Vinyl Me Please (store, exclusives, swaps, etc)

mdmost said:
I once received someone else's VMP Blue Note Anthology shipment. I got mine earlier in the week so this was definitely a mistake that was sent to me. That was back when these episodes went out every couple of weeks. I immediately emailed support to let them know because it didn't feel right to hold onto someone else's records. That's bad karma. VMP sent me a label and I gladly sent it back. Took all of 5 minutes to print it, put the record back in the box, tape it up and set it out for the postal worker to pick up. It's not that hard to box something back up and send it on. It's bullshit, frankly, to keep something that isn't yours.

How would you feel if the record you wanted that sold out was sent on accident to someone else and they kept it, thereby keeping you from getting what you paid for? Yeah, I get it, VMP screwed up big time. But to keep something that isn't yours makes you not only a thief but an asshole. Ask for some credits to compensate you for your time or I don't know, just be a decent person and pay it forward.
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According the law and VMP's own policies, you would not be a thief for keeping the records. They are in fact yours at this point.
It might make you an asshole to not send them back, I'll concede to that.

But boxing up 25 records and going to the post office peak holiday shipping season IS actually a big ask. I would barely consider doing that for family. I would be pretty annoyed if a company I paid money to asked me to do that unless they lead with a pretty decent incentive. My proposed offer to VMP would be a big incentive AND it does still give them an opportunity to make it right it right with their other customers.

If I paid for a VMP record, and I wasn't going to get it in this situation, I would be pissed... at VMP. I would not be pissed at customers for not sending them back. This is 100% on VMP. It's not right to put customers in the shoes of even needing to consider making any sort of ethical choice. I support those customers in whatever they do, even if it mean flipping a record that VMP had to cancel and refund me for.

And if VMP cancelled my order, I would expect it to be cancelled asap, and fully refunded. If that didn't happen, I would be contacting VMP pretty much daily until that money hit my account.
 
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displayname said:
According the law and VMP's own policies, you would not be a thief for keeping the records. They in fact yours at this point.
It might make you an asshole to not send them back, I'll concede to that.

But boxing up 25 records and going to the post office peak holiday shipping season IS actually a big ask. I would barely consider doing that for family. I would be pretty annoyed if a company I paid money to asked me to do that unless they lead with a pretty decent incentive. My proposed offer to VMP would be a big incentive AND it does still give them an opportunity to make it right it right with their other customers.
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Yeah, legally you're not a thief. Morally, you are. I'm sorry but keeping records that aren't yours because of a screw up by a distribution center is wrong. If you don't feel it is then I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I've had it happen to me and I didn't want that on my ledger. I've had stuff of mine go to other people and it sucked. This is the forum that rightfully got angry that a person on here took advantage of the PIF thread for his own private financial gain. Took gifted records and sold them because they had value. Yet, it's cool to do the same because we're angry at VMP because they suck at their job? It's cool to take records that rightfully should go to people who paid for them? I mean that's fine if that's how you feel but it's pretty vacant.
 
mdmost said:
Yeah, legally you're not a thief. Morally, you are. I'm sorry but keeping records that aren't yours because of a screw up by a distribution center is wrong. If you don't feel it is then I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I've had it happen to me and I didn't want that on my ledger. I've had stuff of mine go to other people and it sucked. This is the forum that rightfully got angry that a person on here took advantage of the PIF thread for his own private financial gain. Took gifted records and sold them because they had value. Yet, it's cool to do the same because we're angry at VMP because they suck at their job? It's cool to take records that rightfully should go to people who paid for them? I mean that's fine if that's how you feel but it's pretty vacant.
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I think a big thing you are missing is that I would be making that offer to VMP directly. I didn't say "if VMP doesn't accept my offer I will proceed with flipping them."

I could just as easily offer VMP the proposed statement, and if they turn them down I could come here to the PIF thread and say "Hey, if you ordered this and got a cancellation, let me know. Send me screen shots of the cancellation and I will send it to you. After a few weeks once everyone has had a chance, I'll PIF the rest."

VMP needs to value their customer's time, even during their mistakes.
 
