From Case Labs
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I’m sure by now, many of you have heard about the controversy around us and Thermaltake. I want to say the amount of support we have received from the industry, professional modders and the community at large has been both incredibly humbling and so very much appreciated! All of you have been great!
When I sat in my office at home 5 years ago and began to sketching out the basic concept behind the M8, I never dreamed we would get to this point. With no marketing budget to work with at all, we reached out to the community to share our vision and found wonderful support for what we were trying to do. We have worked together all this time to produce the best case we can with the resources we have available. It’s been an incredible experience.
This brings us to where we are today. After all the work that went into establishing our brand, it seems unnecessary for a company that is over 100X our size with vast resources felt the need to so closely imitate the appearance of our cases. Love us or not, most people can readily recognize our “look”. I’ve seen people ask “Why does it matter?” “Imitation is the greatest form of flattery, right?”
Well, not really. It dilutes the brand we have worked so hard to build. They would be less and less recognizable as our own. Perhaps more importantly, it creates confusion in the market place. I have heard countless times how we “copied” the 900D. Nothing could be further from the truth, the SMH10 came out long before the 900D, but because Corsair is so dominant in the market place, people get it turned around. BTW, I not saying that Corsair “copied” us, they simply took a general concept and did their own take on it. It is unmistakable as a Corsair product. My concern is that a year from now that same will be said about us and the new “W” series, I know there will eventually be confusion in the marketplace about who did it first.
People have wondered why the cases are more expensive that most. Surely, we must all be driving Ferraris. That would be nice, but no. The materials to go into our cases are several more times more expensive than a typical mass produced product. There are a myriad of small details that most wouldn’t even realize are there, but serve to make the cases more durable and function better than other offerings in the market. We don’t make 10,000 units at a time, so spending 10’s of thousands of dollars (or more) on tooling for each case model would be wildly impractical.
Beyond direct materials and labor, there are many other costs to take into account: Facility and machinery expense, utilities, insurance, taxes, regulatory expenses, customer services, warranty costs, administrative costs, the list goes on… Our goal has always been to produce the best product we were capable of.
I know our products aren’t for everyone and that’s perfectly ok. We don’t aspire to take over the world smile emoticon We are big advocates for choice in the marketplace and don’t want to see anything that would impair that.
Finally, in closing, I want reiterate how much we appreciate all the support we have been given. Honestly, it’s hard not to be emotional about it. It’s been overwhelming in the best possible way. Since there is no way for me to reach out to every individual, please share this post to let the world know how much we appreciate the positive force they have been and continue to inspire us to greater
things.
Ok, now all of you get back to work and show us your next incredible project! grin emoticon
Peace,
Jim Keating
President & CEO
CaseLabs"
