CaseLabs Announces It Has Been “Forced into Bankruptcy and Liquidation”

[DoubleTap]

Since you don't bother reading...

I've consistently said it's a complex issue and it's unlikely that tariffs alone did them in, but it almost certainly had an impact. It could have been the straw that broke the camels back. Without actual data, we have no idea.

We don't know anything about their existing contracts, supply chain, previous debt load, profit margins, etc, etc. A tariff certainly cuts into margins and a lot of manufacturing has margins below 10%. Even niche manufacturers sometimes do because they can not purchase at the quantities required to get those prices or take advantage of efficiencies of scale. Also, a 10% tariff doesn't not mean that the price of all aluminum alloys goes up by the same amount. It's sort of the floor for new pricing, but large manufacturers often started stockpiling and that can drive the price of specific products well above the 10% tariff, even to integer multiples of the original price.

For example, I make beer at a 1 barrel volume (split multiple ways) and I can tell you that even at that scale, my ingredient costs are significantly higher even a 15 barrel craft brewery, let alone a massive commercial brewery. It's illegal to sell since I'm not licensed, but I really could never turn a profit margin at those prices. Retail markup on craft beer is about 7:1 which is why craft breweries love selling direct in their tasting rooms. However, my beer is still a third to half the price of commercial.

I did bother reading and you're not the only person to observe that the real reason is likely a combination of factors - you're just the only person who thinks seeing that means they're the smartest person in the room.

This is a forum full of smart people with diverse backgrounds who often make reasonable inferences which are often augmented by people with specific knowledge of niche subjects.

You clearly have a lot to offer, but you might consider not framing so many of your posts as a giant face palm.

Since you don't bother reading...

What you and others fail to realize is that there is not one type of game available to play; i.e. first person shooters.

I'm going to guess not or you'd have never made such a silly argument in the first place.

That's super simple, almost so simple as to be of no value...and yet I bet almost no one on here has EVER seen it before, despite being self-proclaimed business geniuses! For goodness sakes, take some MBA courses at the local community college or at least read HBR occasionally. I'm am engineer, not a business guy and I don't have an MBA, but even this is basic fundamental knowledge. It's literally blog level of knowledge if you'd just take even the slightest interest in the subject.

I'd like to see you stop undermining the good content and persuasiveness of your posts.

 

[jhymesba]

There are mass production cases that are in that price range and even more. CaseLabs made some nice, high quality cases that would last through build after build, with their larger cases being the ones that caught the most attention. With that said, if people would read, one of their main clients defaulted, CaseLabs had stated some time ago they would be raising prices at some point to cover new material costs, however I am not sure that ever happened, but CaseLabs was more of a small side venture for them as their main money maker was design etc and other smaller integrated cases for other industry. One of those clients defaulted and is what made them go under, the tariffs and as such shortages of material went up and killed almost all profit being made, but they were able to keep going, the default was what killed them because of the time it happened at.

Most cases were almost always on back order, as they were small runs, but far from not selling, most normal orders sold out right away and because of demand custom orders took sometimes months to be filled. But they stated they would never be a large high production MFG.

Many people also don't understand most of these cases were massive and not something many people were going to be into, they did get into the smaller and micro cases, which I think sold quite well for them.

That is a full tower next to the CaseLabs case:

View attachment 95691

That thing makes my Mozart TX look small! No wonder it's $500!

 

[pcgeekesq]

That thing makes my Mozart TX look small! No wonder it's $500!

At $500, the entire inside of the case should be chilled. I can get a nice looking glass-door mini-fridge for $100 new, so why not? And yes, I want the humidity controlled too, to prevent condensation.

Expensive cases are a rip-off not because of the profit margins, but because there is so much cool and useful stuff you could do for that kind of money, and instead we get MOAH RGB!

 

[matt167]

Ive never spent more than $50 on a case. They dont have flash but my builds get the best inside i can afford.

 

[Dekoth-E-]

Respectfully, disagree. What happens when all of a sudden (oh yes these are in place, we were hit with 25%, so a BIG number) when the stock you use for collateral to pay your bills you can’t afford or get a hold of because stock was bought out before more tariffs hit?

