5 x macassar customised cues

[jrc750]

He was wrong about Andy though and should have said so on this forum.

Should you not say "in my opinion" ???
Just stirring the pot here, but unless you know for certain how can you say that, ok it might only have been one cue, but.......

[perpetualboredom]

Should you not say "in my opinion" ???
Just stirring the pot here, but unless you know for certain how can you say that, ok it might only have been one cue, but.......

Because he was wrong.

[vmax4steve]

Should you not say "in my opinion" ???
Just stirring the pot here, but unless you know for certain how can you say that, ok it might only have been one cue, but.......

That's what his argument against Andy was based on and was found to be incorrect, so wrong, not just my opinion but in fact also his.

[rdsalt]

I disagree with you there. Honesty and transparency in every transaction is the way it should be, then you can decide if you want to be shafted, no pun intended.
I for one would never consider a pointed stick to be worth over two hundred pounds when the bulk of it is supplied at only eighty, but for those that do then cough up, walk away, play just as badly with it and sell it on to some other poor smuck who gets a hard on over wood grain.
When all is said and done a cue is a tool for playing a game with and there is very little difference between what is said to be a good one or a bad one.

Try walking into a furniture store and asking what the cost price is of a sofa before you buy it. How far could that go, should a cue maker tell us the cost price of the wood and materials that goes into one of their cues before we decide if his price is fair? No business could work like that. What is important is that you get what you are paying for, which was what the original thread was about, if you believe you are buying a cue that is fully hand made from scratch by that cue maker then that is what you should receive, not a cue that was three quarters made by someone else. If Crispian wants to charge £240 for a cue that cost £80 before he worked on it then that is his choice, no one is being forced to buy them. The demand must have been there despite the price as they appear to be all sold.

[jrc750]

Because he was wrong.

That's what his argument against Andy was based on and was found to be incorrect, so wrong, not just my opinion but in fact also his.

I must of missed that set of posts then, as i remember Crispian being 100% sure of it ???
Don't get me wrong, i want him to be wrong and Andy to be the hero i thought he was

[Maloy]

I for one would never consider a pointed stick to be worth over two hundred pounds when the bulk of it is supplied at only eighty.

Interesting... Let's consider only profit: what would you say then about Parris Ultimates for example? Do you think Parris makes only 100GBP profit on selling Ultimates? I personally don't think so, but maybe I'm wrong. Actually it doesn't matter: if quality is good and those cues are desired by many top players and they are ready to pay the price, then the price is right (even if some people may think "How 0.5kg of wood may cost 1000GBP?").
On the other hand, what's the difference between Crispian Customised cues and some thai cues which cost over 200-300 GBP? Do you think they cost more then 80 blanks? So, if someone think Crispian has too much profit and it's "irritating" them, then don't buy!

And the last: I have both Crispian Customised and Andy Travis (second hand) cues and they are both nice, no regrets for money spent! Can't say much about diffrence in shafts stiffness, but finish on Crispian cue is better in my opinion. Nothing personal, just my opinion...

[Stupree]

This is what globalisation is all about, we're all getting shagged up the rear by the 1% who have all the money. Take a look at Dragons Den and ask yourself if these people are good and fair and are to be looked up to, why don't I myself act like them albeit in a smaller way.
As for Crispian I myself think he's gone about his business in an OK manner, upfront about his dealings and profit margins. The last cue I made cost me thirty quid alone in sandpaper as the butt wood (Ipe Tabaca) was too hard to be planed down to within 1mm which is what I normally sand from to the final finish. Sold on ebay for forty quid and I was gutted TBH.

He was wrong about Andy though and should have said so on this forum.

Globalisation? Not so sure about your understanding of that term nor where it enters this debate. I re-read your post in the style of Rick from The Young Ones which adds to the comedy of it I do like that you can empathise with Crispian having made a cue or two yourself and can understand the time, effort, and expense taken in crafting cues.

