Waves Platinum $74.99 USD

[PavlovsCat]

On 6/22/2024 at 9:05 PM, MusicMan said:

The WUP scheme exists because people keep paying it. It's similar to ransoms. If people keep paying, the perpetrators keep on doing it.

If enough people boycott WUP and Waves altogether and their plugins, sooner or later they should realise just how damaging it is for their brand reputation and with sales of WUP tanking it would make more sense to drop it. Although unfortunately their marketing and tactics do exploit people just getting into buying plugins, which makes it harder. Like Peter said earlier, that's where its good to make their scheme known to starters before they fall for it.

I really dislike venture capitalists, but Waves are one case where a VC could actually be better than than it is now!

I'd actually be happy if Soundwise took them over ?

The truth is, Waves, like many small businesses continue to do certain strategies that don't help their business out of inertia. The company came up with the idea at some point and management became so invested in the idea that it would be incredibly difficult for a consultant to persuade them out of it. As a strategist, I would want to look at the percent of the customer base that buy WUP, look at the general market perception of WUP, and its impact on the brand Image, paying special to the negative impact WUP may have on the Waves brand image, looking carefully at the percent of prospects that don't purchase due to WUP and also at the customers that defect related to the practice. 

Judging from years of seeing comments in social media and Waves knee jerk reaction to the customer outcry against subscription only -- added to the recent 5% of the workforce that the company reportedly shed, and I feel fairly confident that Waves use of WUP and their ill conceived,  and short lived, subscription-only strategy have caused the company significant brand damage that is most easily measured in lost sales and lower conversion rates over the years as well as customer attrition rates.  They've been doing WUP for quite a long time, however, the market has been changing significantly in recent years and many new competitors have emerged and it's a pretty easy guess that Waves is seeing their market share decline. Software companies have to work hard to maintain market share and, from observations, I think Waves is going to make changes. Perhaps their subscription service is helping them bring in new revenue, but I doubt it's enough to replace what they've lost. 

Edited June 27 by PavlovsCat

[Grem]

2 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

No, I wouldn't.

In the 10+ years I've been using their stuff, I've never had a bug or a compatibility problem that wasn't taken care of within the first year of a plug-in's release.

And, speaking theoretically, if I were to buy this bundle for $75 today, and then 5 or 6 years down the road ran into trouble that updating would solve, I'd wait for a deep sale and buy it again rather than spending $240 on WUP.

You don't spend 3X the purchase price of a new car to have the old one fixed.

Well said Starship.

 

You don't like em, don't use em. If you think the only way to avoid WUP is by not purchasing the plugins, your wrong.  

And for any people new to Waves, you can get some excellent plugins in this deal that you can use for years to come. 

BTW, Waves still allows owners of versions below v9 to d/l the plugins they own. If you still have a system that runs them, you can still use em. No WUP involved. 

Edited June 23 by Grem

[MusicMan]

2 minutes ago, PavlovsCat said:

The truth is, Waves, like many small businesses continue to do certain strategies that don't help their business out of inertia. The company came up with the idea at some point and management became so invested in the idea that it would be incredibly difficult for a consultant to persuade them out of it. As a strategist, I would want to look at the percent of the customer base that buys WUP, the percent that has an aversion to it, and study the percent of prospects that don't purchase due to WUP as well as the negative impact WUP has the the Waves brand image.

Judging from years of seeing comments in social media, I feel fairly confident that Waves use of WUP and their ill conceived,  and short lived, subscription only strategy have caused the company significant brand damage that is easily measured in lost sales and lower customer conversion rates over the years. 

Some of those are very easy to reach black and white numbers. The one I think isn't and yet is probably the most important and telling, is how many sales are lost due to their scheme. I actually like some of their plugins and might buy them if they scrapped WUP altogether and changed their ways. Although after that subscription only debacle, even if they did now though, I'd still be very cautious and hesitant.

I get income streams look great for them and of course WUP paints one picture on the books, but there would also likely be a point where dropping WUP would drive more sales, newer customers and then potentially allow them a net boost overall. Even if they broke even and they cancelled each other, the brand would gain such a reputation boost and potentially get back some of the shine it once had.

They really need a new CEO at this point, or be taken over. The way they're sticking to these old ways is reminiscent of the old video stores who never adapted to streaming and went bust as a result.