Be prepared to pay a little more for electronics, with specialty items becoming more rare. There is a worldwide shortage on the IC / component stream, leadtimes for some items in the 50 week area, these dont help things.

I support the president, have since he announced running but these hurt, I am hoping for the long game here. China cannot overtake the USA so at least he’s doing something about it.

I'm not sure what that has to do with my statement. It might if businesses were run how most people budget and survive paycheck to paycheck, but that isn't how businesses work. Based on the bolded though I'm not certain you know what you are talking about.

 

[Deleted member 222586]

Funny how the people that repeat this drivel are never actually economists, hmm.

Any economists will tell you that tariffs destroy trade and protect nothing, long term. They are shitty practices. If you can't compete, then you should go under. Putting tariffs is simply a form of non-competitive practices that doesn't help anyone but the non-competing company to begin with.

 

[Deleted member 184142]

At $500, the entire inside of the case should be chilled. I can get a nice looking glass-door mini-fridge for $100 new, so why not? And yes, I want the humidity controlled too, to prevent condensation.

Expensive cases are a rip-off not because of the profit margins, but because there is so much cool and useful stuff you could do for that kind of money, and instead we get MOAH RGB!

CaseLabs don't have any lighting....

They are also low volume and not made in China, unlike that cheap mini fridge. People talk about wanting jobs back in the USA, but when someone does offer something made in the US, no one wants to pay the costs...

They are also all aluminum, most cases on the market are cheap steel, and even then lots in the same size and build are as much or more than CaseLabs, any of the Aluminum mass produced cases are also in the $400+ range. The full tower 900D is $350, mass produced in China and is made of steel and plastic, yet being made of steel which is 2.5 times the weight of aluminum, yet it still weighs the same as the full tower case labs case, to give you an idea of how over built the CaseLabs cases are (which are 100% aluminum), yet people are not shitting on Corsair for the 900D.

CaseLabs were well built (overly so), modular, very focused on working in the case and modding. You get what you pay for.

As for cool and useful stuff you could do in a build, that is not what these cases are for. And no one is going to suggest someone get a CaseLabs case who is on a build budget, the builds that tend to go into these cases are already maxed out in every way you could think of.

I just find it so funny, that even on a site like the [H], you have so many people willing to shit on a company who is offering a quality item, made in the US, still sticking to the roots and not going mainstream RGB etc, for no other reason than they can't afford it.




To everyone else still talking about tariffs, CaseLabs stated that was part of the reason for their costs going up etc, but was NOT the reason they went under. This market of cases for them was SMALL, they made most of their money from industry, server and military enclosures. They started CaseLabs because they could not find a case that worked for their own internal computer builds....so they made their own.

This is what they made money from:

But as already stated, one of their main clients defaulted on payment, so they will not be able to stay open.

 

[Zepher]

Ive never spent more than $50 on a case. They dont have flash but my builds get the best inside i can afford.

The most I have ever spent on a case was $250 for this YY-0221 I bought around 2003.
I used it for about 8 years and then traded it for a set of Chevy Avalanche wheels with a friend. 2 years ago I was at a different friends house buying some PC stuff and saw my old case there.
He had gotten it from my other friend a year or so before in a trade.
Last year he brought it by and gave it back to me.

 

[The Mad Atheist]

Damn those are some pricy cases!
Most I spent was $350 for 2 SF-201BLK Magnesium aluminum mid-tower cases so I could rivet them together back in the early 2000s.
http://www.super-flower.com/sf201t3bk.html
Threw a UPS and water cooler in the 2nd case and prayed for no leaks from that early gen water setup.

Guess I will keep the ones I have. This big one and two smaller ones including one painted to look like the Teenage Ninja Turtle Van (mean to build it for Vanilla Ice - still might one day) . . .(not my airbrush work - disclaimer)

Thanks, now I got that go ninja rap stuck in my head!

 

[emphy]

we have made some progress already with the EU...

You do you know why, don't you? 0 tariffs has always been one of the major goals at the EU level, so it was fairly easy for the president of the European commission to agree to that.