If you are in it for the love of the craft then enjoy doing it and produce cues you are proud of. If you are in it for the money then import cues and add the finishing touches. We all have the right to choose any path as long as we are being truthful about the product. We all have the right to ask any price we want for items and none of us need to disclose any of the costs incurred with anyone other than for taxation purposes. We all have the right to make a free choice about how we choose to spend our money.

Both Crispian and Andy have benefited through this fairly commercially open forum and have both contributed some advice and support too. Both have had opportunity to state their respective cases on this matter and it is still unresolved between them. It needs no further sidetaking, pot stirring or territorial pissings. I have a love and passion for well crafted cues and respect for those who have the talent and dedication to produce them but couldnt care less if this gets resolved and will use this information to make informed choices about the cues I choose to buy.

There really is not any more that anybody could add to this so lets end it here!

[itsnoteasy]

Interesting... Let's consider only profit: what would you say then about Parris Ultimates for example? Do you think Parris makes only 100GBP profit on selling Ultimates? I personally don't think so, but maybe I'm wrong. Actually it doesn't matter: if quality is good and those cues are desired by many top players and they are ready to pay the price, then the price is right (even if some people may think "How 0.5kg of wood may cost 1000GBP?").
On the other hand, what's the difference between Crispian Customised cues and some thai cues which cost over 200-300 GBP? Do you think they cost more then 80 blanks? So, if someone think Crispian has too much profit and it's "irritating" them, then don't buy!

And the last: I have both Crispian Customised and Andy Travis (second hand) cues and they are both nice, no regrets for money spent! Can't say much about diffrence in shafts stiffness, but finish on Crispian cue is better in my opinion. Nothing personal, just my opinion...

I would say not worth the money,
Actually it does matter, life is not about screwing people for every penny you can.
Top pros get the cues for nothing, it's a great marketing ploy, you create the demand by getting top players to play with them, it's a well know advertising ploy and he has used it very well. We are all gullible and think if you pay more the quality is better, supermarkets have done it before tried to sell something at a low cost and couldn't shift it, people thought there must be something wrong with the items, so they banged up the price ,to above the average for the item and they flew off the shelves as people thought they must be top quality and worth the few pence more, so you see it's a very common trick to pull. Just look at the Asian market you can see it happening, they look towards these cues instead of the quality cues that can be a third of the price made in their own part of the world.
I'm not going to comment anymore on Crispian as he is not here to defend himself or correct anything wrong I say and that's not fair.

[vmax4steve]

Actually it does matter, life is not about screwing people for every penny you can.

My thoughts exactly mate, but try telling that to Thatchers generation.
Tony Benn died yesterday, one of the great socialist politicians who never compromised on his beliefs that wealth is created by the workers but owned by the rich. I too am socialist at heart and believe in fairness for all and that manufactured items should be priced according to what they cost to produce.

You should be able to go to a furniture store and see an itemised bill for your next sofa telling you exactly what it cost to make, the price of the timber used, where the timber came from, the cost of the fabric or leather, the time and cost of the labour and all the companies overheads as part of an agreed percentage allowed in law.
Why can't this be enshrined in law so we can all see just who the bloody sharks are and make our choices accordingly. Then if something costs £10 to make in Thailand, is maybe being exported by a middle man for £80 and is being breathed on by an english 'craftsman' and sold for £240 we can make an informed choice if we think that item is what we would actually want to buy.

This is where I am not at odds with Crispian as this he has done, but my first thought on such an item would be, 'where do the raw materials come from', seeing as those same raw materials if purchased in the UK would cost ten times as much for they would have to come from accredited sources abiding by EU law.

I have serious worries that the game I love so much is a major reason that the rainforests are being raped by far east timber companies to supply cues and tables and british cue makers are jumping on this in order to make easy money from UK customers in a time of austerity when money is tight as well as tickling the egos of the nouveau riche of the far east at £700 a pop.

One must keep in mind that one day death will put his hand on your shoulder and everything you have done in your life will be accounted for by your conscience. That is the real meaning of the afterlife, but if you don't give a damn then hold up your hand and say so.

