Runbox increases all email storage quotas to 10 GB.

[s a]

Originally posted by carverrn
5 customers x $30/year = $150
3 customers x $50/year = $150

A very valid point but it's not always about the arithmetic...

it's about the message Runbox is sending out to their customer base, something that will be taken into account by prospective buyers. If you make drastic changes that alienate some fraction of your user-base then you are unlikely to win subscriber loyalty (those 5 customers you counted at $30 are probably long-time users with some degree of attachment to Runbox).

[ you may argue with me about this but their message seems to be: if you do not want to (or cannot) spend more than $30/yr on email, please look elsewhere after a year ]

While it is important for runbox to watch the numbers and make decisions that keep them profitable it is equally important for them to do so without treading on the toes of their customers (FastMail talks often of "grandfathering" accounts if "pricing plans" change : there may be a lesson in that for Runbox).

[adam15c]

Originally posted by carverrn
They know they will lose some of their customer base. But that's not a problem.

Of course its a problem. Why alienate any customers? No business wants to lose customers. Especially Runbox, who probably lost a good few when their system kept crashing before the introduction of their new servers. Who's to say they will gain the new customers to make up for the ones they may lose. I guess they have done their homework.

Didn't smileglobal do something similar? They stopped providing services for private individuals to concentrate on the business end of the market.

[gdg]

It makes sense to do things like Runbox is doing from a certain point of view, namely the view of Runbox as a premium service being compared to free services having 1GB, 2GB, and 2.655676848 GB ... and who's counting bandwidth, right? So, yes, it makes sense for a premium service to have more space.

Yet Mailsnare is still in business at a whopping 100MB of storage. I know that makes Runbox appear much better in a way, but it also shows there are people out there that are not considering the size of the mailbox when they buy. Something else attracts them.

Like s a mentions, treading on your customer's toes will ultimately make you look bad. How many people are willing to live with a 66% increase in price, all at once, on any service they use?

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Many of the posts in defense of this decision appear to come from a strange outlook on business, as well as some confusing signals:

Reason 1) There's not enough resources (personnel), so Runbox needs to increase prices to weed customers out, and therefore improve service levels to those customers that are left. (Huh?)

Reason 2) We have decided to have only one level because we want to focus on only the customer that demands more. (But you have limited resources, right?)

---------------

I'm not sure where those ideas are supposed to fit together, but they surely do not imply Runbox is in any way growth minded.

If Runbox did have different levels with different support protocols and different resource allotments for each level, appropriate to the pricing of each level, you may avoid treading on your existing customers' toes, and may get many new desired customers as well.

If all the extra load becomes burdensome, you'll at least have all the extra money rolling in, and perhaps you can purchase more resources (personnel and otherwise) to handle it.

You may grow rather than wither.

----------------

But I'm sure better minds made the decision that has been made than any on the forum that may oppose.

[Shelded]

Originally posted by s a
A very valid point but it's not always about the arithmetic...

it's about the message Runbox is sending out to their customer base, something that will be taken into account by prospective buyers.

Agreed. RB has a history of making jarring decisions which make sense at the moment and rattle off a few customers for the best of the whole. "Continuity" might be a good word to meditate upon for RB's visionaries. Maybe different policy would result.

[hanslysglimt]

I would like to refer to the original post for Runbox reasoning please.

Thank you.

[gdg]

Originally posted by hanslysglimt
I would like to refer to the original post for Runbox reasoning please.

Thank you.

From the first post (not the reasoning):

Originally posted by hanslysglimt
However all current most valued customers are invited to and advised to renew their accounts before January 1. to lock in the current great prices effective since 2001. We hope most of you will make sure you lock in the low price.

Great! Maybe current customers can do that 59.95 for three years deal.

Originally posted by hanslysglimt
The 3 year super-promo at USD 59.95 is no longer avaliable.

Awwwww! Now why did that have to disappear right now?





Sorry, but see the impression your loyal customer may get?





No one that opposes the decision is trying to ruin you, Hans. Some here are trying to give you food for thought...all in the best interests of Runbox. But it's your baby. You've got to do what you've got to do.

[carverrn]

Runbox has a development/support staff of 2 (maybe 3). If you want to count Linpro folks you could probably add a couple more but I'm just talking Runbox proper.

2-3 people can't support a large customer base. They have been doing an amazing job for a long time now, with some hard times here and there, but they can't do that forever.

Liz (support) and Geir (development/support) have been the two "constants" at Runbox with a 3rd position (development/support) that has changed people a number of times.