It is one of the more effective ways the Trump government has been dealt with; give it something it already has, pretending it is a concession. Another effective one has been to promise something new and promptly ignore the agreement.

Apart from that, tariffs have never really been a problem between the US and EU. Much more conflict has arisen from government support (at both sides of the Atlantic) and the (generally) stricter safety regulations at the EU side.

Trump is not even very original; the Obama administration tried tariffs, too. Didn't work out too well, and these new ones likely won't either; especially when China's politically targeted ones start to really hurt.

 

[DarthBeavis]

Damn those are some pricy cases!
Most I spent was $350 for 2 SF-201BLK Magnesium aluminum mid-tower cases so I could rivet them together back in the early 2000s.
http://www.super-flower.com/sf201t3bk.html
Threw a UPS and water cooler in the 2nd case and prayed for no leaks from that early gen water setup.



Thanks, now I got that go ninja rap stuck in my head!

Here is the $2k In Win case we used last Season

 

[Krenum]

Here is the $2k In Win case we used last Season
View attachment 95779

Ice is back with my brand new invention.....

 

[Mugato]

CaseLabs don't have any lighting....

They are also low volume and not made in China, unlike that cheap mini fridge. People talk about wanting jobs back in the USA, but when someone does offer something made in the US, no one wants to pay the costs...

They are also all aluminum, most cases on the market are cheap steel, and even then lots in the same size and build are as much or more than CaseLabs, any of the Aluminum mass produced cases are also in the $400+ range. The full tower 900D is $350, mass produced in China and is made of steel and plastic, yet being made of steel which is 2.5 times the weight of aluminum, yet it still weighs the same as the full tower case labs case, to give you an idea of how over built the CaseLabs cases are (which are 100% aluminum), yet people are not shitting on Corsair for the 900D.

CaseLabs were well built (overly so), modular, very focused on working in the case and modding. You get what you pay for.

As for cool and useful stuff you could do in a build, that is not what these cases are for. And no one is going to suggest someone get a CaseLabs case who is on a build budget, the builds that tend to go into these cases are already maxed out in every way you could think of.

I just find it so funny, that even on a site like the [H], you have so many people willing to shit on a company who is offering a quality item, made in the US, still sticking to the roots and not going mainstream RGB etc, for no other reason than they can't afford it.




To everyone else still talking about tariffs, CaseLabs stated that was part of the reason for their costs going up etc, but was NOT the reason they went under. This market of cases for them was SMALL, they made most of their money from industry, server and military enclosures. They started CaseLabs because they could not find a case that worked for their own internal computer builds....so they made their own.

This is what they made money from:

View attachment 95749

View attachment 95750

View attachment 95751


But as already stated, one of their main clients defaulted on payment, so they will not be able to stay open.

Good to know the full story, I’m going to check and see if they were a supplier tomorrow.

 

[DarthBeavis]

Ice is back with my brand new invention.....

Turn out the lights and it glows . . . .

 

[FrgMstr]

 

[Deleted member 184142]

Good to know the full story, I’m going to check and see if they were a supplier tomorrow.

Don't take that as the full story, as with anything, I am sure there is more than what we will ever hear about. Just giving some info I know of from following them for a long, long time. It would be interesting to know more inside info, on what the pricing effects would have been on their cases if their other business didn't go under, that however is something we will probably never know. Would also be interesting to know who the client was that defaulted, but they don't seem to be sharing that info.

 

[Mugato]

Don't take that as the full story, as with anything, I am sure there is more than what we will ever hear about. Just giving some info I know of from following them for a long, long time. It would be interesting to know more inside info, on what the pricing effects would have been on their cases if their other business didn't go under, that however is something we will probably never know. Would also be interesting to know who the client was that defaulted, but they don't seem to be sharing that info.

Depends on the contract I suppose if they would release or not.

 

[DarthBeavis]

Depends on the contract I suppose if they would release or not.

I can find out if you want. My friend did marketing for them for the last year or so. I would not give the name of the client of course but I can find out about what the pricing impacts of the tariffs were. I also know she tried to help them because they needed marketing help so that indicates they were trying their best to make a go of it and likely they just reached the point where they could not continue.

