Went to a new magic booth in town over the weekend to do my "magic shopping". As the demonstrators there did not know me, I was treated like a layman, and I like it that way. At least I could see what they are selling to people these days.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, one of them tried to sell me a svengali deck by telling me it was "the hottest thing in magic right now". Right... and when I told him I actually had the deck when I was in primary school, he "reassured" me that "the deck is making a comeback now and many magicians are using it".

I kept quiet for a while and asked him about invisible and mental photography decks. He kept telling me to get svengali first as "invisible deck requires a intermediate level sleight of hands which might not be suitable for my level now."

Look, I am not pissed for him not recognising TBMIS, but I seriously think he was misrepresenting his products to unsuspecting newbies, which, IMO, is as bad as those banks selling the wrong products to uncles and aunties. Very bad...

Anyway, just to mention that I eventually bought a Cheek to Cheek deck from another demonstrator. At least she looked better and was pretty honest...

Are you referring to the XXXXXX in XXXXXX?

I had an experience seeing one of them trying to hard sell an effect to some tourists. The presentation was poor and was fumbling all over. To top it off, the effect failed. :( The tourist was left wondering what had happened. The sales staff still tried to hard sell it despite failing.

I had to control my laughter so as not to embarrass the sales staff.

hm..didn't notice any new magic stores in town. unless mudbuddha is talking about the one at XXXXX basement outside XXXXXX, it should be under the same management by the other magic shop at XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX.

That's it. I'm going there this weekend.

That is horrifying. Now you know why I seldom go to magic shops. Over priced and they try to sell you the things they want to clear.

Was just told over last week that a lock mentalism effect that I purchased for $20 is being sold in one of the magic shops for $80+.

Well, that's business

Overpricing is not a problem, How regular can a magic shop generate sales?
And usually all buyers are one off, hence it is not fast moving consumer goods.
Not like boutiques or food chains, magic shops require high margin for survival.

Hence, if i got a choice. I would not go to magic shop for props, but merely sight seeing.
I can order at a much cheaper price online :)
Magic shops are targeting lay people at large.

However, if you want to open a magic shop to target at innocent laypeople and generate high income. The motive is not good in the first place. It is overpricing things and getting people to buy without their knowledge of market prices. It gives people the wrong impression of magic.

Today I went to the new place. I saw them repackaged Numberground by Mickael Chatelain and selling the gimmick. The description fits the original trick but the name is changed.

True we can't do much about it, but it makes me wonder in the first place that why do these black sheep even appear. Ain't our Art sacred?

In the first place, the aim of a magic shop IS to make money. Such is the any purpose of any viable business. No one gets into it for free, afterall they do need to survive you know.

BUT having said that, it should be done ETHICALLY.

As long as it (the product) is original and done ethically, at whatever price they charge, as long as they can back it with whatever value - say the add-value is after sales service, that is all fine.

For eg. Brick and mortar shops do have to charge to cover for rental. The extra value that the customer gets is he gets to feel/ touch/ see the effect in person before buying and perhaps aftersales in person. Online shops do not have that physical presence, so they charge cheaper.

If physically touching and seeing the stuff is not of a value to you, then you might feel it is best to buy from online, then in that case, do so. If you feel that any shop is over pricing, just switch to other avenues for your stuff. Supply and demand will govern the price in the end.

Those who love the art should protect it by simply supporting the originals.

Price it like Penguin Magic and see how many people will swarm to the shops... probably a majority of the magicians here since it would then be cheaper to buy from them than online. I'm convinced that they will earn more... and honestly.

Just like the Tiger prawns in Newton hawker centre. :(

Same things as when you buy a pair of shoes or a T-shirt online. You only get to see pictures of it, virtually. You cant touch, you cant ask questions, you cant move the camera around and see things from another angle.

The price difference lies in all these. Why do girls go to Bugis Street to buy dresses where a similiar one can be found at shoplah.com at half the price? Can you try the dress at shoplah.com? Can you turn your body around and check yourself out in the mirror?

I'm not saying that you can physically touch the props after a demostration (cause the truth is most likely you can't). But having a demostrator showing you a trick LIVE (with risks of failing or getting heckled) is the key difference in watching at video at Penguinmagic. He can simply just turn on his laptop and double click and sit back while you watch a video from PenguinMagic and afterwards ask you if you wanna buy.

