Purism "second hand marketplace" as a forum category?

@mladen Hi Mladen,
I’m considering, if it could make sense to have a “marketplace” Category for ppl who want to sell their Purism device and those, who want to buy.
Offers and demands are just a bit scattered all over the place as of now … so rather hard to find something for both sides.

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It probably doesn’t benefit Purism to provide a marketplace for their devices… Especially now, when they are trying to get more orders for both the phone and laptop.

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I think what @Pink_Unicorn means perhaps is simply a classified section for the forum? Where forum users can list what they have to sell, or wish to buy?

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Yeah, we likely won’t add such category, sorry.

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The idea is to benefit the :arrow_right: users :arrow_left: aka customers. And in the consequence it will benefit the company in return!

The benefit in providing a forum to the customers of their product always meets the producer crabwise. Not directly.

The point is: Forum members will post inquiries and offers anyway - just messed all over the place. So no benefit for no one.
Especially not for the forum itself.

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Well … Hard to buy a new device, no matter how strong the will to do so, if none is in stock.

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THIS!
Thank you. :+1:
Didn’t expect my proposal could be gotten wrong … :thinking: :rofl:

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Agreed. I don’t get the downside? Items will be listed all over anyway, as you say, it just organizes them for the forum users. What’s the big deal to create one more category? Other than normal monitoring, Purism doesn’t have to do anything else?

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IMO it increases the long-term value of Purism devices, because by selling to other (potential) Purism customers, you can get a better margin. This can increase the willingness to inverst a lot in Purism devices.

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This works! I am a member of the cruzbike forum, and they have a marketplace thread.

The forum gets info on products and activities out to new members, and those individuals who cannot afford a new product buy used from the marketplace. They then get support and become familiar with the product.

Then sometime later when a new “improved” version is offered they become returning customers because in a sense they can “trade-in” their used product in the marketplace and buy the new product. I’ve seen this happening on the cruzbike forum for years.

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An there is also the “N + 1” rule which states that for a product that has many uses, you may find that where N equals the number of the products you currently have that you actually could use +1 more ; )

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Yes, thank you!
I encountered the same in the Fairphone (dutch phone company having similar aims as has Purism) -forum: They have a marketplace for parts, phones and cases - just as a forum category. Works perfect for everybody.
Causes no additional workload to the company.

Here is why, in the long run, non-cooperative action leads to bad things.

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I would also support that second hand sales support new product sales. One selling an old product second hand has a high chance doing this because he wants to buy a new product. Like buying a LibremXvNext and selling the old LibremXvPrevious. Saturating also lower price categories without compromising the own quality also distributes high quality devices more which generates a wider marketing reach.
This works for long lasting premium products which from what I read is Purism’s own claim to themselves.

Question remains, why a forum category? Most potential buyers of second hand Purism products are probably here so one can achieve a higher price compared to e.g. selling it via ebay (only). On the other hand there are no securities of any platform implemented here on the forum and noone can expect purism to support such cases…

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I agree and the example of @emeljay proves it, but I don’t think it should be implemented now, when Purism is expecting preorders and is struggling to ship its new devices. Perhaps in a year?

@fsflover
There is nothing to “implement” except to make the category “marketplace” in the forum.
One-click-action.

I don’t mean some shop or store in the hands of Purism, causing workload and trouble. What I mean ist just a category in the forum to have the inquiries and offers for Purism devices all in one place.
People offer used devices in the forum already or place offer links to their ebay auction. But they post it under category “Librem” mostly. So hard to find, whilst unspecific.

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Sure, I understood you. This is a small task, but it will influence the state of things a lot, encouraging people to trade Purism devices. Currently it’s sort of discouraged, which should be good in the short term I think.

I don’t expect, that someone, who is happily working with their device, would sell it out of the blue, just because Purism would initiate a “marketplace” category in the forum, really.

But don’t you expect that someone will decide not to preorder Librem 14, but instead buy a used Librem 15?

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If so, than rather because of the L15 v4’s UHD screen, as I interpret the voices in the forum.
And if so, that not in amounts or figures, that would harm their business.

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