 

[Deleted member 93354]

There’s another post here that’s quite good as well, there is a lot going on and we do not have much detail. But! In my experience (as was stated in this other post as well) profit margins are very low for manufacturers, often below 10%, many of them lease equipment but purchase inventory with cash. Where does that cash come from? Lines of credit, initial investors, loans against any equipment owned, and loans against inventory. That one is important, if you use all of your inventory, and can’t get more with the cash you have due to inflated prices or competitors buying it all up because tariffs might hit, you can’t pay the bills man. They have to report inventory levels weekly most likely, the bank will look at this and not extend further credit.

It’s a ton more complex than this and we have little info, and I totally agree something else could have been the problem, just saying it hurt our company and ran a shockwave through our industry. Honestly, running that close to the margins (and it sounds like they use high grade alunimum which is much more expensive and procured outside the chinese market usualllly) you can stay afloat for a while - hell years - but something like this could do a company in.

That sounds like an extremely risky business practice. Not that I'm passing judgement. It just sounds risky given the number of things that could go wrong.

 

[d8lock]

The way the US bankruptcy code is setup, a smart business person can use it to maximize their personal income at the expense of their customers, suppliers, lenders, and stockholders. And then do it again a few years later. All in the name of giving people a second (and third, and fourth, and so on) chance.

Is that what happened here? Could be. How much did the head of CaseLabs pay himself and his cronies this year?

There are mass production cases that are in that price range and even more. CaseLabs made some nice, high quality cases that would last through build after build, with their larger cases being the ones that caught the most attention. With that said, if people would read, one of their main clients defaulted, CaseLabs had stated some time ago they would be raising prices at some point to cover new material costs, however I am not sure that ever happened, but CaseLabs was more of a small side venture for them as their main money maker was design etc and other smaller integrated cases for other industry. One of those clients defaulted and is what made them go under, the tariffs and as such shortages of material went up and killed almost all profit being made, but they were able to keep going, the default was what killed them because of the time it happened at.

Most cases were almost always on back order, as they were small runs, but far from not selling, most normal orders sold out right away and because of demand custom orders took sometimes months to be filled. But they stated they would never be a large high production MFG.

Many people also don't understand most of these cases were massive and not something many people were going to be into, they did get into the smaller and micro cases, which I think sold quite well for them.

That is a full tower next to the CaseLabs case:

View attachment 95691

That case is bad ass and all, but it's the size of a refrigirator.

 

[Mugato]

That sounds like an extremely risky business practice. Not that I'm passing judgement. It just sounds risky given the number of things that could go wrong.

Well of course it is, it’s not ideal at all, but see my other posts, an SMB is difficult gents, we see all the Apples and Facebooks who provide very little and are overvalued massively, but not what most companies go through to make it. The real world.

 

[motomonkey]

This is completely false. Caselabs was a US-based manufacturer not a chinese company (all their products were made in the USA). This is why the steel tariffs applied to them--they had to buy steel/aluminum to make their cases here. One main reason for the higher cost is the higher cost of US labor vs some sweatshop in China.



The tariffs on bringing steel into the US have been active since May. Steel prices went from around $600 before the tariffs to more than $900 and some grades are in short supply due. The steel tariffs applied to allies like Canada and Europe as well. People are confusing the 25% tariff on China with the steel and aluminum tariffs that have been more widely applied.

We just lost the steel mill in the town where I live, it shut down last year because of the subsidized steel production in China, the irony, is that back in the 90's Chinese steel execs toured the mill. My wife actually traveled to China later and stayed with the family of one of the party that was was in the tour. The furnaces are cold now, would have to relined to restart the plant. for even more Irony, Kawasaki steel owns part of the plant.

I drive by the plant every day on the way to work. it's hard to look at some times, seeing how far we've fallen.

 

[motomonkey]

Got some people with their head in the sand in this thread for sure.

Which is more likely to go away sooner, this president with his racist and ideological agendas or all of the people and ideologic beliefs he disagrees with?