All I'm saying in, if you dont like a shop, just stay away from it. Dont need to criticise and STOP others from going. If you think getting stuffs online is cheaper and better, then go ahead. Tell that to others. There's a fine line between badmouthing a magic shop compared with just saying that getting online from who who who is better.

When you own a magic shop, you'll know how hard it is to maintain one. This is why they have to resort to such tactics to grab sales and keep their rice bowl. If you cant see eye to eye with that, then close your eyes and ignore it.

For those naive magicians who intend to open a magic shop when you "grow" up, good luck.

1) Firstly, no shop name was mentioned here

2) Are you saying that the difficulty of maintaining a store is a valid excuse for dishonest sale tactics? Tell that to CASE.

3) I do believe they will get better sales if they do lower their prices. A point you have not countered.

Guess this arguments will have no end depending on the view from different perspective

1. Prices
If they lower down their prices, some guy would pop up and say, " it cheapens magic"

" they offer magic at cheap price for layman, how are we magicians going to survive? no one would have paid to see my show! "


2.Dishonest tactics :

Undeniably, svengali deck is one of the most idiot proof, most visual and strong magic. It has always been the best seller in magic shops for ages, So it is actually not too misleading, unless some shops claim that their PIRATED DVD are ORIGINAL, that is misleading.

See that?

At the end of the day, regardless of what price they charge, they should not sell counterfeit products.

1. I bet those that say that it cheapens music only want cheap products for themselves.

I don't see how cheaper magic will lead to less people paying to see my shows.

People pay to be entertained, and if they are, they will pay... whether they know how the effect is done or not.
As a matter of fact, I think magicians pay to watch more magician shows than non-magicians. Just ask yourself how many magic shows, lectures or even magic videos you have watched the last 1 year and compare that with any non-magician.

2. Except that this hottest trick sells for $30 or $40 when Daiso sells it for $2. And we all know how some of these shops sell their self-made gimmicks (often poorly made) and claiming them to be the original. Heard so many horror stories, where people buy these imitation products, being told that it is the real thing, only to find out that it is so badly made that the it became impractical to perform a decent trick... and get charged like $30-$50 more than the original. Just in case you are not familiar, this is in violation of Singapore's Advertisement laws.

There are some honest shops around, and I do not want to clustered all of them together, but this is somewhere you might want to go to if they are really being dishonest. Under the Complaint section.
http://www.case.org.sg/

Eh... guys, I didn't actually say their prices were too high.

I was only talking about the way they talked about their stuff. Not that they are lying or what, but I think they could be slightly misrepresenting.

I mean I don't really think svengali is one of the "hottest thing in magic", at least not the way they suggested. Maybe as the most popular trick deck among beginners, yes, that I agree. Among the more experienced magicians, I only know of 2 people who ever used it frequently.

By phrasing it the way they did, customers might have the wrong expectations of an effect.

A good example is E's How to Do Street Magic. It was really a misnomer, as many of the effects require a table to perform, and not really the "street magic" we have come to know. It was a marketing gimmick to put in the magic words SM to entice beginners. Many people would have thought the DVD would be teaching Blaine's kind of tricks.

I'm aware that no shop name is mentioned, and its my bad for interpreting myself wrongly.

I didnt say maintaining a store is a valid excuse for dishonest sales tactics. Because its not. But what can you, as a consumer do about it? Ya ya ya like your past few posts you can be a hero and "Tell that to CASE", or you can simply.. stay away.

When you see people at road side selling pirated DVDs, what do you do? Stay away. Get too closed and you might get ur a** in trouble when they get raided. Call the police and be a hero? Sounds good, until I heard a story from my dad that a guy got whacked and I dunno got die anot, cause he go call police and those "scouters" overheard him.

Lastly for your last point, if they lower their prices, they earn what? You wanna compare with a online dealer who has no rent or physical demostrator? Dude I believe you're a adult and the way you say it is simply too "on the surface" kind of thing. Lower prices will increase the quantity sold, but not the profit earned, what for?

