As far as the rat comment.....

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Empire has no reason to intentionally deceive customers.

I don't know exactly what the case is here. But I do think your accusation is unfair. They are not holding onto your money, or taking orders that can't be cancelled.

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It is true that AdultDVDEmpire has never charged my credit card (as I stated in my original post). However, they have also NEVER filled a single backorder. Not once out of four titles over three different orders. Except for the two current titles, I've cancelled and ordered elsewhere when similar deals have appeared (& gotten product!).

The current situation is two titles that have been on backorder for over 2-1/2 months (one of the titles for even longer as I had cancelled its backorder from a previous order and then decided to order it again).

It seems to me that if these items were really one-time specials, an email saying something to the effect of, "We're sorry, but we haven't been able to reorder that same special deal from our distributor. Would you like to leave the order in place in the hope that we will be able to fulfill it soon or cancel or choose something else instead?" might be in order. I'd hate losing the deal, but I'd understand.

Instead, I get an order confirmation and wait ... and wait ... and wait. Then I send an email inquiry which is not answered and I wait ... and I wait. Then I send another email which has not been responded to either and I follow it with a telephone call and get the, "We can't ship what the distributors don't supply ..." response. Late, but okay until I run a search for the same titles again and find that they ARE available several other places. I even called to confirm and was told by two different sources that they sold a fairly steady stream of one title and a few of the other and that they had not had any trouble getting stock of either item.

This is not my first rant aimed at ADE: their inattention drew my ire once before, including my complaint about their backorder situation. (See: Adult DVD Empire is going crazy... :)) At that time, they resolved the immediate problem -- a coupon applicable to straight porn but not to gay porn, but they never addressed my backorder problem. It was on the strength of the responses from Jeff Rix and Empire Man that I placed two additional orders at that time -- one containing the two backorder items still in question and another that was fulfilled and shipped immediately.

I admit, I'm ruthless in search of deals on gay porn. I feel that gay porn is unfairly expensive compared to its straight counterpart. I realize that the volume of sales is less and that the potential market is smaller; however, I think that the high prices make the situation a self-fulfilling prophesy. As other marketing segments are well aware, gays tend to have a fairly high disposable income compared to straights in similar socio-economic situations. That means we've got the money to spend on non-essential items like porn. It doesn't mean that we enjoy spending extra dollars for similar product just because we are gay.

Here's hoping that the situation improves, both at Adult DVD Empire (& its new gay offspring) and for gay porn in general.

~ GaySatyr

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Not getting responses to emails is a different than saying Empire is intentionally offering misleading pricing.

I understand your frusturation with the high price of gay porn. But you should give online retailers some credit for offering gay DVDs at much lower prices than anywhere else. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like gay porn DVDs are much more reasonably priced than gay porn VHS ever was.

I'm guessing the best way to get gay DVDs at a reasonable price is to encourage the good studios to make some mid-budget productions. It seems like it's either huge-budget or low-budget with very little in between. Just a thought.

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Gay DVDs for$19.95

Enjoy

Edited by - Empire Man on Nov 20 2001

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On seeing an item that IS in current production and IS available from multiple sources at various prices and knowing that one of the larger sources has it listed at the lowest price, even though it is currently out of stock from that source, and seeing the item continually listed at the same low price on their otherwise often updated price list, one could logically conclude that the item would be back in stock at that price within some reasonable period of time. Additionally, give that an item is listed at a lower price from one source with a reliable reputation, one would not order that item from another source at a substantially higher price.

I don't think Empire is intentionally trying to rip me off. If they were, they could have charged my credit card long ago. However, they do not have a policy in place that addresses backorder situations effectively. And, based on past experience, they overlook details affecting their gay customers. My guess is that, this being a title only likely to be ordered by gays, it is one more thing overlooked by a retailer who concentrates its efforts on its straight trade. They probably got a shipment of stock at a special price, it sold out at that price, and they have never bothered to adjust their inventory to reflect that the special purchase is no longer in effect -- just a guess on my part.

Since Empire has yet to answer my emails about the backorder situation, maybe having it aired in this public forum will get them to address the situation so that it does not happen again. I would hate to see their new GayDVDEmpire venture sullied by these kinds of situations.

~ GaySatyr

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~ GaySatyr

P.S. I just ordered 7 titles (make that 5 titles, 2 were out-of-stock so I deleted them from the order). ~ GS

Edited by - GaySatyr on Nov 21 2001

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We brought in a great guy to specifically handle our gay product. You should see lower prices and more site features coming in the next few months...

Thanks for your input!

-MikeB
Adult DVD Empire

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EXCEPT: I've placed 2 orders now. BOTH orders have indicated that all titles were IN STOCK at the time I placed the orders; however, in BOTH cases, the confirmation email has indicated that 2 titles ordered were NOT in stock.

Given my history with backorders with your company, on the 1st of these two orders, I canceled the 2 backordered titles and let the order for the remaining 5 proceed - it has already shipped although it has not yet arrived (I took advantage of the free shipping so it will arrive in a few days). The 2nd order, placed today, included one of the two titles indicated as backordered on my 1st order - a title that was noted as being IN STOCK on your website again today. Yet, the confirmation email indicates that it is NOT in stock. Make up your minds!

I'm going to leave the 2nd order in place. It contains 3 titles, all 3 of which are indicated as being IN STOCK on your website but 2 of which are indicated as being OUT OF STOCK on my order confirmation email. I have checked each of the 2 titles at other online retailers and in both cases, the titles are indicated as being IN STOCK on at least 2 other sites; however, I did NOT call to confirm their availability. It will be interesting to see the progress of this order and I will report it here.

BTW, my original, now 5-month old backorder is still in place awaiting stock (not totally fair as I canceled the order after a couple of months and placed a new order for the in-stock titles which was filled very promptly and placed a new order for the backorder titles, this back on Sept 2nd! - but it HAS been about 5 months total).

Rather than end this post on a negative note, I'll try to offer some suggestions. Let me reiterate that your new site is great and I wish you phenomenal success with it. But please assign someone the task of dealing with backorders! Perhaps you could send an email at the 15-day point reassuring the customer that you are still trying to fill their order. If the order is still incomplete at the 30-day point, perhaps you could send an email informing the customer that there is still a stock problem and offering him the choice of cancellation of the backordered titles or, with him knowing that there is a chance of the order's fulfillment being somewhat indefinite, leaving the order in place. Thereafter, on an every 30-day basis, send an email stating that you are still trying.

All this could be automated. It would be easy to alter your order automation software to generate additional email correspondence at specific intervals and it could also generate reports of backordered items that could be routed to a "live" person for follow-up.

Best of luck to you and your new site.

~ GaySatyr

A post script - I've checked your site again and NOW the 2 titles are showing as OUT-OF-STOCK on your site. Is there a bug in your IN/OUT-OF-STOCK subroutine? ~ GaySatyr

Edited by - GaySatyr on Nov 25 2001

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GaySatyr: I thank you for you comments. No one could get anywhere without some criticism and we are doing our best to correct the order status problem you mentioned. Things are somewhat hectic right now so please be patient...we may not be perfect yet but we're getting there. =)

AND for those of you who have not noticed, we have added a feedback feature to the gay site. Now any comments, concerns, or complaints may be emailed directly to me for a more prompt reply and/or solution. (for those of you who don't have it the address is feedback@gaydvdempire.com )

Thank you all for your time and support...

Sincerely
Todd

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(Now if they can just resolve the Sept 2nd order!)

~ GaySatyr

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