*sigh*

Just because none of you are going to be around to benefit from a true globalist end game doesn't mean you have to slow it the fuck down. Think of the generations that will follow and how they benefit from a united Earth.

"cue United Nations Anthem and hand out tissues"

Fuck Globalism with Negan's bat.

 

[Deleted member 184142]

That case is bad ass and all, but it's the size of a refrigirator.

Which is kinda the point. Its a quality product, in a niche of a niche market, made in low volume, in the US. High prices are expected.

They had more than one case as well, and made large full towers to cubes and micro cases, their normal ATX and micro cases were always sold out. Which is to be expected, as the market for those is much larger than the market that needs/wants more or less a half server rack.

 

[{NG}Fidel]

Many? Which US companies are closing entirely due to tariffs?

So unemployment drops to historic lows and the economy grows at a historically high pace because "many" companies are going out of business.... Because of tariffs?

View attachment 95544

Because Learn lessons from great depression maybe?

 

[Master_shake_]

Ice is back with my brand new invention.....

If you turn out the lights, the case glows.

 

[spugm1r3]

US company effected by tariffs from their products made in China. Yea, that's bullshit. Lets see the real reason they're shutting down.

http://www.caselabs-store.com/atx-eatx/

So their cheapest ATX case is $300. How the fuck can they expect to do well when they charge over $300 for a Chinese made metal box? This is like Starbucks coffee when people realize that $10 for a cup of coffee is way to much.

I second what GreenOrbs said. I also have to say, most people here spend up to $150 for riveted 1/16th inch steel and plastic. Caselabs cases are 4mm aluminum without a single rivet or an ounce of plastic.

This is a sad day, and its made more sad by the fact that a US company, building products with US workers, falls in the face of economic pressures, and a whole crowd of people blame the company. But go ahead and keep buying your Corsair and Thermaltake.

I also second what TheHig said, which is why I have two Caselabs cases.

 

[Daroller]

LOL @ people complaining about hardware costs on [H]. Where did all these budget minded 'tards come from? I didn't think they were the target demographic of [H]ardOCP. GTFO of here with that shit.

I thought my next case would be a CaseLabs product when I "outgrew" my Core X9. It's a crying shame they won't be around anymore.

And yes my American friends, the tariffs (10% aluminum and 25% steel, and that's just from Canada) are hurting your industries.

 

[alxlwson]

I second what GreenOrbs said. I also have to say, most people here spend up to $150 for riveted 1/16th inch steel and plastic. Caselabs cases are 4mm aluminum without a single rivet or an ounce of plastic.

This is a sad day, and its made more sad by the fact that a US company, building products with US workers, falls in the face of economic pressures, and a whole crowd of people blame the company. But go ahead and keep buying your Corsair and Thermaltake.

I also second what TheHig said, which is why I have two Caselabs cases.

Plenty of US made aluminum.

 

[The Mad Atheist]

Here is the $2k In Win case we used last Season

$2k and you couldn't buy a decent desk to game on. Look at that!, you have to sit on your knees, you can't even pull up a chair, the desk is too short! And how can you use the mouse, there's no room to move it......
Please I hope someone didn't take this ^ serious.

LOL @ people complaining about hardware costs on [H]. Where did all these budget minded 'tards come from? I didn't think they were the target demographic of [H]ardOCP. GTFO of here with that shit.

Back in the Dark Ages of case modding, most didn't rely on costly cases!
Hmm, I wonder if Directron's forums are still up, been a while looking at those mods.....

 

[spugm1r3]

Plenty of US made aluminum.

No. But, I'll go ahead and make a statement based on gut feelings too, since that seems the modus operandi. The few that do exist are likely experiencing a massive windfall, due to the tariffs, and are not likely feeling altruistic.

It's simple supply and demand here, limit the supply without a drop in the demand, and price goes up. US production will ramp, but they are going to do it slowly. In the meantime, if you somehow had a business model that was predicated on building quality products, and the country where you employed that business imports more than 80% of the raw material you need to build those products, a change in the taxation model on that raw material WILL affect your bottom line. Maybe catastrophically so.