---

From the start to end I never at any point say that who is right or who is wrong, just that if you think whoever is wrong, just stay away from them. And I never meant to startle or disagree with the threadstarter or anyone else, but just express myself and hopefully you all can stop having such terrible negative views on magic shops.

And I think I'm going off topic so I'm going to say no more. This truely has been discussed before throughly and there was never an ending to it. A very very complicated issue.

Mod's note: Mind your language

It's not really about giving negative views about magic shops.

It's true that it's up to the shops to employ whatever sales tactics they wish to increase their profits.

It's just that some people feel that there is a need to generate awareness on potential unscrupulous merchants.

It's only recently that i encountered an incident. I bought an effect and discovered that the gimmicks seem suspiciously incomplete. I suspected it was incomplete because there was supposed to be a tutorial DVD which wasn't there. I asked if it was incomplete and the reply was the effect was from a different supplier. Innocently, at that moment, i believed and went home. Along the way home, i kept thinking about it and did some research and managed to discover that the effect was sold to me with 2/3 of the content missing at the same price of the full set.

I returned to the shop and enquired, the saleperson claimed he is not sure and will find out. Personally i was thinking :" What the hell? You don't even know what is the complete content of the effect you are selling? Where is the product knowledge?"

A day later, i received an sms saying that they are willing to refund me $20 for the missing items. Only $20 refund for 2/3 of the items missing? He must be joking. I demanded either i return the incomplete set and get a full refund or he top up the missing items. He chose to refund me in full and i returned the incomplete set.

Perhaps this is just an one off incident and a genuine mistake but it is definitely a good case study to generate awareness there might be unscrupulous merchants trying to rip off unsuspecting victims in a similar fashion.

I certainly do not see this as giving negative views about magic shops but as case study instead to educate people to be more alert and buying when buying.

That is the reason why some people refuse to support such shops and I agree that such incidents need to be made known to fellow magicians.

No one is forcing anyone to support or stay away from these shops. Its up to you to decide if its the right thing or not.

Lower prices means higher volume which in a way will increase profits. Its up to the shop owner to price their products, no one can force them. If they find that their sales is good even with high price, then this is probably how their business should be operated. Again, no one is forcing anyone.

Brick and motar shops needs to be priced higher due to their higher overheads, but it is totally different if they priced it to rip off people.

I recall my second visit to a local magic shop to get coin[. I went there specifically because I thought it was the best place to seek advice and new materials especially when I am new to the gaff at that time.

The guy showed me the usual that normal magicians use and but he did not sell the coins as well so I was abit hesitant to buy the gaff as there were no coins to practise with. Then he brought out the chinese coin set which consisted of 4 chiense coins and a gaff. He sort of brainwashed me into buying it at $70 and of course i did bought it in the end along with DVD. I realised that the gaff is actually quite obvious at that time because it was thicker and bloated so I asked him and he said 'Dun worry, nobody will realise".

I got home and practise but I realise that the gaff and the coin make sound when fitted and the coin just keeps dropping out. Something like they don't hold well together. At that time I thought it was my fault because I was inexperienced until I performed that time, someone actually realise that the gaff was different and after reading so many threads on the gaff I realise I was pretty much conned. They both should hold well together and look the same.

Not only so, I realise that he ripped me off so much. I could have gotten 4 gaff and 4 chinese coins at around 80+ on Ning.

I still remember he told me that the chinese coins were very popular because they were rather different than what normal magicians used and that as asians we can relate to why we use chinese coins.

Another cowdung he told me was that the DVD teaches CP. Because I saw him CP and asked him about it, he just said that the DVD teaches it.

He did not pass information to me on the gaff but instead just tried to get me to buy his so called "most popular coins at that time".


Now I only have those coins and gaff and I try practising 3Fly and Coins across with it, I can tell you it is such a pain to practise. The coins are so light and it falls off before I even set my hand in the right position for it.


-Just a reason why I do not support local shops-

Ever got charge $30 to cr**p a card as a way to mark the deck?

At least that was not false advertisement... just stupid me.

Hmm... I only paid $25 for that, lucky me. :P

Anyway, if you guys read my thread on Bicycle Seconds, yup, it was the same place.

I think this is the BEST kind of service that you can get. A salesperson does not know everything. He's not god. There're so many things out there, how is it possibily to know everything?