I don't see anything wrong with telling VMP that you want compensation for your time. That's a very valid thing to ask for given they are counting on the customer to send something back. Given VMP needs those records back, they should absolutely do something good for the person who's honest, contacts them on their own, and has to arrange to get the records back. I'll add that I didn't ask for anything in return to ship that Anthology extra records back. To me, it was more about good karma. Maybe that's naive in today's world and I should've asked for something in return. To me, it wasn't a big deal to box it back up, slap a label on it, tape the box up and set it in my mailbox for my postal worker. They're used to me doing that for PIFs I send out and records they deliver to me.
 
mdmost said:
Yeah, legally you're not a thief. Morally, you are. I'm sorry but keeping records that aren't yours because of a screw up by a distribution center is wrong. If you don't feel it is then I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I've had it happen to me and I didn't want that on my ledger. I've had stuff of mine go to other people and it sucked. This is the forum that rightfully got angry that a person on here took advantage of the PIF thread for his own private financial gain. Took gifted records and sold them because they had value. Yet, it's cool to do the same because we're angry at VMP because they suck at their job? It's cool to take records that rightfully should go to people who paid for them? I mean that's fine if that's how you feel but it's pretty vacant.
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I mean the company made the choice to press a "limited" quantity creating a false market resulting in some people missing out on the pressing. They also made the choice to be so disorganized to ship their product to the wrong place in the wrong quantity.

The recipient of the records is at lest two steps removed from those choices, so it's hard to understand how it's "morally" wrong to keep them.

Returning them might be the nice thing to do, but keeping them doesn't make you a sinner
 
Tbh I don't think anyone is against what is being said here

VMP is stupid and causes these dramas at least like twice a week..

I think more people are just facing the sunk cost fallacy (I been with them for 5 years, they are my family), or feel personally attacked by the criticism..

That's just my guess as to why the defenders are kinda adamant about it (including how I was), and also personally I just have trouble finding good recommendations for new or old records that aren't just p4ks bnm and wanna know what to spend my life savings on (no one wants to spend time listening to bad music... Especially when you have an anxiety disorders making you scared about how long your life will last). So they mostly need a good place to get new records every month..

I outright have told Pauly if the 3 month subscription gets more expensive I will cancel and never come back. So I'm not a stan, I just want pretty records, find me a place for that and I'll join that or not join a club
 
wmeugene said:
If I had to guess, those of us who got Mobb Deep shipping notices already probably are alright or may receive multiples, those who haven't might know where their copies are now.

The migration has been a disaster in a number of ways and now causing them to ship out multiple copies of their most in-demand exclusive since De La Soul. Get the popcorn for their exchange with the person on reddit who got 25 copies.
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It really sucks. I had to be among the first to order, I placed it as soon as it went live. I havent even gotten a shipping notice yet and these dudes got 25 already. What a shitshow
 
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duke86fan said:
Tbh I don't think anyone is against what is being said here

VMP is stupid and causes these dramas at least like twice a week..

I think more people are just facing the sunk cost fallacy (I been with them for 5 years, they are my family), or feel personally attacked by the criticism..

That's just my guess as to why the defenders are kinda adamant about it (including how I was), and also personally I just have trouble finding good recommendations for new or old records that aren't just p4ks bnm and wanna know what to spend my life savings on (no one wants to spend time listening to bad music... Especially when you have an anxiety disorders making you scared about how long your life will last). So they mostly need a good place to get new records every month..

I outright have told Pauly if the 3 month subscription gets more expensive I will cancel and never come back. So I'm not a stan, I just want pretty records, find me a place for that and I'll join that or not join a club
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These are valid points.

People also just buy from VMP because they like 1. coloured vinyl or they know they are spending their money on 2. something to flip or that they can flip when it's time to do so. I don't know if there's anything inherently wrong with either of those motives, but I'm pretty sure VMP's business model is more about those 2 things than curating or community.

Almost all of their releases are not unique to them other than the color variant. Sometimes VMP releases something first and then the same album gets released by someone else immediately afterwards or within a few months. Sometimes they release things that are readily available already with only a color variant being the difference. They have upped their prices and their product and service hasn't gotten any better.

So the thing that I'm personally offended by is that they keep treating their customers like hot garbage and expecting everyone to treat them like they aren't just like every other corporate record dealer. It's about expectations. VMP shouldn't get to say they're about the people, the "community", and then get to treat the community poorly with service that is worse than most other vinyl retailers
 
duke86fan said:
(I been with them for 5 years, they are my family)
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Dude, no.

Like, holy shit.

You PAY them for a service. If you stopped paying, they would immediately discontinue said service. VMP doesn't care about you as an individual customer, let alone as a human being.

