Bit of Controversy in the World of Diaper Companies - ABUniverse vs. NetDiapers

[Brandiaper]

So I'm sure I'm not the only one here who received an email from ABUniverse's CEO, Casey Strom..

According to this email, there is a "new" company--owned by

[rusty pins]

First, it's moot to me because I do not buy diapers on-line.

[Diapered Jason]

I recently switched from Bambino to ABUniverse, because they were cheaper and they had better prints. I am not sure what the complaint over price is about. If you want cheaper diapers, buy non AB/DL diapers.

I would also think they have ran the numbers to determine which price would most increase their profit margins. While I am not sure of the elasticity of ABDL diapers, there are more competitors now then there ever has been which will eventually drivdrdown cost.

[randy]

@Brandiaper .. i completely understand your position. i like an awesome AB diaper as much as the next, and i drool for ABUniverse diapers, and will pick some up when i get my finances in better shape; however for me they will have to be my 'sunday best' diapers, there is just no way i could use these as my daily drivers. i am not a harden conservative (quite the opposite in fact) but i do beleive in the free enterprise system, and one sells a product for as much as the market will bear, and there is no shame nor 'shinanigans' with that,

[Elfy]

Aren't the people behind NetDiapers the people who were running ABU before the site went to shit for a while? It's hard to keep up with this pointless drama.

If a website comes about that can sell a VERY similar product for nearly half of the price then one of two things are happening: 1) The cheaper nappies are vastly inferior or 2) ABU is massively marking up their prices.

I don't really buy into the owners of ABU being awesome people just because of some good PR and what have you, they are running a business designed to make money. The e-mail you showed here, to me, looks ultra defensive. They claim it is for the good of us but to me it looks like a scared message that perhaps someone is revealing that these nappies can be sold a hell of a lot cheaper than they currently are being sold.

I don't agree with taking it public either. If someone is infringing copyright then go through the proper channels, don't air the dirty laundry in public. Again, I don't believe there is anything there about protecting consumers, it seems like they are trying to stop people buying a cheaper alternative to their own nappies. If copyright is being infringed then they will be shut down in due course, if they aren't well... For someone claiming to welcome competition they certainly seem to be trying to shut this down as quick as possible.

Whether copyright is being infringed or not this shows how hugely overpriced these nappies (made by people who apparently and repeatedly say they care about the consumer) actually are. This isn't a slight undercutting in price, it is almost half the price. For someone saying they care about the people buying from them, that is pretty damning.

Either way... As consumers, loyalty to brands usually hurt the wallet. It is much better to go to where the cheaper versions of the nappies are and take advantage of low prices than staying loyal to a company selling the same thing for much more just because you have ordered from them before.

[minachan16]

I've suspected ABU could be marking up prices as they offer free UPS shipping (which isn't free to us), but the products are good quality and I feel they are worth the cost so no love lost here. And really, while I understand the fear of copyright infingement, what makes them think anyone would want to deal with the previous ABU owners' new company? They're the ones that let customer relations go to pot, right, so why are they afraid the ABDL community would ever buy from them given their reputation? Doesn't makes sense to make all this hub-bub publicly.

[AwakenEvil]

So how many owners has ABU had? I'm under the impression that's it's 3 different owners cause I had someone from net diapers contact me and his name wasnt

[randy]

@Elfy .. unfortunately it looks a bit messier than simple copyright infringement. i will admit, i am an ABUniverse fanboy, so take my bias into account. When 'Old ABUniverse' sold to 'New ABUniverse' i am assuming they sold copyrights to all their products and

[Elfy]

Regardless of copyright issues, I think the guy in charge of NetDiapers is not the person who ran ABU into the ground. He is the person before that whom I don't think anyone had complaints towards. Seems a lot of people seem to think he is but from what I have heard it is the person before that one. There were three owners that I know of, the original who was fine, the second one who nearly burnt the thing to the ground and the current person.