They should always be evaluating whether their current approach makes sense. Business shouldn't be set and forget normally if they want longevity.

It's a competitive market with SO many great options. If they want a piece they need to compete.

[Carl Ewing]

10 hours ago, MusicMan said:

Some of those are very easy to reach black and white numbers. The one I think isn't and yet is probably the most important and telling, is how many sales are lost due to their scheme. I actually like some of their plugins and might buy them if they scrapped WUP altogether and changed their ways. Although after that subscription only debacle, even if they did now though, I'd still be very cautious and hesitant.

I get income streams look great for them and of course WUP paints one picture on the books, but there would also likely be a point where dropping WUP would drive more sales, newer customers and then potentially allow them a net boost overall. Even if they broke even and they cancelled each other, the brand would gain such a reputation boost and potentially get back some of the shine it once had.

They really need a new CEO at this point, or be taken over. The way they're sticking to these old ways is reminiscent of the old video stores who never adapted to streaming and went bust as a result.

They should always be evaluating whether their current approach makes sense. Business shouldn't be set and forget normally if they want longevity.

It's a competitive market with SO many great options. If they want a piece they need to compete.

Any evidence that their business is doing poorly? Or just yammering on because you don't like their update scheme? Unless someone can post actual numbers this is a meaningless conversation.

On the flip side - you're free to use Fab Filter where they charge $75 for a single plugin update lol. Or pay for the endless updates to iZotope plugins. I have no problem paying $240 to update 100 plugins every 5 years or so...if needed. And neither does any studio I visit, all of whom use Waves plugins. Although most are on subscriptions like the majority of the industry. 

 

Edited June 23 by Carl Ewing

[Starship Krupa]

21 minutes ago, Carl Ewing said:

any studio I visit, all of whom use Waves plugins

Yeah, gotta remember that pro studios don't geek out over plug-ins the way that we do here. Waves make solid products that are well-known, respected, and established.

A studio has a Waves subscription, my imagination says they'll have a collection of plug-ins that the pro engineers who come in will find sufficient to their needs. If I were going to go into a pro studio to mix, I'd probably bring my iLok in case they didn't have Phoenix or Nimbus (unless I could find a reverb in the Waves catalog that I liked as much as Phoenix/Nimbus/Stratus or they had an actual Bricasti) and that would be it for mixing plug-ins. Could I assume that they'd have Trackspacer?

[Grem]

4 hours ago, Carl Ewing said:

Any evidence that their business is doing poorly? Or just yammering on because you don't like their update scheme? Unless someone can post actual numbers this is a meaningless conversation.

Well said. 

 

3 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

pro studios don't geek out over plug-ins the way that we do here

Yep.

This is my opinion,  Waves is doing very well without any of  those that do not like WUP making any purchases of their products. 

[GoncaloL]

Following this conversation…

https://www.meldaproduction.com/MCompleteBundle/features 

“Everything you need

MCompleteBundle contains all of our effects covering all the tasks involved in music production: composing, mixing and mastering. It also contains all of our instruments. With our included free for life updates, any new plugin we release moving forward will be free for you! And it takes just a few clicks using our update system.”

Not all business models have to be the same thankfully

Edited June 23 by GoncaloL

[Starship Krupa]

31 minutes ago, GoncaloL said:

Not all business models have to be the same thankfully

Nor design philosophies.

Waves' stuff is mostly designed to be immediately useful, with all controls front-facing. Melda's stuff is mostly designed to reward deep dives.

Generally speaking. They both have plug-ins that are the other way around.

Waves have become more Melda as Melda have become more Waves. In the past several years, Waves have come out with things like H-Comp, the Meta series, etc. which are deeper than things like the Renaissance series, and Melda have come out with their "devices," which have more skeuomorphic UI's and front-facing controls.

[GoncaloL]

21 minutes ago, Starship Krupa said:

Generally speaking. They both have plug-ins that are the other way around

They are both great.. but Waves is a subscription for Mac users

[mibby]

3 hours ago, Grem said:

This is my opinion,  Waves is doing very well without any of  those that do not like WUP making any purchases of their products. 

