Aurora/Deux Press/Luv Luv SALE from Manga Factory

[2old4yaoi]

@Sawwie. AMZN actually read my complaint & refunded me the difference - however small it is. They also promised to fwd my feedback to the customer service. That is good. I do hope they stop doing things like this in the future for the sake of other customers. I checked Rightstuf but so many of the titles I want are out of stock there :-(

[Ruby_Alexandrine]

I will say that Amazon.com is pretty quick in responding to emails compared to others. I did have a concern on a recent purchase and they answered my email the next day. The issue was minor but it was resolved quickly.

The only thing I would not recommend is purchasing mangas or other books from Amazon Marketplace. Some of the cheap prices are enticing while others are so exorbitantly priced (i.e. Viewfinder) that its nearly fraudulent to price mangas that do not have monetary value compared to American comic books. They are independent vendors and if anyone has problems with those vendors, Amazon suggests to resolve the problem, whatever it may be, with the vendor. I already have one experience with a vendor when I purchased an out of print book which I thought they had in stock. The independent vendor sent me an email stated that they did not update their inventory and did not have that book in stock. Luckily I did receive a full refund yet it left me a bad impression with independent book vendors at Amazon Marketplace.

[sawwie-chan]

@2old4yaoi - Rightstuf does restock, if the item is listed as 'on order from manufacturer', then you can still order them You can also check on the status of your order without having to bother CS. Can't promise on the restocking time though, but they don't charge you until they are ready to ship your order. I should edit my previous comment to say that shipping is only cheap if you buy in bulk.

@Ruby_Alexandrine - wow you're lucky, most of my msgs almost always took the better part of their quoted response time (I think its 2-3 working days). Although the one time I used the JP version, their response was both HUMAN and quick (only a few hours turnaround). I always buy directly from amazon (not marketplace) and that was why I was a bit miffed that my manga did not come in the Brand new condition that it should have.

but we digress ^^
Has anyone been to the Deuxpress homepage lately? Their announcement section lists all of their deals and the $3 deal has been moved down some way (there's a new one advertising for borders ) I'm not sure whether that means the $3 deal is over and its back to $5, so maybe I should edit the first page again :/

[Ruby_Alexandrine]

@sawwie-chan - I did see the Borders announcement as well which baffles me because it doesn't directly lead to their publications. Some of the mangas are regular cover priced while others are priced slightly less. Purchase four books and receive the fifth one free.....well, it gets expensive when its purchased at the cover price.

As far as the $3.00 - $5.00 price concern, I think you have to download the spreadsheet again to see what the mangas' current pricing.

[sawwie-chan]

@sawwie-chan - I did see the Borders announcement as well which baffles me because it doesn't directly lead to their publications. Some of the mangas are regular cover priced while others are priced slightly less. Purchase four books and receive the fifth one free.....well, it gets expensive when its purchased at the cover price.

As far as the $3.00 - $5.00 price concern, I think you have to download the spreadsheet again to see what the mangas' current pricing.

Maybe they're earning advertising fees

I've downloaded the spreadsheets from both their $3 and$5 pages, and depending on where you get it, the price is different on the spreadsheets.

[LiuFeiLong]

@Ruby_Alexandrine: Honestly I meant no offense. And I did not imply that these publishers do not make money out of their deals with Amazon. I simply stated what I read, voiced my opinion and explained the reasons why *I* would buy directly from the publishers.

[Ruby_Alexandrine]

@Ruby_Alexandrine: Honestly I meant no offense. And I did not imply that these publishers do not make money out of their deals with Amazon. I simply stated what I read, voiced my opinion and explained the reasons why *I* would buy directly from the publishers.

I know that you didn't mean any offense. I am glad that several fans are willing to assist a trouble publisher rather than watch it go out of business. I still think that Deux Press is in the "red" which probably means that they will not acquire as much titles as they want to.

As long as fans support Deux Press by buying directly from them to help them restructure their business and not purchasing used copies from Ebay vendors. At times I wonder why buyers are willing to bid more for used mangas that are currently in print and end up paying more than the cover price. I get my mangas cheaper and brand new from legitimate online stores. Oh well that's the nature of the beast called Ebay.

[LiuFeiLong]

I still think that Deux Press is in the "red" which probably means that they will not acquire as much titles as they want to.

That's why I suggested buying directly from them: they get the whole sum of money from the sales.

As long as fans support Deux Press by buying directly from them to help them restructure their business and not purchasing used copies from Ebay vendors. At times I wonder why buyers are willing to bid more for used mangas that are currently in print and end up paying more than the cover price.

This is something I can hardly understand either, particularly if a manga title is still in print.

[2old4yaoi]

I've got my "Cigarette Kisses" yesterday. It made for a very good bedtime reading. I honestly like it a lot & it is my fave licensed Yamato Nase's work to date. Deux made a great choice in saving the license for this series from Boysenberry. I hope Deux will license more sensei's works such as "Benriya-San" & "Kyoushi mo Iroiro Aruwakede"

Unfortunately I can't say I am as happy w/ "Gakuen Heaven - Nakajima" in the same shipment though. The art is great & this pairing is probably my favourite in the series. But the cheap print & publication quality Blu gave Higuri Yuu's wonderful artwork is a travesty! I pulled out my older Blu books for comparison - it is an outrage that the quality of their latest print has really gotten worse (cheaper, thinner, gritty feel papers & filmy cover etc ...) But the MSRP price has gone up by 50%. The sad part is Blu actually got the licenses for some of the prettiest yaoi art works out there (i.e. Takagana Hinako) I definitely will wait as long as it takes for their books to go on very deep discount to even collect the books that I want. On top of that, the scanlation that used to exist for this work is actually better - translation wise!

[LiuFeiLong]

The last volume I bought from Blu was end of July, early August, vol. 10 of "Junjo Romantica" and noticed that the cover was thinner and somewhat lower quality than previous volumes. I really hope they won't continue this trend in order to overcome the financial crisis. On the other hand, and with all difficulties present, Deux keep their quality on the same level.