[vmax4steve]

If you are in it for the love of the craft then enjoy doing it and produce cues you are proud of. If you are in it for the money then import cues and add the finishing touches. We all have the right to choose any path as long as we are being truthful about the product.

Agreed

We all have the right to ask any price we want for items and none of us need to disclose any of the costs incurred with anyone other than for taxation purposes.

That contradicts what you say above.

We all have the right to make a free choice about how we choose to spend our money.

We cannot make an informed free choice if we're denied the truth.

Typed in the style of Rick from The Young Ones

[Phil C]

My thoughts exactly mate, but try telling that to Thatchers generation.
Tony Benn died yesterday, one of the great socialist politicians who never compromised on his beliefs that wealth is created by the workers but owned by the rich. I too am socialist at heart and believe in fairness for all and that manufactured items should be priced according to what they cost to produce.

You should be able to go to a furniture store and see an itemised bill for your next sofa telling you exactly what it cost to make, the price of the timber used, where the timber came from, the cost of the fabric or leather, the time and cost of the labour and all the companies overheads as part of an agreed percentage allowed in law.
Why can't this be enshrined in law so we can all see just who the bloody sharks are and make our choices accordingly. Then if something costs £10 to make in Thailand, is maybe being exported by a middle man for £80 and is being breathed on by an english 'craftsman' and sold for £240 we can make an informed choice if we think that item is what we would actually want to buy.

This is where I am not at odds with Crispian as this he has done, but my first thought on such an item would be, 'where do the raw materials come from', seeing as those same raw materials if purchased in the UK would cost ten times as much for they would have to come from accredited sources abiding by EU law.

I have serious worries that the game I love so much is a major reason that the rainforests are being raped by far east timber companies to supply cues and tables and british cue makers are jumping on this in order to make easy money from UK customers in a time of austerity when money is tight as well as tickling the egos of the nouveau riche of the far east at £700 a pop.

One must keep in mind that one day death will put his hand on your shoulder and everything you have done in your life will be accounted for by your conscience. That is the real meaning of the afterlife, but if you don't give a damn then hold up your hand and say so.

Well said.

No matter who we all are, how rich or how poor, how big our status is in life; our graves will be the same.

[vmax4steve]

I must of missed that set of posts then, as i remember Crispian being 100% sure of it ???
Don't get me wrong, i want him to be wrong and Andy to be the hero i thought he was

As I remember he took one of Andy's cues apart in an attempt to prove that it was machine planed like a Thai cue, which gives the distinctive round top and very accurate splices rather than the less rounded ones in a hand planed cue. He failed to either find it was so or forgot to post the pictures for proof.
As his proof wasn't posted I expect that he failed to find the proof he needed.
Andy stood by his defence that this one piece cue shaft was split, weighted and re-joined below the butt splices before splicing on the ebony in order to get the balance point further forward as it is very difficult to drill accurately that far up the butt once the cue is made in one peice.

There is a difference BTW between machine planed and machine spliced and hand spliced. You can machine plane a hand spliced cue, machine spliced is very different as you probably already know.

[jb134]

My thoughts exactly mate, but try telling that to Thatchers generation.
Tony Benn died yesterday, one of the great socialist politicians who never compromised on his beliefs that wealth is created by the workers but owned by the rich. I too am socialist at heart and believe in fairness for all and that manufactured items should be priced according to what they cost to produce.

You should be able to go to a furniture store and see an itemised bill for your next sofa telling you exactly what it cost to make, the price of the timber used, where the timber came from, the cost of the fabric or leather, the time and cost of the labour and all the companies overheads as part of an agreed percentage allowed in law.
Why can't this be enshrined in law so we can all see just who the bloody sharks are and make our choices accordingly. Then if something costs £10 to make in Thailand, is maybe being exported by a middle man for £80 and is being breathed on by an english 'craftsman' and sold for £240 we can make an informed choice if we think that item is what we would actually want to buy.

