I understand the anger and frustration by those that are annual subscribers but have been recently contemplating buying the lifetime subscription. I’ve experienced that numerous times when I procrastinated too long on a purchase only to find the price went up. Life happens. Truth is, your price has not gone up… Only the option that you already decided to postpone.
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My career was advising company executives on employee development and customer loyalty. I loved my job.Treating employees and customers right is the way to long-term growth.
No price increase is universally welcome, but saying why it was needed to its customer base is the type of customer communication that no company I ever worked with in 40 years ever did without a consultant like me suggesting it.
It was a brilliant move in so many ways. The product alone wins my loyalty. The unapologetic and genuine transparency handling something as sensitive as a price increase just cemented that loyalty.
Creating something of Roon’s quality had to have some really good people at the helm. Roon rocks, and I’m confident that it will continue to rock for a long time to come. It enhances my music listening and makes me happier than a couple of drinks a month at the local pub.
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I do not believe this is awful customer relations. They are raising the price of lifetime subs to help stabilize future cash flow so Roon can remain viable and improve their product for years to come. Roon has provided a logical explanation as to why they didn’t make an advanced announcement of the price increase. I can understand you might be upset but would you rather pay $500 now and Roon go out of business 3 years from now or pay $119 for the next 6 years (the equivalent of the new lifetime cost without even factoring much for the time value of money) and have a product that stays viable and continually improves? I am personally not a lifetime subscriber. I am in the same boat as you. I would have rather been able to become a lifetime subscriber when I renew in a couple months but I think the reasoning makes sense and is part of the natural progression of a business coming out of the start-up phase.
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And given the reactions from a lot of people it wouldn’t surprise me if Roon now wish they had just removed the lifetime option.
Roon have made their plans for lifetime subscriptions crystal clear for a long time (years) so unless you are a very new user or live under a rock (no pun intended) then no-one should be surprised by recent events.
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@danny I am surprised you say “it’s not a rent to own model”. We are not looking at it that way. We are looking at it more like “date before you marry for a lifetime”
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The issue is not the price raise. That’s ok. The issue is not giving existing customers an upgrade window with the old price.
Yes, Roon’s rationale makes sense if only looked at through their lens. When looked at through the customer lens, it is a different perspective.
There is nothing to suggest that Roon had to do this price increase and essentially lock out the approximately 70,000 existing annual long time subscribers from the old price upgrade window because Roon is going to go under unless they do so. It was a move to squeeze those 70K annual subscribers for more money, either 40% more through the lifetime, or more years of annual fees. Fine, it’s their right to do that, and it’s our right to complain.
This is not just a lifetime license price raise, it’s also effectively a substantial annual license price raise for those that can’t afford the $699.
We are not shocked by the price raise, just how its has been executed. Roon seems quite content to take the customer relations hit, which is an extremely peculiar approach to take during the Black Friday seasons.
It would’ve been a more reasonable approach to do away with the lifetime subscription entirely. Or to extend an equal upgrade warning window to all, like they did last time. Some way that didn’t ostracize so many users. Giving current trial members the old price and locking out current users makes sense for Roon, but its a big finger to the rest of us.
Yes, yes, yes, I understand the business side of it from Roon’s perspective. It’s the lack of finesse when dealing with long time annual subscribers on this issue that is seriously lacking. @danny ‘s explanation says what’s good for him, it offers little beyond that.
This is not a universal decree from on high, it is only my wee opinion.
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Run that past me again. How is a user on an annual licence paying more ?
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Thanks for getting me off the fence. Third year of subscription. I just cancelled my membership (expires in June).
I enjoy the product and the community, and have recommended it to others. But, fundamentally, a SAAS subscription is a luxury, and no one else in the family has ever used the product. Plex? Yes. Tidal? Yes. Roon? Just me.
Nothing demeaning or snide intended. The announcement just reminded me how much I dislike the SAAS model.
Best
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I’m very disappointed. I understand your point as roonlabs but now try to be in our shoes. 2015 wasn’t the apocalypse, 2019 will not be either. we all aren’t all your target market, all new users will know at start the lifetime price is $700 as we knew was $500. sorry for my bad english
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I think the problem is that passionate users perceive the Life Time purchase as the way to say to Roon;
Hey I like what you’re doing, and because I’m such an advocate I’m willing to sign up for life!
Whereas the best way to support Roon for life is to keep paying an annual subscription for life. This is what I will continue to do because I want Roon around in 10 years still doing good things for my music.
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Yes it’s amazing how many lifetime subscribers think They are entitled when they are now deadweight.
Also amazing how many think that saying they will go lifetime if Roon adds the feature they want will encourage Roon to add it when in fact the opposite is true.