 

[DarthBeavis]

$2k and you couldn't buy a decent desk to game on. Look at that!, you have to sit on your knees, you can't even pull up a chair, the desk is too short! And how can you use the mouse, there's no room to move it......
Please I hope someone didn't that ^ serious.



Back in the Dark Ages of case modding most didn't rely costly cases!
Hmm, I wonder if Directron's forums are still up, been a while looking at those mods.....

It is a full room VR setup . . . .In Win sponsored the case. When I want something really custom I fab it myself . . . I have a laser cutter, CNC router, and several 3d printers The dark ages still do pop up . . .Dremels and files are still the most used items in my shop. Go figure. By hand will always be critical.


Here is one of the CL Bullet cases . . . they did make some nice smaller chassis but as others said they were priced out of reach for too many people This one fits ATX but they also have a smaller ITX version.

 

[alxlwson]

No. But, I'll go ahead and make a statement based on gut feelings too, since that seems the modus operandi. The few that do exist are likely experiencing a massive windfall, due to the tariffs, and are not likely feeling altruistic.

It's simple supply and demand here, limit the supply without a drop in the demand, and price goes up. US production will ramp, but they are going to do it slowly. In the meantime, if you somehow had a business model that was predicated on building quality products, and the country where you employed that business imports more than 80% of the raw material you need to build those products, a change in the taxation model on that raw material WILL affect your bottom line. Maybe catastrophically so.

Yes. I know because I work at them. Slowly isn't even close to being accurate. As fast as they fucking can is the accurate term. The cheap Chinese aluminum doesn't cut the mustard.
But hey, what do I know... I only do work in every sector of manufacturing all over this country, Mexico, and Canada.

 

[d8lock]

Yes. I know because I work at them. Slowly isn't even close to being accurate. As fast as they fucking can is the accurate term. The cheap Chinese aluminum doesn't cut the mustard.
But hey, what do I know... I only do work in every sector of manufacturing all over this country, Mexico, and Canada.

No offense, but for all we know you watered the plants.

 

[MacLeod]

Because Learn lessons from great depression maybe?

I'm not questioning whether or not tariffs are bad, I'm questioning the excuse by a company that has to shut down almost overnight only ONE month after tariffs went into affect.

Hard to argue our economy is steaming along pretty good right now and even if tariffs are the most evil thing since Hitler, any company that heads for the tall grass after 4 weeks of them had a LOT bigger problems with their business than tariffs and to blame 80% of your problems on them reeks of bullshit.

 

[Lizard Testes]

I'll take Tariffs over outsourcing any day.

Narrator: he got both.

 

[Dullard]

Most cases were almost always on back order, as they were small runs, but far from not selling, most normal orders sold out right away and because of demand custom orders took sometimes months to be filled. But they stated they would never be a large high production MFG.

Just these observations seem to point towards labor being a major portion of their cost. Wasn't the tariff on aluminum 25%? So a 25% increase in material vs months to build cases and the burden on the labor force to build these custom cases. Not being able to produce high volume points to lots of hand labor. That 25% might have surely put a dent in profits, but if they were operating even 50% cost of goods then the price increase would only need to be 12.5% per unit to cover that. $500 case becomes $565 case. But I bet material costs were way less than 50% of the cost of one of their $500 cases.

Steel prices have increased a lot this year, more than 25%, but we go through a few hundred thousand pounds a week and are nearly swamped with a backlog of orders and are having no supply issues out of the ordinary.

 

[RanceJustice]

This is incredibly, incredibly disappointing. CaseLabs was truly a cut above the rest. Truly made (designed, manufactured, built entirely. Unsure the source of all their materials but even if those weren't all local its still impressive) in America, they were crafted for enthusiasts top to bottom. Every case was made of aluminum and was modular w/o any rivets; you put it together with screws from a flat pack. Every major chassic component and sub-component was able to be purchased a la carte if you wish - wanted a new top panel radiator mount with a different style? Just buy that piece! They offered upgrades to everything in this way - you never needed to buy a whole new case just for a modern I/O panel or a new radiator mount style etc. Furthermore, such features like FlexBays went even further with this even between models! I have one of their high-end cases and I was getting ready to buy at least one more so to see them go out of business is really frustrating.

