Mya-Moe News

"What is especially peculiar to me is the amount of work this is going to take for Mya Moe. Getting dozens of emails to "put me in the lottery", "please renew my lottery bid this month" or "okay, take me out of the lottery now," etc. A tracking nightmare!"

This is very true. It would certainly add to their workload.

very interesting but if I really wanted any instruments, I would play by whatever rules they have. Maybe some of those that don't like it rather get something else

I'm seeing the up-side to the new system.

Gordon and Char have an untenable waiting list. They are slaves to that list. Now they will be able to shrink it to a workable length. If they want to have a six (or eight, ten...) month waiting list, that's all they have to have. They just don't draw any names until they catch up that far. Plus, they get to take a vacation once in a while. Maybe plan an extended trip in the future. They probably deserve it. Not only that, they might have less than half the number of customers calling and emailing them wanting a personal conversation every week or so. It seems they enjoy that part of the business, but it must be cumbersome, even exhausting.

Now for the customers, maybe there is a down-side. How bad is it really? Really. The sensible thing to do if you want a Mya Moe would be to enter the lottery, buy a temp ukulele, and hope for the best. (By the way, there is no shortage of builders making beautiful, fine ukuleles.) If and when your name gets drawn, you take the ____ (fill in the blank) months to sell your ______ (fill in the blank) ukulele. In fact some, perhaps many, will fall in love with the Talsma, Ko'Olau, Moore Bettuh, Kamaka,...and decide to remove themselves from MM's list. Everybody wins. You have an instrument that makes you happy, the maker of your uke makes a sale, and the next person pulled from Mya Moe's hat gets on the list. Will Mya Moe lose business? Not in any way they will ever notice.

The alternatives to MM going to the lottery system are pretty unattractive. Keep going as is? How long can it go on? Apparently no longer, as far as Gordon and Char are concerned. End of conversation. Raise prices? Now you're turning away customers. Start saying no to customers? Can't be done in a way we would see as fair. Close down the "Order" section of the web site for months (or a year) at a time? Everybody would be upset. These are the ways you hurt the brand's reputation.

If you think the lottery will hurt Mya Moe in some way, I think you're mistaken. They will continue to build as they have, or better yet, as they would like to going forward. Good for them. Their instruments will not be built by people burned out by their own success. If I was actually getting one, I'd be very happy. If I put my name in the hat and never got one, I'd get something else that I would really love anyway.

It's all good. ENJOY.

Andy Chen said:

"What is especially peculiar to me is the amount of work this is going to take for Mya Moe. Getting dozens of emails to "put me in the lottery", "please renew my lottery bid this month" or "okay, take me out of the lottery now," etc. A tracking nightmare!"

This is very true. It would certainly add to their workload.

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I'll bet they already have software doing it for them. They're pretty sophisticated with that end of the business.

stevepetergal said:

I'll bet they already have software doing it for them. They're pretty sophisticated with that end of the business.

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That is true. They have the iPhones all set up with the build tracker, etc. They do seem very computer savvy.

Nickie said:

I don't understand not hiring another person. Apprentiship used to be the way to learn, and carry on the brand. Example: LoPrinzi. Augustino carefully taught his daughter Donna, who has taken over the buidling, and there's not been one iota or sacrifice in quality.

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Taking on an apprentice and increasing the size of your business by 25% are very different things. If Gordon and Char had a son or daughter who wanted to build ukuleles, it would already be happening. But, I believe taking an apprentice would be very problematic for a company as streamlined as Mya Moe. Training someone, (even someone with experience) is expensive and enormously time-consuming. The 14 month list might stretch out to 18 months without adding a single customer. "By the way Mr. Smith, your October 2015 delivery date will now be some time in 2016." Will Mr. Smith recommend Mya Moe to his friends? There's a question Gordon and Char don't want to ask.

If it doesn't work out, they can always go back to the waiting list.

kvehe said:

It's driven me away. I was planning on a particular configuration for a specific serial number that would most likely come up during the winter, but that's over now.

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I'm amazed. Are you disgruntled because you wanted a specific serial number you might have missed anyway? Were you really interested in a My Moe or was the ukulele just a side-issue?

I'm wondering if Gordon and Char have thought about the possibility of drawing a name more than once, while other customers wait. Not that others will find out and cry foul, but the Mayers seem to strive for fairness. Technically it would be "fair" but how would they feel?

nongdam said:

very interesting but if I really wanted any instruments, I would play by whatever rules they have. Maybe some of those that don't like it rather get something else

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This.
My tongue in cheek comment about the pampered UU vets kind of alludes to the fact that there will be new players/buyers who will not remember there was a change and they will do what needs to be done to get "their" Mya Moe. This will be a small hiccup when we look back in a few months.

eugene ukulele said:

People like to place an order and be put on a wait list, in the knowledge the instrument will be built at a given time. How long the wait list isn't a problem, you know what you're getting into from the start. With this {new} arrangement you may never get one built, however long you wait. Meanwhile someone else comes along and opts in and gets drawn out of the hat a month later with virtually no wait time.

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Jon had many solid points in his last post, but this one above resonated with me.

