Komodo order allocation problems

[Ryan Chernin]

Heads up for anybody who ordered their Komodo right away:

It looks like there's some f*ckery going on with allocation. Orders aren't getting allocated in the order they were received. My order just got bumped to "sometime in November" without explanation, and I was told I couldn't speak to a manager to get further clarification, for some reason. Screenshots of my chat with red support attached below for transparency.

Anybody know what might be going on here?

 

[Colton John McLaughlin]

It looks like there's some f*ckery going on with allocation. Orders aren't getting allocated in the order they were received.

You don't know where you were in the allocation, so i don't think there is any fuckery going on. Just because you ordered right away does not mean you are first in line. I ordered my ST within 4 minutes, and i was 189th in line (if serial numbers match allocation), and had to wait for the first 3 batches of ST to be delivered before mine was sent out.

 

[Jonathan Keane]

Its a very popular camera, many people ordered the camera, Red isn't as big as canon or sony, covid, I understand the frustration but things are pretty crazy for everyone right now.

 

[Rakesh Malik]

There are almost always a bunch of people ready to pull the trigger right away when a new Red product goes live, and the result is a huge surge of early orders. I have a feeling that Red pulled a Black Magic here... in other words, in spite of expecting it to be popular, Red still managed to underestimate quite HOW popular.

I'm HOPING that I'll have my Komodo in time for a shoot I've been hired onto for the city of Seattle, but we might be starting work on that before I get mine, so I'll probably have to shoot it with my Epic-W.

And when it arrives I'll have an excuse to sell off my Sigma fp, which is a pretty nice camera, but not as nice as a Komodo

 

[Ryan Chernin]

You don't know where you were in the allocation, so i don't think there is any fuckery going on. Just because you ordered right away does not mean you are first in line. I ordered my ST within 4 minutes, and i was 189th in line (if serial numbers match allocation), and had to wait for the first 3 batches of ST to be delivered before mine was sent out.

That all makes sense, but to clarify I am just going off of my order number relative to my friend's whose komodo shipped last night. We're only 30 orders apart judging by order number, so I just feel like the math on their new shipping estimate doesn't line up. That's why I'm guessing they're allocating out of order.

 

[Ryan Chernin]

There are almost always a bunch of people ready to pull the trigger right away when a new Red product goes live, and the result is a huge surge of early orders. I have a feeling that Red pulled a Black Magic here... in other words, in spite of expecting it to be popular, Red still managed to underestimate quite HOW popular.

This is definitely possible. Unfortunate, but possible. Still, you'd think they'd record how much stock they actually have ready to go and have that reflected in the shipping estimate. I assumed that to be the case, otherwise why would the estimate jump from 7-10 days to 3-4 weeks after enough orders came in on release day?

 

[Rakesh Malik]

Maybe his got into an earlier batch, and yours has to await a second production batch? Hopefully they'll be able to streamline their manufacturing and raise the fulfillment pace, but at the same time, Red is big on QC, so they don't want to speed things up by becoming sloppy.

 

[Rakesh Malik]

This is definitely possible. Unfortunate, but possible. Still, you'd think they'd record how much stock they actually have ready to go and have that reflected in the shipping estimate. I assumed that to be the case, otherwise why would the estimate jump from 7-10 days to 3-4 weeks after enough orders came in on release day?

Maybe they did, but underestimated how many orders they'd get on that first day, which probably why the jump was so large. The estimate you saw when you added yours to your cart was probably but there were enough people submitting orders while you were filling out your address and entering your payment info to bump up your lead time.

Again, I'm guessing. I don't know for sure, obviously. But Red isn't into screwing people, and the guys there do like to have their cameras in customers' hands rather than have their customers waiting... but they still exist in the real world, so they can't have everything they want, either.

 

[Glen Powell]

I ordered in the first 20 minutes... and my order number is 194 after yours Ryan. Even if all of those orders aren't Komodos, it would still be a lot of cameras.

The cameras will come; I'm just amazed that with the global sh*tsh*w happening right now that they can deliver a new product in any kind of volume.

 

[Ryan Chernin]

I ordered in the first 20 minutes... and my order number is 194 after yours Ryan. Even if all of those orders aren't Komodos, it would still be a lot of cameras.

The cameras will come; I'm just amazed that with the global sh*tsh*w happening right now that they can deliver a new product in any kind of volume.

These are both excellent points.

Also, I spoke with Riley at customer service and now feel like a shmuck for putting him on blast in particular. Had no idea RED was such a small company, and our conversation really demonstrated how much they give a crap about their customers.

Certainly will keep my fingers crossed for an early November shipment and just plan to keep using my S1H a little bit longer

 

[Christopher A. Bell]

Also keep in mind dealers that may have contracts for X amount of cameras to be allocated to them up front that have to be provided.

 

[Christoffer Glans]

The biggest issue I think is that all the people who were held back by trying to fix their EU tax orders and Hydrogen discounts were pushed back in favor of the ones who just ordered without caring for those things.

But, I'm not too worried about that really. I've read that the first units seem to have problems with too much play of the adaptors so I really hope I'm late in the delivery so that I'm getting a unit that is correct and much better in its mount. I much rather have one delivery that is right, than an early delivery that needs to be sent back. So my suggestion is to stay cool and be happy about a late delivery.

 

[Rakesh Malik]

I was one of the folks who got stuck in preorder limbo for the Scarlet-W, and was shooting the start of a feature film. Red loaned me a Scarlet-X Dragon for four months while I awaited what ended up being my Epic-W.

So yeah, Red does care about its customers.

 

[Jamil Stubbs]

I was one of the folks who got stuck in preorder limbo for the Scarlet-W, and was shooting the start of a feature film. Red loaned me a Scarlet-X Dragon for four months while I awaited what ended up being my Epic-W.

So yeah, Red does care about its customers.

I call that customer service!!!

 

[Rakesh Malik]

Me too -- that's why I posted it.

I'd planned on getting a Komodo sight unseen, but due to the fact that I didn't have the bux ready when the order page went online, I was "forced" to watch the intro videos that Red posted

 

[Ryan Chernin]

I was one of the folks who got stuck in preorder limbo for the Scarlet-W, and was shooting the start of a feature film. Red loaned me a Scarlet-X Dragon for four months while I awaited what ended up being my Epic-W.

So yeah, Red does care about its customers.

Hell yeah, that's incredible. I've certainly been eating my words since first complaining!

 

[Rakesh Malik]

Hell yeah, that's incredible. I've certainly been eating my words since first complaining!

And now you know the REAL reason that Red's customers are so loyal.

 

[S_James]

first I’ve heard of this issue with the adapters, but I agree...what a bummer after waiting this long to even place the order, to finally receive a camera and have to ship it back! especially overseas.

 

[Jamil Stubbs]

I occasionally talk smack about RED but I keep coming back. Awesome color science and awesome customer service. Now I just wish I could receive my KOMDOO now. I feel like it's XMAS!!

 

[Rakesh Malik]

With IPP2, Red really nailed the color science. It was good before that, but after that it looks like film out of the box, rather than requiring any futzing to look beautiful.

I'm going to put my Sigma fp up for sale when my Komodo ships. It's not because I don't like my fp; it's a good camera, and Sigma has great color science, but I do more motion than still photography which the fp requires an external recorder for in order to record raw, making it a bulkier package to backpack and travel with.

Plus it will match nicely with my Epic-W, which makes it an extra win. And for 95% of my film work the Epic-W is severe overkill. The Komodo will be less severe overkill