing this stuff from my portfolio once my current sub ends as luckily I have other products that don't require Tagul at all.

# 8 years ago

wookeywarn

Member

@ricochet64 ok same question I guess - is $499 a typo?!
this doesn't even cover my income from this stuff, let alone profit! If anyone makes this much profit I'd love to hear from you! With so many free options out there people just wont pay as much as I would need to charge.

I have just got home and looking at an alternative as we speak, if no good I will be removing this stuff from my portfolio once my current sub ends as luckily I have other products that don't require Tagul at all.

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	Sorry, does that say $899 a year? Is that a typo?

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	sadly no Alex - they sell for about £5 on eBay here. And if someone makes 10 changes they can use a months credits in one go so much more than $1! So no the market here must be very different and I won't be spending 2 hours on a piece to sell for less than £4 profit! I can't seem to see the plans on my phone so I will have to look later. Thanks for replying anyway.

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	Thanks Alex, sadly no, the word clouds are often not used on their own - I resize them or most often incorporate them into wider designs. It would have been useful for you to understand how your customers use their designs before you decided on pricing. I am sure I am not alone in not knowing how many I am likely to sell - some months I sell none and some months maybe only 1 but it might require many many iterations and if each time my customer changes their mind (which happens a lot in afraid), some months I might sell 5 - all of which are awkward customers (you know what I mean!) it would not be viable. You are clearly now aiming at a large volume market of which I am not and I am very very saddened to go but if the multi months plans are not affordable to me then I shall have to go elsewhere.

# 8 years ago

wookeywarn

Member

Thanks Alex, sadly no, the word clouds are often not used on their own - I resize them or most often incorporate them into wider designs. It would have been useful for you to understand how your customers use their designs before you decided on pricing.

I am sure I am not alone in not knowing how many I am likely to sell - some months I sell none and some months maybe only 1 but it might require many many iterations and if each time my customer changes their mind (which happens a lot in afraid), some months I might sell 5 - all of which are awkward customers (you know what I mean!) it would not be viable.

You are clearly now aiming at a large volume market of which I am not and I am very very saddened to go but if the multi months plans are not affordable to me then I shall have to go elsewhere.

# 8 years ago
wookeywarn Member	After the holiday break my heart sank when I logged into Tagul today for the first time in 2 weeks. Probably the worst New Year gift I could have had! I, like others, have been a loyal Tagul customer for a long time and whilst I would love to continue to support this superb enterprise I just cannot continue with this pricing structure - I just don't sell enough (I could be 1 or 5 a month - who knows!) and the ones I sell I just don't have a high enough margin. Can you please confirm whether downloading the vector counts as HQ download because I could do this 20 times for each design after a client says "can you just move this here, or make this bigger"? And now I will spend the rest of my day looking for another software platform as this is not viable for me I'm afraid. Good luck with it all…

# 8 years ago

wookeywarn

Member

After the holiday break my heart sank when I logged into Tagul today for the first time in 2 weeks. Probably the worst New Year gift I could have had!

I, like others, have been a loyal Tagul customer for a long time and whilst I would love to continue to support this superb enterprise I just cannot continue with this pricing structure - I just don't sell enough (I could be 1 or 5 a month - who knows!) and the ones I sell I just don't have a high enough margin. Can you please confirm whether downloading the vector counts as HQ download because I could do this 20 times for each design after a client says "can you just move this here, or make this bigger"?

And now I will spend the rest of my day looking for another software platform as this is not viable for me I'm afraid. Good luck with it all… smile

# 10 years ago
wookeywarn Member	I have a cloud which is red and white text on a black background. when I save as a SVG file and open in Inkscape to resize the background is gone (its white again). I can save with a black background to PNG but I want to save as SVG so I can continue to resize in Inkscape without distortion. Help?!