Being a "fanboy" to any company is usually not good because in situations like these it allows companies to charge much higher than they should and get away with it. You say there that you think the owner should be given some leeway but that isn't how business works... They can't just charge more money than they should because he is a nice guy or because he invested money... If his investment meant he had to charge a high price for nappies, that doesn't mean people should pay him his money back if there are better options elsewhere. Even this transparency... If transparency means charging a high price for more profit when their correspondence talks about how important the consumer is, seems pretty opaque to me!

I don't have a horse in this race... I live in the UK so I'm unlikely to order from either company (although there is a UK shop selling US ABDL nappies now), I've long heard of people complaining about ABU's high prices and now I see that there is a possibility that they are marking up their nappies much higher than they could. Just offering a different point of view since I imagine most will defend them thanks to the same "loyalty" idea that you have.

[starman]

reading on their home page it tells you the founder

[warpiper]

Also, netdiapers does not offer free shipping on cases. Yes, they appear to be cheaper from the get go, but they actually end up being 3 dollars more expensive when you factor in shipping after going through the check out processes on both sites. So not only are they breaking a trademark, they are riding the coat tails from someone who revived a company they drove into the ground, and they are trying to steal customers by claiming they are cheaper, while hidden charges will make it more expensive in the end. Sounds like netdiapers.com is up to it's old tricks and shitty business practices.

BOTTOM LINE, NETDIAPERS IS STILL MORE EXPENSIVE THAN ABUNIVERSE AFTER YOU FACTOR IN SHIPPING.

[WakkoWannaBe]

According to Casey, we have a new company, Neovi, that's registered this domain name, NetDiapers, and is copyrighting a diaper design that he has the rights to, and is using a database that he has the rights to. According to the website NetDiapers, a woman named Amy started the website.

So, the WA Business License Records office lists Neovi as being a business in WA, as Casey said. However they don't give the name of the owner.

I don't know how to check out who owns a domain name, but this site gives some information. It's not very useful, however, as it only seems to give out information as to where the server is located, while what we're looking for verification that Jason = the owner of Neovi and that Neovi = owner of the domain name NetDiapers.com.

So, I think that all the tech-y stuff is beyond me, but regardless: a new company is using copyrighted material and databases that it shouldn't be using. Plus, when you read the info on NetDiapers.com it's ssuupperrr corny and fishy. You can only get preorders of a certain diaper? They had experts from Amazon and Microsoft build the website? I don't think so. The site feels extra fish-y because there's even the possibility that the same guy who gave ABU a bad name owns it.

Since everyone else is weighing in on ABU's prices, though: I get that they're high. I kinda want them to have lower prices also, but like I'm okay with paying that much. The diapers are super high quality and are very cute. If you buy in bulk then it makes things a bit more economic, but I know everyone can't do that.

Also, I think that it was a smart move on Casey's part to send an e-mail to his customers. This new company is playing it cut-throat (assuming the e-mail thing is true) by e-mailing someone else's customers, and Casey is playing the same game by giving information out to the people. It's effective, I think.

I thought that ABU only had 2 owners, Jason and then Casey, so yea I suppose this can be hard to track.

[eatenbywo1ves]

Yeah, something seems a little fishy about all this. Wonder if it will be solved with litigation, would be an interesting case to watch. I can't really complain about either companies pricing structure, as I have not dealt with either of this companies. However, sometimes I do feel like we are getting scalped on price points for materials and features they say are incorporated in the manufacturing process but are to verify if they've actually materialized. As far as this goes, I'm not really in a position to complain because at least these companies are trying something that is in still relatively untested waters, so they deserve to make a few extra bucks as far as I'm concerned for the having the balls to go out and start these companies up.

I wasn't really active when the whole ABU debacle went down (ordered from them a few times in winter '11/spring '12 with no problems except for a box flap that come untapped during shipping so it was obvious what was in there when it was at my apt. [no big deal though tbh]) so if there is a thread that details this ordeal please link it so I can catch myself up on happenings and shit.

That being said, DRAMA, DRAMA, DRAMA, that shit is everywhere in life!

[Nat]

I wouldn't want to do business with Net Diapers because of their poor customer service and I think the ABU prices have gone up because I used to pay less for them and now they cost much more. But their shipping is free now right? It used to not be free so it cost me at least 10 or six bucks for shipping because I lived a few hours from them. But then again they are around the same price as Bambinos when I buy two cases and some of the ABU diapers are cheaper but I get 16 less diapers from them.

[Alyeskabird]

Ok, a point I should point out, Casy/ABU did not take this public, far as I can tell, thay emailed there customer base to let them know what was going on. Someone else

[erevu]

I really don't get what pricing has to do with any of this.

[babybobomb]

Here's what really upsets me, I received these emails at both my "real" email address, and my "this side" email address. I have them linked as backups but I can't for the life of me think how they got the other one...

[Hookedondiapers]

What's with the fake yellow stains on their diapers?

[sunwutian]

New site is super shady, would never trust buying from there.

But back to ABU.. can you really "own" the SDK print? Isn't it just lifted from Pampers in the '80s? Which I don't mind, wonderful on the authenticity aspect. But it's a bit pot calling the kettle black, isn't it?

As for the prices, we are definitely getting gouged. That should be obvious to anyone, we're a niche market and we pay dearly for it. You can find the companies ABU and Bambino are using selling the same products on Alibaba. Imported, you're looking at about 60 cents a diaper last I checked. But the real problem: you have to order 5000 of them at a time. And if it's a bad batch, good luck getting your money back from China.

That said, even with that, the prices of the medium-quality lines at ABU and Bambino are obscene- SDK, Cushies, Teddies, Classico. They're 80-90% the price of the super premium ones- Space, LittlePawz, Bellissimo, but only last half as long before needing a change. I wait for the two times a year Bambino does a sale to stock up on the biggest discounted medium-quality ones, only way they're even remotely economical. If I run out before another sale, I'll have to switch to the clump-tastic ATNs

I'm okay with the sub-$2 prices for the premium ones for overnight use though. But the Rearz ones at more than $3 each at case pricing? That's criminal! I hope no one buys those.. we don't want the market to think more than $3 a diaper is acceptable!

[Snugglebear_69]

Are the Rearz diapers pricy, sure, outragiously pricy, nope. Rearz does A LOT of business and the market has already spoken and the clear message is that $3 / diaper for a premium diaper is acceptable. At the end of the day it's a

[hampshirebaby]

costings from both sites on 80 larger diapers to the UK

Netdiapers.com

Super Dry Kids - SDK Classic Diapers Large - 80 Diapers

[wetatnight]

many of the specialty abdl diapers are way over priced in my opinion

[Nyte Kitsune]

Shipped from ABU to my Door (1-3 days delivery depending if I get the order in before Sunday)

[FretaBWet]

First off I'll address the copyright database issue. I'm an ABU customer so I too received Casey's email. I had never bought from ABU when it was owned by any previous owner and I haven't received any communication from the netdiapers company

[Cheatz911]

Personally, I believe that the old owner was a terrible person and a terrible business person. ABU was practically blacklisted to stay away. The customer service was atrocious. Then you had the same person offering a brand of diapers that were known for questionable activities. He sponsored questionable websites on his web page. He would accept money, and not deliver products and would offer no communication what so ever.

Casey on the other hand basically took a brand from being a resented, horrific, and disgusting image and flipped the ship back over and took all the punches from people. I thought it was a horrible idea to keep the name. Casey has made it the best experience possible. I wouldn't be upset if the name would change, just to get rid of the memory of what ABU once was. It took a lot to order from ABU again after all the crap that it was. It took everything I had to purchase my first time. The past still haunts me in a way, but I've gotten over it as Casey has set the bar really high in this small corner of a market and made it very difficult to surpass.

If you do order from this person at netdiapers, be very aware that you are dealing with a potential con man that has supported websites involving pedophilia. A person that cared nothing about customers. A liar. A thief. Stay away!