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Considering what people spend $10 a month on, or a day with coffee or other things :-), this is a no brainer if you’re a curated music fan. I have to laugh at some of the complaints considering how out of control even the modest audiophile gets with new gear. And even though I own and will likely not care too much about “new” releases for the classic jazz and such I listen to, I’m still ok paying Roon to listen to my own music. I didn’t think I would at first and stayed annual for three years now thinking maybe I’ll go lifetime. But hearing how it would more hurt than help Roon, I’ll stay with the annual plan to do my part to ensure they grow and remain profitable. Considering the alternatives to Roon, I want them for as long as I can listen to music. Thanks Roon. Keep up the great work.
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Wow. The conclusions you draw are unfounded and illogical.
You had plenty of time to buy a lifetime license at the old price. You knew that Roon had plans to eliminate the lifetime license option and you had no idea when that might happen. The raising of the price was done specifically to discourage people buying it.
People in the trial stage have not had plenty of time to buy a lifetime license so extending that option at the old price to them is reasonable. and fair.
Roon is not trying to squeeze anyone. Look in the mirror for someone to blame here.
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C’mon @philr, you know that isn’t the whole truth. As Danny said, Roon needed buckets of cash upfront. The lifetime members gave them that, and freed them from the various demands of VC groups. In that sense, the full subscriber base up to now gave Roon cash to grow, and latitude to do it free of investor demands.
It is perhaps too broad to include all Lifetime Subscribers, but being active and helpful in the Community often helps to get new users off on a good foot. Not exactly deadweight. But yeah, other folks are funding it now.
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Many lifetime subscribers are the ones who went in early and took the $500 risk. Nobody’s entitled, but it turns out to have been the right play. If Roon crashed and burned after a year or two it would been the opposite. Sometimes you’re the dog, and sometimes you’re the hydrant…
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Deezer is an option. That would be a good streaming service to add. Your question had more applicability when Tidal was the sole service and rumored to be in financial trouble. Qobuz just expanded to the US and lowered prices, so I think the streaming services employed by Roon are safe at the moment.
This is typical internet discussion forum poison. My opinion is my own. It’s well expressed and articulated. It just happens to be a different opinion than yours. Neither one of us is being illogical or expressing unfounded opinions, rather, we are expressing different opinions.
The facts are that there was a substantial Roon price raise. We can agree upon that. It would be illogical and unfounded to state there was no price raise. And no one claims that.
How we then interpret that price raise is a matter of personal opinion. There is no right or wrong to it. You are welcome to say that you see something different than me, I encourage that type of honesty. But there’s no reason to demean another, to demean the foundation of their intelligence, simply because their interpretation and opinion is different than your own.
It’s very reasonable for you to say that you feel the price raise is ok, or welcomed, or justified, or handled properly by Roon. That would be your opinion.
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The annual user ends up paying more because the $699 lifetime price will discourage more from going lifetime. By having fewer annual users convert to a lifetime license, assuming those users stay with Roon for many years to come, they will end up generating more revenue for Roon. It’s simple math. Over a ten year period, someone paid $500 for a lifetime license, or $1200 with the annual. Roon is trying to discourage lifetime licenses because they make more money with the annual. That more money comes from the annual user.
Some people who can easily afford the lifetime license choose, for whatever reason, to go annual. But there are those for whom $499 was a big stretch, and $699 more so. For someone who signed up in September for the annual, for whom $699 is beyond reach, the amount they will pay over time went up because they can’t jump over to the lifetime license saving. Yes, the annual fee is the same, but the total out of pocket expensive over time went up.
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It’s reasonable in the sense of treating all customers evenly. Everyone should’ve been given a week to upgrade before the new price kicked in, not just trial people, or those who paid their annual fee in November. The way it is, only a relatively small percentage of customers are being given a fee increase warning. And that’s not fair, and is terrible customer relations. It’s better to give no one the warning instead of just a select few. Doing away with the lifetime license entirely would also be an even action as it would hypothetically apply to everyone evenly.
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That doesn’t make your opinion well founded or logical.
Roon did not raise the price of their annual subscription and have specifically stated they raised the price of the lifetime subscription to discourage its purchase and that this step was a precursor to eliminating the lifetime subscription altogether.
Your statement that this move was “effectively a substantial annual license price raise” is not logical. Nor is your statement that it “was a move to squeeze those 70K annual subscribers for more money” logical. In fact, this new price does not affect people that have chosen the annual lives route at all.
The only existing customers affected are people that had planned to switch to the lifetime plan but had not yet done so. That plan was always a risk considering Roon had stated that the lifetime license could go away at any time. For those that think the new price is too high, Roon effectively eliminated the lifetime license with that new price.
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