If the goal is for the good people at Mya Moe to avoid burnout and cut back on ukulele building, take vacations, etc., as brother SteveP mentions, it's perfectly understandable. SteveP notes they are "slaves to the list". Steve, they're not. Gordon and Char control the work schedule! We, the customer, never see it. If they now make two ukes a day, cut back to one. Make ukes only two weeks a month. It's all good. It can all be factored into their build schedule. If they want to build one single, solitary uke a month for the rest of the existence of Mya Moe and have a waiting list develop until until 2020 (if anyone wishes to sign on), it's their choice as owners. They can give everyone on the wait list their deposit back and it's all over. They are in complete control. No slaves that I can see.

The customer, however, can choose to order a ukulele from that build schedule...or not. It's quite fair, open, simple. No lottery, no emails. If the customer feels it's too long a wait, they won't place an order. Simple. Since we all know Gordon and Char are fair-minded people, there's no bias as to whether they choose in a lottery Steve's uke before Jon's uke before Carmen's uke, right? So, then, why have the lottery? Why add uncertainty for customers? Why add potential angst for customers, as Jon mentions, when JoJo signed up today for the lottery and gets a build next month, and I have re-applied to the lottery for a year and have never yet gotten lucky?

Introducing luck as a factor in an honest, committed, two-way, seller-buyer transaction will likely not be good for the seller or the buyer.

I find this thread fascinating. Gordon and Char have a business. It's their choice to run it how they choose to run it, success or failure (and clearly to date more the former than the latter but, on the other hand, the past does not equal the future). Apparently, the joy of what they do gets marred when their backlog is excessive (they determine what "excessive" is). Lots of opinions here on how right or wrong their decision is. Some people will be drawn to them because of how they handled their currently excessive backlog, others will go away. I doubt any opinions in this thread matter to them. The one thing that will is whether or not they get their backlog to a spot where THEY are comfortable. So why six pages of dialogue on a topic that ultimately serves no purpose whatsoever? Damn, I just added to it! ;-)

Ukulele Eddie said:

So why six pages of dialogue on a topic that ultimately serves no purpose whatsoever? Damn, I just added to it! ;-)

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Because we are customers, and it's okay if we discuss these things. Comments such as "they can do what they want" (not you, Eddie, but a couple below) are a given. Dah! Obviously!

If everything on this forum was discussed only by those that actually could make the choices, there would be no forum. ;-)

I think Gordon and Char and Aaron read this Forum quite a bit and may (or may not) tweak based on things they might not have considered. Just as we, the customers, may (or may not) tweak our buying based on this thread.

On the plus side for G + C, these six pages are mostly testament to how much people want their ukes. Then again, the 14-month wait list also told them that already.

coolkayaker1 said:

Because we are customers, and it's okay if we discuss these things. Comments such as "they can do what they want" (not you, Eddie, but a couple below) are a given. Dah! Obviously!

If everything on this forum was discussed only by those that actually could make the choices, there would be no forum. ;-)

I think Gordon and Char and Aaron read this Forum quite a bit and may (or may not) tweak based on things they might not have considered. Just as we, the customers, may (or may not) tweak our buying based on this thread.

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Hmmm. I'd be interested to know how many people commenting on this thread are TRULY high potential near-term customers or not. I'd wager most are not.

stevepetergal said:

I'm amazed. Are you disgruntled because you wanted a specific serial number you might have missed anyway? Were you really interested in a My Moe or was the ukulele just a side-issue?

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You amaze easily. In any event, I wouldn't say I'm disgruntled - just disappointed. I like the Mya-Moes I have, and wanted another one to commemorate a specific event. I've done it before, and if I can't have it, that's a disappointment, but at this stage of my life I should be downsizing anyway. Maybe they've done me a favor.

See post # 88 for change of heart, now that I've calmed down and gotten used to the idea.

Assuming demand stays the same, this will drive up Used Prices. Heck people might be able to charge MORE for a used in-hand one. Or could we see place-holder people who hold a spot ( like paying someone for a spot in Black Friday lines)?
I commend them on not raising prices, which is awesome.
It is a "creative" solution to what I'm sure is a tough problem with the backlog. I would have cut off the log and said, lottery for everyone going forward, after we get the current backlog done.
These are good problems to have though if you're running a business, especially in this economy!

This will probably cause a lot of people to skip Mya-Moe and get on the Moore Bettah waiting list instead (tic)

I get what coolkayaker is saying, when he says Gordon and Char are not slaves to the list. But, they aren't willing to leave the list at 14 months and growing. I can't even imagine how intimidating it must look from their side. Let it grow to years? Not the way they run their business. For most people, too much is too much. I'd be happy to climb a mountain, but put the Andes in their entirety in front of me, and I don't think I'd even try the first one.

If they wanted to build on a more relaxed scale, how to do it? You can see that Mya Moe is a well-oiled, concise machine.They have an operation designed to build at its current pace. Cut production by 25 percent and they'd have to shut that machine down and build a new one from scratch. It can be done, I suppose. Perhaps they're not slaves to the list, but slaves to the production. The list is the indicator. And again, if they chose to slow production, how would they get there from here? Tell everybody on the current list they'll have to wait another 2 to 8 months? Very bad P.R. and not their style. Not to mention Aaron and Nicole, who now have another mouth to feed. Cut production by 25 percent and Aaron would almost surely have to go.

I hope it works out well for them, whatever it is they're trying to achieve. Personally I think it's silly, if I put down a deposit for something then I want a rough date, not a lottery ticket.

It's a shame as I wanted to order a resonator through them, maybe this turn of events is saying that it simply wasn't to be.