It doesn't at all surprise me that the recent economic decisions and trends were a big part of this - I know many American business owners/workers who have found materials becoming far more expensive at every step of the supply chain, even those locally sourced thanks to ripple effects among other things. I find it a little surprising that some seem unable to believe that the current tariff and overall economic situation could not have a role to play here. Lets not forget that many metrics commonly cited for economic "strength" and joblessness are - and have long been, regardless of major American political parties in power - imperfect at best, failing to account for a wide variety of factors (perhaps selectively and by intent) bolstering appearance compared to the real experience of the majority of citizens. In any event, the amount of people who seem to be placing the majority of blame on CaseLabs instead, seems odd.

I like anyone here who is not privy to special knowledge on the company do not know the inner workings of CaseLabs, yet some of the rationale for blame set upon them don't seem to sit right. For instance, the expense of the cases themselves. CaseLabs has always made more expensive, boutique cases. Furthermore as I mentioned, they also made them here in the US. They've survived many long years catering to a niche group of us who appreciate it and are willing to pay the price if what we get in return is reasonable, such as some of the features I described above. It should also be noted that many other boutique builders over the years like MountainMods, LDCooling, and many others (including those like XFORMA) charge similar or greater amounts for their cases of similar type, owing in part to the various features of being a "boutique" case manufacturer. Its also worth noting that in the past year or two they even added the Bullet series which were significantly less expensive and thus more accessible while still maintaining a solid level of quality. In addition, in recent years there were many mainstream companies launching high end cases with higher prices, even though they were not designed/manufactured/assembled in the US/EU etc...or necessarily otherwise up to CaseLabs level standards. From what I could see from public posts, it seemed that CaseLabs had plenty of demand for their product - if anything, a valid criticism could be that there were sometimes long lead times when they had a back-up in fabrication, especially when they were forced to divert resources to major contracts. CaseLabs seemed to have (possibly through their parent company) contracts with larger business and government operations in need of specialty gear . For instance, I was told once when inquiring about the possibility for a "desk case", they had actually made a few custom ones that had ended up at NASA. The mention in the decision to closed down shop that a large client backing out of a deal acting as the killing blow would seem to confirm this.

So between a strong relationship with enthusiasts , making a solid and highly desired product, backed up by a parent company with large contracts, a long standing business etc... it doesn't seem likely that their business plan or implementation of caused them to fail. WHile anything is possible, Occam's Razor suggests that instead of some sort of severe and covert mismanagement of which there seems little evidence, that instead a niche company, making high quality products locally sourced, fell victim to the economic policies of the time (which as others have mentioned, sadly are going to hit companies of this type first and hardest) mixed with an untimely event of a large client backing out, caused the issue. Its just too bad that companies "doing it right" have to bear the brunt of these horrid policies and the loss of CaseLabs is a significant blow to the hardware community.

 

[pendragon1]

making high quality products locally sourced

they were not using local material, hence the "due to tariffs" part of their explanation...
doing it right would have been using American materials to back up that "boutique" price.

 

[Deleted member 184142]

Just these observations seem to point towards labor being a major portion of their cost. Wasn't the tariff on aluminum 25%? So a 25% increase in material vs months to build cases and the burden on the labor force to build these custom cases. Not being able to produce high volume points to lots of hand labor. That 25% might have surely put a dent in profits, but if they were operating even 50% cost of goods then the price increase would only need to be 12.5% per unit to cover that. $500 case becomes $565 case. But I bet material costs were way less than 50% of the cost of one of their $500 cases.

Steel prices have increased a lot this year, more than 25%, but we go through a few hundred thousand pounds a week and are nearly swamped with a backlog of orders and are having no supply issues out of the ordinary.

It wasn't a simple matter of the tariff, there was also an aluminum shortage because of it, many places were also over buying because of expectations, so prices shot up. They didn't make a lot of money on these cases, their main business was the focus, and they never wanted to be mass production, they got asked that question probably once a week on FB. But again, the tariff was not the reason for them closing, it was the parent company that had to close, and as such so did this CaseLabs side.