^^^ This ^^^

I'd bet that Waves is in a lot of pro studios and that their primary income is from pro studios through annual WUP/subscription.  Regardless of our beef with them, they make quality plugins.

I think the "hobbyist" is a secondary niche market. They are glad to make money off us, but it's not necessary. Their business model is geared towards pros and they are just fine without us...

Edited June 23 by mibby

[Lionel]

1 hour ago, GoncaloL said:

Not all business models have to be the same thankfully

One-time purchases, updates for life, amazing sales, great upgrade paths, etc.  Tbh, this is THE model all big companies should attain to.

Melda FTW.

 

[mibby]

4 minutes ago, Lionel said:

One-time purchases, updates for life, amazing sales, great upgrade paths, etc.  Tbh, this is THE model all big companies should attain to.

Melda FTW.

 

While I agree with this sentiment 100% -  as a customer, Melda, Kuassa, Kilohearts and SoundToys have not gotten a penny from me since I went "all-in" with these Devs.  (Well KH charges for new plugins as does ST.)   It's been discussed ad nauseam, but I worry  about the longevity of these Devs with this business model.  Less so with Waves.

[PavlovsCat]

3 hours ago, mibby said:

^^^ This ^^^

I'd bet that Waves is in a lot of pro studios and that their primary income is from pro studios through annual subscription.  Regardless of our beef with them, they make quality plugins.

I think the "hobbyist" is a secondary niche market. They are glad to make money off us, but it's not necessary. Their business model is geared towards pros and they are just fine without us...

I've consulted to around three dozen music software and hardware companies. I've had one of the larger ones recently contact me for advice. There's not a ton of secondary research comparing the pro audio market to the hobbyist market, but I can tell you from advising three dozen music software companies over 15 years, and what I've found from them, the hobbyist market is a very significant portion of their income. I suppose the surprise to many hobbyists is that this industry is still growing (a lot of hobbyists post in this forum from their gut feeling that the industry is declining; it's actually growing). It was projected that the DAW market grew by nearly 9% last year.  The education market is also significant.  Garrittan, long ago, made the education market a significant part of its market strategy and that set the way for many others in the business. 

One of the people posting in this thread mercilessly mocked / trollled me as an unknowledgeable in a past thread about Waves following the launch of their short lived subscription only pricing. Specifically,  he mocked me for my prediction that Waves would retreat on subscription only pricing within three months because the hobbyist market wouldn't accept it. Of course, it happened much sooner than that. Why? Because Waves reacted to outrage from the hobbyist market. Do you think Waves would have reacted so quickly to hobbyists protesting subscription only pricing and go back to perpetual licensing PLUS subscriptions if the hobbyist market wasn't a significant portion of their revenue? Of course not. 

Businesses often like / prefer software subscription pricing,  whereas hobbyists are most often are resistant to it, especially older generation hobbyists.  When you look at it generationally, each older generation hobbyist group (starting with Boomers in the research I reviewed) is more resistant to software subscriptions than the next younger generation.  Boomers are more resistant to software subscriptions than Gen X,  Gen X is more resistant than millennials, and millennials are more resistant than Gen Z. 

So, is anyone here privy to Waves books (their revenue, net profit, whether they're growing or declining,  etc.)? Probably not. I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that Waves is in financial trouble,  but based on their fast reaction to hobbyist outrage over subscription only pricing and forum and social media reaction to  the brand, I would expect that Waves revenue is no longer growing as well as it was prior to that move. The unsubstantiated claim that Waves is doing great these days is also unsupported by fact. Actions like Waves took often have a long lasting negative impact on a brand / sakes growth. Based on social media and forum mentions of the Waves brand since then, I suspect that Waves is not seeing the same growth it once had and that the brand has a serious, long term problem. There were reports that Waves reduced its employee head count by 5% last year due to revenue issues,  but because they're a small, privately held company that brings in around $15 million US in revenue annually, it's pretty difficult to get trustworthy info on them. 

Edited June 23 by PavlovsCat

[Starship Krupa]

4 hours ago, GoncaloL said:

Waves is a subscription for Mac users

No snark intended, but Mac users are also more used to having to crack open their wallets regularly to pay for their tools. I'm sure they skew more affluent.

[PavlovsCat]

3 minutes ago, Starship Krupa said:

No snark intended, but Mac users are also more used to having to crack open their wallets regularly to pay for their tools. I'm sure they skew more affluent.

Yep, there's a lot of research on that. Year after year, studies by multiple major researchers have found Mac users to be more affluent than Windows users. 

Edited June 24 by PavlovsCat

[Grem]

5 hours ago, mibby said:

^^^ This ^^^

I'd bet that Waves is in a lot of pro studios and that their primary income is from pro studios through annual WUP/subscription.  Regardless of our beef with them, they make quality plugins.

I think the "hobbyist" is a secondary niche market. They are glad to make money off us, but it's not necessary. Their business model is geared towards pros and they are just fine without us...

Very well said mibby. 

[bats brew]

On 6/21/2024 at 5:27 PM, PavlovsCat said:

Do you think if you were faced with having to pay $240 US to get your plugins on projects working again (and for that year only, not next year) that you would still have good feelings for Waves and their WUP practices or might that impact your perspective a little?  

i don't know, it has never happened yet.

 

if it does, i'll come back and update my deep and dark personal feelings. LOL

 

it's a plugin. i don't need any updates. i just need to be able to install it again as is, in the future.

 

i'd stick with ALL of my Presonus Studio One plugs instead, if ever the waves plugs stopped working.

all those S1P plugs are perfectly fine as is.

[Reubend]

Hey all. I'm completely new to the Waves ecosystem. Can someone help me understand where this bundle stands within their offerings? I can easily guess that their Platinum bundle is better than Gold or Silver, but what on earth are Mercury and Horizon? What's the equivalent of the "everything bundle"?

And is $75 a rare sale for this? Or is it pretty common to go down to that price? I ask that because I see someone commenting that they got it for $60, although it seems to me like they added some new plugins to it this time around.

For the update plan, I don't anticipate needing that very badly. But if I do, can I just buy the platinum bundle again next time it goes to $75 to get the WUP for another year?

[PavlovsCat]

1 hour ago, Reubend said:

Hey all. I'm completely new to the Waves ecosystem. Can someone help me understand where this bundle stands within their offerings? I can easily guess that their Platinum bundle is better than Gold or Silver, but what on earth are Mercury and Horizon? What's the equivalent of the "everything bundle"?

And is $75 a rare sale for this? Or is it pretty common to go down to that price? I ask that because I see someone commenting that they got it for $60, although it seems to me like they added some new plugins to it this time around.

For the update plan, I don't anticipate needing that very badly. But if I do, can I just buy the platinum bundle again next time it goes to $75 to get the WUP for another year?

This is probably the lowest price that I can recall for the platinum bundle.  It's very low. 

As far as WUP,  I think if you understand how it works prior to purchase,  as you do, and you're okay with potentially spending $240 US or whatever it is in the future for yearly updates, or buying the bundle again when it's on sale, it's a good buy. As I mentioned earlier, I like Waves Abbey Road series enough that they're worth it for me. In the case of Abbey Road Chambers,  I'd absolutely pay for WUP if they improved its efficiency on Windows (that specific plugin is well known to be a resource hog, and while I love its sound,  it's latency makes it unusable in real time and I find its sound so inspiringly good, that I'd pay for WUP if they fix that; however, my research indicates they haven't done so). Although I wouldn't do that for any Waves plugins beyond the Abbey Road series. 

Edited June 27 by PavlovsCat

[husker]

2 hours ago, Reubend said:

Hey all. I'm completely new to the Waves ecosystem. Can someone help me understand where this bundle stands within their offerings? I can easily guess that their Platinum bundle is better than Gold or Silver, but what on earth are Mercury and Horizon? What's the equivalent of the "everything bundle"?

And is $75 a rare sale for this? Or is it pretty common to go down to that price? I ask that because I see someone commenting that they got it for $60, although it seems to me like they added some new plugins to it this time around.

For the update plan, I don't anticipate needing that very badly. But if I do, can I just buy the platinum bundle again next time it goes to $75 to get the WUP for another year?

It goes Silver, Gold, Platinum,  Diamond, Horizon, Mercury.  

You could rebuy it, but quite honestly, I found it less expensive to upgrade bundles.   I started with Gold, then about every other year when there was a good sale, I went up a bundle.  I've been on Mercury for a couple of years.