Such a small operation has it's limits and they have reached those limits in the past year or so. In my opinion they are in a "Catch 22" situation. They can't continue to provide a quality service for it's customer base without increased revenues. Customer support is already at it's limits so trying to increase increase revenues by adding more low-revenue customers will just make things worse. Increasing the customer base will also increase server demands on a system that still has some problems meeting peek demands (that's just my observation though). So that little bit of extra revenue will have to be spread pretty thin.

Their only viable option is to maintain (or decrease) the current customer base and increase the fees in order to get those revenue increases they need to maintain and improve their services.

Again, this is all based on my observations over the last few years. I hate to see Runbox lose customers too but I don't think they have any other workable option at the moment. In time if they can regain a decent revenue stream they might be to support a larger low-end customer base but not right now.

Regards,
Rich

[carverrn]

Originally posted by hanslysglimt
I would like to refer to the original post for Runbox reasoning please.

Thank you.

Due to extra demands of premium email usage and the expected cost increase over time with more disk space we announce that we intend from January 1. 2006 to raise the standard price for Runbox accounts to USD 49.95 (in line with the current special extra storage promo priced at USD 49.95 per year. Effectively raising the price from today’s USD 29.95 per year.) In order to promise storage space at this level along with increased support levels Runbox will need to increase the price that has otherwise stayed the same since 2001.

Hans, Geir and Liz can correct me if I'm wrong but I think the biggest costs to Runbox is probably in the "increased support levels" and the "extra demands of premium email usage" (e.g. feature development). Which is what I've been saying in my posts. I think the actual cost of extra space is probably one of the lower costs but the most visible benefit to the users.

Regards,
Rich

[s a]

Originally posted by carverrn
In my opinion they are in a "Catch 22" situation. They can't continue to provide a quality service for it's customer base without increased revenues.

Their only viable option is to maintain (or decrease) the current customer base and increase the fees in order to get those revenue increases they need to maintain and improve their services.

Now if Runbox were to simply say that ^^ I would wish them good luck and leave this discussion.

However, my impression of their explanation is more like this: We have decided that 10GB is what all of you will want and since storage of that kind is expensive, we will hike our prices. I think the idea of offering vast storage is a good one but to leave customers in the lurch without a valid explanation (like the one you've offered above) is simply poor policy.

[adam15c]

The funny thing is I just sent an email to support of another email provider (I wont mention who), as I noticed my account was not showing the correct GB allowance. The email I received back from the CEO of the company told me that in his opinion high GB storage is just a gimmick and they offer it just because "other's" do.

[carverrn]

Originally posted by kobukan
The funny thing is I just sent an email to support of another email provider (I wont mention who), as I noticed my account was not showing the correct GB allowance. The email I received back from the CEO of the company told me that in his opinion high GB storage is just a gimmick and they offer it just because "other's" do.

10G of email space ... yeah ... I might agree with that. But I don't know Runbox's high-end customer base so I can't say for sure. However, 1G of file space isn't a "gimmick" to me. That I could immediately find useful.

Regards,
Rich

[sky]

What are high-end users anyway? The main change in this announcement is the storage space, so does it mean high-end users are the one who need 10 GB and the lower end are the ones who need 1 GB or less?

And does RB expect the lower-end users to subsidize the high-end users? Or it expect the lower-end users to leave and look for alternative? If the users are currently happy with the 1 GB space, does RB expect them to suddenly all want to get 10 GB?

[sky]

I think it might be good for them to two types of accounts : Personal and Business/Family.

Personal will be exactly what RB has right now (1 GB for $30).

Business/ Family will give 3 or 4 mailboxes to share the 10 GB of storage for the higher price.

This way, RB will lose none of the current customers while able to gain any extra stream of income. It might be a win-win for them.

[carverrn]

Space is probably the least expensive part of their costs. Staff for support and development are probably the most expensive.

If they did provide a personal version it couldn't be the same as the current accounts. They would need to reduce/drop some of the features. 1GB email space and 100MB of file space just like before. Bandwidth would have to be lowered to something like 750MB/month. Hosting a personal domain would be dropped. No aliases (maybe 1) but they could still use the Plus Addressing scheme.

As far as I know, sharing the space for one account over multiple accounts is not possible with their current software so that's out because it would require additional development that wouldn't be done for a while.

So I'd say if you want a two tiered system then the current accounts would need to be the $50 accounts as they have priced them and a $30 would have to cut some of the more costly features (e.g. bandwidth).

Regards,
Rich

[gdg]

Originally posted by carverrn

So I'd say if you want a two tiered system then the current accounts would need to be the $50 accounts as they have priced them and a $30 would have to cut some of the more costly features (e.g. bandwidth).

Regards,
Rich

I think that's what most opponents are proposing.