This is where I am not at odds with Crispian as this he has done, but my first thought on such an item would be, 'where do the raw materials come from', seeing as those same raw materials if purchased in the UK would cost ten times as much for they would have to come from accredited sources abiding by EU law.

I have serious worries that the game I love so much is a major reason that the rainforests are being raped by far east timber companies to supply cues and tables and british cue makers are jumping on this in order to make easy money from UK customers in a time of austerity when money is tight as well as tickling the egos of the nouveau riche of the far east at £700 a pop.

One must keep in mind that one day death will put his hand on your shoulder and everything you have done in your life will be accounted for by your conscience. That is the real meaning of the afterlife, but if you don't give a damn then hold up your hand and say so.

Benn was a clever man. Wanted to put some of the profits from oil into a fund. If he had got his way I wouldn't have to listen to that clown Salmond now. The bottom line is most profit is made from cheap labour. You used to be able to get that here until the workers wanted too much now we make nothing.

Big companies have to chase cheap labour around the globe now and as those workers want more, prices rise. Blanks, I believe have about doubled in cost.

If Crispian took a week to fully finish these and made £100 each clear profit what's the problem? There's plenty people make more that £500 a week. The problem with the sofa scenario is unless there's a big profit why take the risk of running a big company?

The thing that needs changing is the limited company structure that allows profiteers to suck the money out in boom periods and then go bust leaving debts.

Otherwise, we can be idealistic until we are blue in the face but capitalism and striving for improvement is our only hope of survival. Culling the weak might help too but I dare say that's against their human rights. Please note, the last bit was a joke.

[itsnoteasy]

Who should get the wealth then?, just the top one percent? Feck the little people who's backs are broken making it, how dare they want to share in the profit they helped create, they should doff their caps know their place and be thankful for the pittance they are given. I don't know what has become of us, I really don't ,I'm all right jack seems to be the order of the day, what happened to fairness, if a company or individual makes a huge profit surely they have a duty to share a bit of it with the people who made it for them, but no ,let's trawl round the world looking for the next countries workforce to exploit, then tell us it's your own fault you should have just accepted the pittance ,see you have priced yourself out of a job, NO NO NO I haven't, you greedy git want it all and will stop at nothing to keep it, if this is not the case why is Nisan in the northeast making the biggest profits for that company yet paying very good wages, see it can be done. Most benefits go to pensioners the next biggest is the working poor, our government has to subsidies wages because they are below the poverty line, how is that wanting too much, make companies pay fair wages, it benefits everyone, more money in their back pocket, they will spend more in the shops creating employment in turn producing more tax revenue for the government it's win win all round, pay a pittance no one spends no jobs created no tax revenue, massive benefit bill, it's obvious isn't it? But no just keep them in their place ,keep grinding them down and keep the money while not paying the taxes they owe, that's the way to do it, god help us all.
I am old enough to remember the Tories raping Scotland in Seventies and Eighties(only just mind) I will never forget Thatcher say she believed in the trickle down effect of business, let the rich make fortunes and the money will trickle down to the workers, Cameron and his eton bulingdon club pals believe the same, how's that worked out for ya Dave and Maggie? As I've not seen much trickling, but I still see massive wages for your city pals , who caused this mess, and huge payouts for failure, now that would be the sack for a worker, oops sorry I seem it have lost you 250 million this year, never mind, have a 5 million bonus as I thought you were going to lose me more so you have done well, could you see that happening to us? Who am I most disappointed with ? US, we have let these people convince us that fighting for fair working practices is wrong, while shafting us left right and centre, look at the NHS pay increases, no increase if you're on incremental pay, now what are these people meant to do? Roll over for a fifth year, or stand and fight, it won't be the later because the public have been brainwashed into thinking this is wrong, instead of supporting them for a fair wage we will turn our backs, because I'm all right jack feck you.

[billabong]

Anyone seen a snooker forum ?