The vast majority of people aren't aware of these QC issues because they aren't here or on Reddit, so VMPs bottom line isn't affected a fly's fart by any individual's dissatisfaction. The only effect threatening to quit will have on Pauly is that he will dream of one less email in his queue. Believing anything else is setting yourself up for some major disappointment.
 
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TenderLovingKiller® said:
We are aware that they fucked up (regarding Mobb Deep) twice but I feel like that there is a likely possibility that it happened more than twice and that even if the two redditors who came forward and return the albums is perfect condition, there could likely be others that aren’t as forthcoming, meaning either some customers are not getting their copy or they will have to repress more. Based on the Weyes Blood shit show the latter seem like a more likely proposition.
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I guarantee there are more than 2. Aren't some already being flipped?
 
Dead C said:
I guarantee there are more than 2. Aren't some already being flipped?
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I would be very surprised if there weren't more than two as well. The 25 on eBay might have been one dude who was able to make 5 orders though. I wouldn't be too surprised if you could put that past VMP.
 
mdmost said:
I once received someone else's VMP Blue Note Anthology shipment. I got mine earlier in the week so this was definitely a mistake that was sent to me. That was back when these episodes went out every couple of weeks. I immediately emailed support to let them know because it didn't feel right to hold onto someone else's records. That's bad karma. VMP sent me a label and I gladly sent it back. Took all of 5 minutes to print it, put the record back in the box, tape it up and set it out for the postal worker to pick up. It's not that hard to box something back up and send it on. It's bullshit, frankly, to keep something that isn't yours.

How would you feel if the record you wanted that sold out was sent on accident to someone else and they kept it, thereby keeping you from getting what you paid for? Yeah, I get it, VMP screwed up big time. But to keep something that isn't yours makes you not only a thief but an asshole. Ask for some credits to compensate you for your time or I don't know, just be a decent person and pay it forward.
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You didn't get someone else's anthology, you just got 2. VMP just didn't send them theirs. They needed to send a new one
 
displayname said:
According the law and VMP's own policies, you would not be a thief for keeping the records. They are in fact yours at this point.
It might make you an asshole to not send them back, I'll concede to that.

But boxing up 25 records and going to the post office peak holiday shipping season IS actually a big ask. I would barely consider doing that for family. I would be pretty annoyed if a company I paid money to asked me to do that unless they lead with a pretty decent incentive. My proposed offer to VMP would be a big incentive AND it does still give them an opportunity to make it right it right with their other customers.

If I paid for a VMP record, and I wasn't going to get it in this situation, I would be pissed... at VMP. I would not be pissed at customers for not sending them back. This is 100% on VMP. It's not right to put customers in the shoes of even needing to consider making any sort of ethical choice. I support those customers in whatever they do, even if it mean flipping a record that VMP had to cancel and refund me for.

And if VMP cancelled my order, I would expect it to be cancelled asap, and fully refunded. If that didn't happen, I would be contacting VMP pretty much daily until that money hit my account.
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THANK YOU
 
mdmost said:
I don't see anything wrong with telling VMP that you want compensation for your time. That's a very valid thing to ask for given they are counting on the customer to send something back. Given VMP needs those records back, they should absolutely do something good for the person who's honest, contacts them on their own, and has to arrange to get the records back. I'll add that I didn't ask for anything in return to ship that Anthology extra records back. To me, it was more about good karma. Maybe that's naive in today's world and I should've asked for something in return. To me, it wasn't a big deal to box it back up, slap a label on it, tape the box up and set it in my mailbox for my postal worker. They're used to me doing that for PIFs I send out and records they deliver to me.
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How do they "need those records back"? To reship them without quality control, versus pressing new ones? You think 20 albums are going to solve this problem?

You're drawing some false equivalencies between individuals being exploited and a corporation fucking people over. The person with the extras is the only person alerting anyone to this issue even happening and now you're claiming they are an immoral piece of shit if they keep the company's product? They do not have YOUR album. They have VMP's product. Your album might not even exist
 
Ultimately they are gonna do whatever is most prudent for them as a business going forward. It wouldn’t surprise me it they just refunded the cost to those that don’t end up the the album but I think the most likely scenario based on past fuck ups is a 2nd run delivered around June after they finally decide how they want to resolve the issue sometime in March. Maybe they will include a signed lithograph from Havoc and Prodi...oh, right...nevermind.
 
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