Ortho Kits in GMK GB's

Let me just start off by saying that while I’ve been in the hobby for a bit now, I don’t really know a ton about running a Group Buy, so I am genuinely asking the following.

When running a GB, where the Alphas are included in the Base Kit (like a typical GMK GB), why are Ortho kits not run with their own Alphas?

Effectively, you’re forcing Ortho users to pay more to outfit a smaller board with fewer keys (a lot of the time). Why not just include Alphas in an Ortho kit?

Like I said, I’m sure it’s something I don’t know or realize. Just trying to learn about it and discuss. Cheers!

Usually this is because there may not be enough Ortho users only getting Ortho kits to hit MOQ.

Another reason is this also takes away from the base kit. If the base doesn’t meet MOQ, nothing else does.

Getting 100-250 (depending on color) people together to purchase Ortho kits isn’t easy since adding alphas would increase the price quite a bit. There might be a future for it, but I don’t see so right now based on how Ortho kits are currently selling.

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On that subject (well kind of), since I’m really new here I’ve been wondering why the sets are so split up.

It seems to me, like it would be better to sell sets that consist of alphas + ctrl [etc.] + keys that make up the name of the set like Fruits in milkshake, and not having to add $20 here $40 there etc.

Don’t get me wrong here as well, I understand that it’s all up to preference, and people wanting to complete their own sets with keys they need. I just believe that “the base kit” should be let’s say 60/65% + those name keyes, and then there would be the rest of sets like numpad, ortho etc.

As I said I’m really really new and it just seems more logical to me for the base set to be more complete. :smile:

It’s a conspiracy.

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Because kit design is arguably one of the hardest parts of a set, especially for some manufacturers vs others. SP is fine dealing with lots of small specific kits because of their fairly manually involved processing. GMK prefers single, large kits because they have an almost completely automated setup that benefits from them, and every extra kit you add on introduces setup cost for that kit.

For the ortho kits specifically: Again it’s kinda complicated.

  • Running an ortho kit with its own alphas means that ortho users won’t need to order a base kit, but you’ll likely lose anyone willing to toss an ortho kit in with their order due to the now increased cost.
  • Running ortho as just mods means that anyone can more easily afford to grab the kit if they think they’ll use the set on an ortho board at some point, but also be able to use it on more than just ortho.

The first method is cheaper for specifically ortho users, but will most likely make it harder for the kit to hit MOQ and may affect the base kit hitting MOQ as well. The second method is more expensive, but makes it much easier to get the kit to MOQ due to its lower cost and being easier for pick up for people it isn’t specifically targeting.

I appreciate the insight! Like I said, not complaining, just trying to understand. Cheers!!

While all these responses make sense and have merit, I cant recall the last set I’ve seen that wouldn’t have it’s base kit hit MOQ if the number of ortho kits purchased were subtracted from it. I think the community is large enough at this point, ortho kits could include their own alphas, as past GMK group buys have done this successfully (GMK space cadet/GMK oblivion/GMK 9009), or at least have alphas and mods separate like GMK pulse and GMK carbon did. I realize the sets i listed are among the more popular ones, but as an ortho user myself, I appreciate and am more inclined to participate in a group buy when I don’t have to buy the overkill base kit, just to get alphas.

With that said, I have never run a group buy and I’m probably overlooking something. Just my two cents as an ortho user the past 2+ years.

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As you stated, those are all decently popular/hyped sets which were all almost guaranteed to hit MOQ from initial IC. Sets like Carbon can afford to split up their kit parts because of the popularity of the sets. The extra cost per kit is dampened significantly when the kits are hitting 500-1000 MOQ price points and the popularity helps carry the less popular kits to creation.

I will admit, GMK GBs have changed a little while I was away; Last I saw it was still a pretty intense effort to get any non-MassDrop set to MOQ, especially for custom colors, nowadays it seems like pretty much any set will hit MOQ, even through smaller community vendors. So now you might have more luck with running a separate self-contained ortho/dox kit, but it’s still a risk to try it. Even if it’s not affecting the MOQ of the base set there’s a lot of logistics going into managing a separate kit and a lot of work when kits don’t hit MOQ and a bunch of refunds need to be issued, learned that from experience.

Who knows, it would be interesting to try with a set that isn’t top tier popular to see if it can succeed without the overwhelming popularity of some sets.

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Yeah, I can imagine my viewpoint might vary if I had experience running some GBs. At the end of the day, I’m glad to see how many more sets offer an ortho kit in general and tip my hat to the designers/vendors who put in the work to make them available to us :slight_smile: