CaseLabs in liquidation

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I felt bad before I clicked the link. Some of their top sellers at the bottom as insanely priced. Cheapest case was $250 and some of the top sellers at $650.

Way too many case options out there these days to be charging like that.
 
I'm waiting on the sale at this point. A lot of back orders it seems.
 
auntjemima said:
I felt bad before I clicked the link. Some of their top sellers at the bottom as insanely priced. Cheapest case was $250 and some of the top sellers at $650.

Way too many case options out there these days to be charging like that.
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I'm going to guess you've never used or seen a Case-Labs case. They are worth it.
 
I'm so glad I ordered my BH8 a while back in preparation for a new Threadripper build. Ya, it's going to be tight, but that's part of the fun. How compact can I make an ultra-high performance workstation!

Definitely sad day.
 
pendragon1 said:
shitty but like I said about the hipster ebikes, for their price shouldnt they be American made with American materials?
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Aren't they though? The tariffs on steel and aluminum wouldn't have forced their bankruptcy if they were manufacturing overseas.

And yeah, I've not seen a Caselabs case in person, but I'm to understand that they're top-notch. Steel, aluminum, powder coated, anodized, rock solid hardware, panels more akin to plate stock than sheet metal, not a bit of plastic to be found - Caselabs make nice cases by companies like Cooler Master look like cheap plastic trash.
 
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VanGoghComplex said:
Aren't they though? The tariffs on steel and aluminum wouldn't have forced their bankruptcy if they were manufacturing overseas.
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We don't really have enough information to know if this was the straw that broke the camels back or turned a financially sound business into a looser. I do hope they can restructure and come back, but I'm doubtful. That's much more of a large company option.
 
LuxTerra said:
We don't really have enough information to know if this was the straw that broke the camels back or turned a financially sound business into a looser. I do hope they can restructure and come back, but I'm doubtful. That's much more of a large company option.
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The tariffs have played a major role raising prices by almost 80% (partly due to associated shortages), which cut deeply into our margins. The default of a large account added greatly to the problem. It hit us at the worst possible time. We reached out for a possible deal that would allow us to continue on and persevere through these difficult times, but in the end, it didn’t happen.
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i mean they literally say it in the first paragraph.

there is a silver lining though.

thermaltakes cases are virtually identical to caselabs so if you like that look...
 
Master_shake_ said:
i mean they literally say it in the first paragraph.

there is a silver lining though.

thermaltakes cases are virtually identical to caselabs so if you like that look...
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I read the website. People make unsubstantiated claims all the time, especially on the Internet. I have no doubt that it played a part in their bankruptcy, but again, we don't have the financials to evaluate (you know, like an MBA would?). There's no way to for us to know just how much of a part it played or if they were already heading there or not. As the website notes, it wasn't the only reason.

That aside, this whole trade war business is just stupid. Regardless how much of an impact it had here or not.
 
pendragon1 said:
well they blame tariffs and a customer not paying. so I assumed theyre importing steel or are building overseas and importing. I dont know how much they did in the US.

oh look its all trumps fault :rolleyes:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...-bankrupt-liquidated-us-tariffs-a8487416.html
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Well... yeah. If not for Trump's tariffs, they wouldn't have seen that spike in their raw material costs.

I don't believe it was a Caselabs customer that defaulted. Caselabs had a parent company that also made military-grade electronics enclosures. When you're a company like that and a contract doesn't pay... it's kindof a big deal.
 
LuxTerra said:
I read the website. People make unsubstantiated claims all the time, especially on the Internet. I have no doubt that it played a part in their bankruptcy, but again, we don't have the financials to evaluate (you know, like an MBA would?). There's no way to for us to know just how much of a part it played or if they were already heading there or not.

That aside, this whole trade war business is just stupid. Regardless how much of an impact it had here or not.
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1bhgqb.jpg


people? who own caselabs? don't believe them?

i don't have words for this.
 
Master_shake_ said:
View attachment 95542

people? who own caselabs? don't believe them?

i don't have words for this.
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Sigh...

Since reading comprehension isn't your thing, let me make it clear.

My original statement that we don't have the financials was a question of "to what extent." To which your reply, "read the website" completely misses the point and is irrelevant. I let your lack of comprehension between a question of kind vs a question of degree go. The website provides zero evidence as to degree and people make all sorts of claims, especially when politics (i.e. the tariffs) come into question. I'm sure it had impact, but as the website notes, it wasn't the only thing.

Since you seem to have that financial data and know to what degree the tariffs impacted their business, post it. You don't have it and thus, my statement that we don't have the data to actually evaluate it stands.
 
VanGoghComplex said:
Well... yeah. If not for Trump's tariffs, they wouldn't have seen that spike in their raw material costs.

I don't believe it was a Caselabs customer that defaulted. Caselabs had a parent company that also made military-grade electronics enclosures. When you're a company like that and a contract doesn't pay... it's kindof a big deal.
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my point about the tariffs is that they wouldnt have affected them if they were using and building with american materials like they should have been for the price.
"The default of a large account added greatly to the problem." does that not mean a customer didn't pay.
 
pendragon1 said:
shitty but like I said about the hipster ebikes, for their price shouldnt they be American made with American materials?
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Because there isn't enough produced in the US. We only produce enough aluminum to supply less than half of what is currently needed per year. The rest is imported. And that number is a bit misleading as it includes recycled aluminum, which is not what would be used in these cases. Excluding recycled aluminum the US can only produce about 10% of what is needed domestically.
 
re the ebikes(since youre on alu) they could have made them from recycled pop cans to add to the hipsterness. that might have justified the price....
but aren't weren't caselabs cases made of steel?
 
pendragon1 said:
re the ebikes(since youre on alu) they could have made them from recycled pop cans to add to the hipsterness. that might have justified the price....
but aren't weren't caselabs cases made of steel?
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All the ones I have are made of aluminum. 100% except the screws and rubber mounts.

Edit: as far as Chinese metals go, you can't trust them. You must verify. I use a lot of stainless steel for brewing and anyone that doesn't at least periodically test their Chinese stainless via an independent American lab, I don't use. Given the state of American production, it's very difficult to solely source any large quantities domestically when you consider all the other logistical aspects of production at scale. That being said, there also was a Japanese admission to faking their metals certifications as well...in an attempt to keep production in Japan unlike what happened here.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...ed-amid-deluge-of-sell-orders-on-data-scandal
 
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ah. thought they were all steel. haven't touched one in years and years to be honest.
 
pendragon1 said:
ah. thought they were all steel. haven't touched one in years and years to be honest.
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I honestly have no idea if they ever made steel cases or not. I haven't seen one though. As of years ago (whenever I first learned of them, which I don't recall when exactly that was), they've only made aluminum.
 
LuxTerra said:
We don't really have enough information to know if this was the straw that broke the camels back or turned a financially sound business into a looser. I do hope they can restructure and come back, but I'm doubtful. That's much more of a large company option.
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Actually it is called an excuse. The tariffs did nothing to their business model.
 
Paul_Johnson said:
Actually it is called an excuse. The tariffs did nothing to their business model.
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I have a hard time believing that an 80% increase in costs did nothing to their business model. Though, everyone seems to be focusing solely on that when CaseLabs did not blame just the tariffs for their problems. Tariffs, a shortage increasing costs, and an account defaulting were what they mentioned. I wouldn't be surprised if the defaulted account was what really spelled the end for them.
 
Derangel said:
I have a hard time believing that an 80% increase in costs did nothing to their business model. Though, everyone seems to be focusing solely on that when CaseLabs did not blame just the tariffs for their problems. Tariffs, a shortage increasing costs, and an account defaulting were what they mentioned. I wouldn't be surprised if the defaulted account was what really spelled the end for them.
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If they had an 80% increase in costs because of a 10% tariff then yes. The tariff had nothing to do with it and they had massive structural issues.
 
Paul_Johnson said:
Actually it is called an excuse. The tariffs did nothing to their business model.
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You base this on exactly what non-public data? I accept that as your opinion, but for such an extraordinary claim I want proof.

Edit: if you read through the thread, I think I've made it clear that I think the issue is likely complex and not any single fault, but claiming it's an excuse jumps straight the black and white, they're lying assumption another poster previously made. I'm sure it had an impact, but to what extent I can claim no special knowledge. If you have some, please share.
 
Paul_Johnson said:
If they had an 80% increase in costs because of a 10% tariff then yes. The tariff had nothing to do with it and they had massive structural issues.
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I imagine they did have issues. I doubt they had massive profits and it seems like they were always struggling. Sadly that seems to be the case for a lot of niche companies. Good quality work, but not entirely financially stable.
 
Paul_Johnson said:
If they had an 80% increase in costs because of a 10% tariff then yes. The tariff had nothing to do with it and they had massive structural issues.
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A 10% tariff does not linearly equate to a 10% increase in materials cost.

What happens is that it creates scarcity in supply as big consumers hedge by buying up future supply in bulk.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/guid/7AED185B-FB83-4BD0-84E9-B27ABC4019A7

Aluminum traders have stockpiled aluminum in U.S. warehouses in anticipation of the tariff.
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This is why industries were seeing 30% price bumps as early as April

https://www.ft.com/content/e18080ea-43b4-11e8-93cf-67ac3a6482fd

Not even GM is immune, per their latest earnings:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/gm-slammed-by-tariffs-as-steel-and-aluminum-costs-soar-2018-07-25


Now, if you're just a small business, with an inability to stockpile, and having to buy up residual supply on a tightening market...yea 80% increases in materials cost is definitely possible
 
Paul_Johnson said:
I'm more aware of how it works than you'll ever know. My comments stand.
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As a mod, is this the level of discourse you encourage?

You've not only made a bald-faced assumption about my knowledge of and experience with futures markets, but you've once again asserted, an as of yet, unsupported opinion.

I'm happy to have a discussion, but that's apparently unreciprocated.
 
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pendragon1 said:
my point about the tariffs is that they wouldnt have affected them if they were using and building with american materials like they should have been for the price.
"The default of a large account added greatly to the problem." does that not mean a customer didn't pay.
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Because we all know machines in the USA do a better job of stamping aluminum than machines not in the USA
 
rk said:
You've not only made a bald-faced assumption about my knowledge of and experience with futures markets, but you've once again asserted, an as of yet, unsupported opinion.
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No, I did not.

I'm happy to have a discussion, but that's apparently unreciprocated.
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There is no discussion to be had really. It is very simple. If a 10% tariff results in in an 80% increase in costs then then they had structural issues. You can see that in other industries and companies that deal with tariffs.
 
They are gone. No more meds to be said. Plenty of other cases to buy.
 
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