Saratoga tops: observations, questions, & prices

At $1500 I am a buyer. I am still enjoying the keys!

 

Count me "in" if a $1500. repro Saratoga can be made. In High School I had a Saratoga on my x1/9 and loved it.

 

I am NOT going to make them i just say if there was a market for 50 then i would entertain the task but i know there is not a market for 50 or more, i was just thinking out loud.but thank you for all your comments.

 

Why don't you you start a roster, you never know, you might get your 50 maybe more worldwide.

 

That would be the most logical 1st step - Do some proper, full market research to assess the viability of the project (and not just on Fchat).

It's not going to cost anything to ask!

 

I did this with the folding key as you remember an i had lots of "" orders "" and when i made them and made the tooling i had 5 buyers the rest bailed because the $ 70.00 was to high.
So i got my lesson.

 

I think it's a problem in all manner of businesses - People have the best intentions when they make an offer to buy a product and don't realise just how damaging it can be when they fail to go through with an order.

That's not such a problem if you're an eccentric multi-Millionaire who just wants to help people out and can afford to take a loss on the product, but to someone trying to make the product as a viable business to earn a living it can end up bankrupting them.

This was one of the pitfalls that I just wanted to make sure was out in the open with My (somewhat negative) posts.

I think it either Saratoga or folding tops would be great products to be able to offer owners, but it's a business that you really do need to go into with your eyes wide open!

(At least there are still people such as yourself who are prepared to try and help owners by re-manufacturing obsolete parts! I hope you didn't take any of My comments the wrong way! )

 

Not at all but what is sad the same people buy the product from other suppl.houses for an inflated price no problem,it is a win win because i sell my product to these houses in bulk.
But i dont think this plan would work with the Tops

 

Then I got hosed. I bought two of them at $125 each I think....through Rutlands.

This is a product that could be sold around the globe. Plenty of GTS owners to buy with disposable income. This project would rise or fall based of the cost to make a minimum run and quantity of the minimum run. I would take the initial sales direct at a larger margin. Then I would offset the risk by having distributors and sell to them after your initial purchases.

Let's say you could produce them for $750 each...then tack on 40% to sell to distribution...$1250. Sell direct to your initial purchasers at $1500 (50%). Distribution will likely put 30% on.....$1785 for the purchasers down the road. At those prices I think they would sell if the quality was equivalent to the last iteration of the saratoga top.

I think it would need to be a complete top with storage bag. The factory front pins are available and cheap to reproduce. You could make your own rear latches that worked with the original mounts.

The keys are fantastic. I am sure your lexan top would show similar attention to detail.

 

Glad to hear that you've found a way to make the folding key project work.

The advantage that the keys have over the tops is that they don't take up any serious amount of space and so can be stocked for a long period of time without being in the way.

I suspect also that rather than having @ 50 tops straight away, supplying dealers would want small batches of maybe 5 tops at a time only, in order to gauge the market and not have too much money tied up in stock that could take time to shift.

As a manufacturer, the last thing you really want to do is to be making 5 tops and then having to wait indefinitely for the next batch to be ordered, and by the same token, you wouldn't want to have the next 45 tops sitting around your premises taking up space either.

It's a shame that this project would get so complicated, but it is an unavoidable fact.

 

As we've previously posted in this thread, when you look into the project fully, the numbers simply don't add up to make it viable.

The cost of manufacture, even if kept to the bare minimum, would mean that a small batch of say @ 10 tops would not cover the cost of manufacture, and if you made more than 10 tops then you're highly likely to be left with stock that will not sell for the price you require.

 

You are right unavoidable fact,t
Fact,s for the folding Keys
Moulds. $ 8700.00 incl.all electrodes an artwork
Hardware. Key blanks,springs,3 mm ball,hinge pin,$10.38
Die for cutting key blanks. $1780.00
Machine time for molding and resin. $3.20 each
So you can see i have to sell a lot to break even,but the key was a labor of love because mine broke and i did not find one anywhere
But with the Tops there is no way to make money tooling would be approx.$45-50.000

 

Man, you must have REALLY wanted your key to fold

 

It helps when you own a tooling and molding company lol

 

Thats exactly how my targa foam seals came about, I needed one for my own car. The mold for that cost $9000
I dont mind the fact I am not going to make any money on it. It would have only gone to the tax man anyway. Not making any money is very tax-efficient

 

Sign me up if it can be built for under $2K

 

Sounds like a reasonable expectation. According to Hagerty, most 328 GTS car prices have increased by a factor of 2X between early 2014 and early 2016. Hope some actual top buyers can weigh in to confirm the market.

 

Bought mine in March of '15 for $5k, not perfect but very good condition with no cracks and minimal scratches. I'm 6'4" and the extra head room made it worth every penny for me.

 

I guess $10,000 doesn't seem out of line given the rise across the board with 308/328 pricing. Would I purchase one at that price point? No, but like I've said before, just not my thing.

 

Interesting guys, what will a standard targa top cost now, a good restored one ?

regards
Johnny

 

I'm the 10/12 ebay for #$3750.

If these cross $8,000 I'm selling. End of story. I like it but I have gotten owning one out of my system.

 

Jim, I thought somebody is suppose to remanufacture the Saratoga Top for the 3x8, what happen?