But by saying that he'll check and get back to you is the best option that was available. He didnt bombard you with a load of false information.(This is what people usually do, they say "Erm, I think.. blah blah blah") Neither did he reject and heck care you. ("Oh sorry its your fault for not checking the entire package when you left my shop. God knows if you remove the part and then come back and tell me you're missing something.") Think about it.

---

Again, think about it, you got the BEST OPTION again. Some magic shops wouldnt even do that, 'cause it'd mean you've learnt a free secret. You cant blame shops for selling you spoilt goods, its inevitable, but you can blame shops for not helping you out when you encounter spoilt goods.

There's a whole world of difference.

But shouldnt sale person, magic or not, be fully aware of what they are selling?

Imagine your boss giving you a bag of pills (which you dont know exactly what is it) to sell, would you sell it without knowing what it does and how it works? I doubt.

So I guess thats not really the best, its understandable that he doesnt know what he doesnt see, but you need to know your product before you sell it.

Alright, Imagine you have hundreds if not thousands of effects in the shop.
Are you expected to know in detail all of them?
Are they expected to open all packages/ DVD and know what each single effect does and to check for its completeness?
when shop retailers order, they go by bulk, ie quantity.


I can walk up to Watson or Guardian, and ask the sales person about a particular healthcare product sold there, sometimes all of them might not be able to answer it

Well, I would say YES. You are expected to know, the crux of magic products are the effect it gives. So whats the point of selling A without knowing what A does. Or buying A without knowing what A does.

Dealers, buy in bulk. They have demos sent to them and reviews sent to them. Why shouldnt they know their stuff well?

I guess it boils down to professionalism, regardless of magic or not, if you are a doctor you dont know what symptoms the patients are having you find it out in textbooks and journals.

Same for a mama shop owner, they remmeber the price for every product, if not they have a list they can check against.

So what should a magic shop be sloppy in its sales?

That's pretty unfair for that shop keeper. Unless you work in a marginally small with low stock stall. Look at how much effects are marketed now compared to those days.
I'm on defending him now.

So you mean for each item you ordered and sell in your shop, you have to Open the package, View the DVD, Test the props and verify EVERYTHING in the content before selling them to customers?
Are the sales man allowed to do so? Are customers happy to received opened packages and used DVDs?
I have friends dealing with Murphy, one of the largest supplier for Magic products, and they DON'T give demo set for dealers.

If you are saying mama stall should know the price list, I believe the magic shop guy knows the price too.
But for the content of the item, Take a random book and bring up to the salespersons in Popular, ask them what is the content of the book. They know?

And the case here is incomplete set. Not intentionally misrepresenting or fraud.

Take an example, I bought Justin Miller DVD from magicboutique at the arena.
I received a pack of gimmicked db cards, and the DVD is opened(no complaints for that, the price is fairly cheap).
If Supposedly the description says it comes with 26 db, and i receive only 24.
Do I claim that MB is unethical?
( Above is just an example, No offence to anyone)

I think you probably missed this part of what i said earlier.

Hence it's apparent he knew the content. Imagine Shop A sells you a deck of complete bike cards and shop B sells you a deck of bike cards with all the advertisment and joker cards missing, telling you that's because it's from a different supplier. Different supplier selling different content of the same effect and at the same price, doesnt sound too right does it?

Just like what Alexander mentioned, professionalism is the issue here then. If you are the owner of a shop, would you still defend a staff who doesn't even have some basic product knowledge about the products you are selling?

Isn't it supposed to be the shop's responsiblity to ensure that products sold are complete and serviceable? This is the shop's guarantee of quality service to her customers. This is direct over the counter sales, checks for completeness and serviceablity should be done unless the customer doesn't want to.

He is very much obliged to provide me with a satisfactory resolution to the problem. I'm pretty sure he is fully aware of what consequences he might face if he can't provide an adequate and satisfactory resolution to the problem. I did ask for my set to be topped up to the complete set and since he can't top it up, it's only right he refunded me.


Like i also mentioned this could be an unintentional and one off incident. But it is also good case study to educate people to be more careful when it comes to buying. In our case here, we won't know the contents of the effects until we buy it. If we ain't careful, it's easy to be ripped off by unscrupulous merchants.

Hmm... why can't the shopkeeper top up the set and need to refund the customer? That would mean ALL the sets he is selling are incomplete?

I mean, if it was only one set that had a missing piece, he could have easily pass him another complete set without resorting to refunds.

If... ALL the sets are incomplete and the salesperson claimed ignorance, either the seller themselves has been conned or they were just trying to pass off the incomplete sets to their customers for full price.

I was told it was the last set when it was initially sold to me. Quite frankly i wouldnt mind waiting a couple of days or even up to a week or two for the items to be topped up. But he chose to refund me instead.

Be smart,Buy smart

Mod's note: Please do not use one liners. Read the rules.

Well said. Most companies don't expect the staffs to be god, but they'll expect the staffs to have a decent product knowledge. At least know what you carry in your shop, this help create awareness and help boost sales.

I believe as a good magician .We should have aware of the products,the effects,the price even before we walk into the brick and motar shop.Unless the shop carries stuff that can't be found elsewhere.Instead of going into the shop itself and "do shopping".
i do encounter this shop that carries exclusive dvd by this famous asian magician that can't be found on the market.thats work because he have "networking" from overseas to carry the product back to singapore.that makes him stand out frm the rest of magic shop

Well again, if you want to say about professionalism and know it all, I believe staffs will know what they are selling based on the description along with the product, but not a detailed knowledge about it.
Bring a book to a staff in popular, she will tell u what the book is based on the title/ synopsis, but you cant expect her to tell u everything on the book, because she'd never read it.

This applies to magic sales person, if they got the luxury to hands on every products, I believe they will have well covered knowledge on them. The fact is many times they don't

Magic is not fast moving consumer goods, certain products turnover is slow/or practically stay on the shelves forever.
If the product is common, best sellers, good, I'm sure the staffs will have detailed knowledge about them.
If the shop carries below 100 products, you can blame the staff for not having knowledge on the item, but what if the shop carries 5000 or more, and kept stock in new items weekly and expect the staff to know what should every single package include? It depends on the scale of the shop.

Then the question will be: What was the thing that mudbuddha bought? A common best-seller or a never-heard-before thing? For which I suspect, it should be a quite common thing, and if that is true, then christo's arguments will not hold up.

I know the reply is a little bit late. but here are some of my thoughts.

I believe that there are pros and cons in getting from a online shop and a physical shop.

Online shop
pro: cheap, got video demonstration
con: got to wait 2 weeks before it arrives, difficult face when the item they send is either wrong or damage, if there are question about the product you bought, there is no one to ask immediately.

physical shop
con: said to be more expensive
pro: immediate clarification when in doubt, high quality of products purchase, able to answer your question about the product (most of the time). get your item immediately.

I do agree that the magic shops in Singapore have a problem in their dealing with magic. All the physical magic shop I've been to have this problem. Some are to the extreme but other just a little here and there.

so how do we overcome this problem? I think the right way is to continue support these shops. Buy only things that are legal and reasonably priced. If you find out it is a "fake" copy, tell the owner that it is not respecting the magician and don't buy it.

I actually pity the magic shop here. because of the nature of Singapore business, there aren't able to survive in these market. There are basically 2 groups of people that will buy magic. New-comers and magicians. If you been to Las Vegas, all of the shop along the strip are catered to new-comers. So the trick is beginner focus. But there are also magician focus shop. those shop that sells the real deal. big props, grand illusions etc...
The shops here have to play both parts.

In conclusion, I think we must each do our part. Support the good magic shop, boycott the lousy one. Simple as that.

It is really tough to sell things that are reasonably priced in Singapore because there is not enough quantity. I have been selling Genii magazine for over 2 years now. If not for my passion for reading the magazine, I would have stop selling the mag because the profit of selling it is pathetic. It does not justify the cost of doing it. However, I believe that it is a good mag and thus I have kept the price of selling the mag reasonable.($12 for a mag, for those who doesn't know it cost US$6, so plus shipping it is reasonable. I charge another $1 for the postage cost to send it from my location to your home).

Let's continue to keep the true spirit of MAGIC alive!!!!

Adrian