Goodness, what a cluster eff on VMP's part.
I started with VMP when Perfume Genius was their AOTM. And I was so impressed! Very soon after that was the Whoosh issue with Donuts. VMP stepped the eff up on that and fixed it. Without a single customer having to complain. There was a goof with the Ben Webster AOTM too. I don't remember exactly what it was, but again, VMP stepped up and took care of it. The communication was clear, transparent and TO EVERYONE. Dang, they earned so much respect from me.
But then I started noticing things. The Suuns exclusive sounded AWFUL. And several people commented on it. I emailed. I got a replacement, it sounded the same. I emailed again. To this day, I have not received an explanation or a proper sounding replacement. The whole Nina Simone fiasco. People were told to email in by some at VMP while someone else at VMP was saying on the forum that we shouldn't email, they would have a solution for us all and they would announce it. Yeah. Ok. There was the delayed shipping around the holidays. And the response to that was also baffling. I emailed in and was overnighted my package. But for some reason that solution was not offered to all.
The staff engagement on the forums became problematic. Staff was being rude and even told people to quit if they didn't like it. WTF? And then there was staff that actually did try to help and answer questions on the forum. Very valid questions like - is this mono or stereo? Is this foil stamped? Where was this mastered? Is this exclusive for an amount of months or ? And staff couldn't even answer the questions. I remember being told, "VMP is not Amazon" when trying to figure out what product it was that they were selling in their store. I don't fault the staff that was trying to help. I fault the higher ups for not providing staff with the adequate info to answer the questions. The questions that weren't out of nowhere, right? They work in the vinyl industry, the higher ups had to know that we would want to know this type of info. And yet, it was time and time and time and time and time again hard if not impossible for them to tell us what we were buying.
There have been ongoing issues for years. Shipping, the lack of QC, not knowing what they are selling, that whole Al Green and having to sign up for an app fiasco, not knowing what is in their inventory (I can not tell you how many times myself or friends have bought something only to be refunded our money because oops, VMP didn't have enough inventory. How hard is it to have a correct accounting of your inventory?????) It all adds up. We don't live in a vacuum, but I think VMP wants us to. Time and time again we were told they were trying, they were new, they were working on it, come on guys!!! Sure, that kind of response would be acceptable if there was a mutual communal relationship. But they are not about community - (they claim to be a community ONLY when it benefits them). They are a business. And one of the most important assets a business needs but can not buy is goodwill and integrity. You have to work your ass off to earn goodwill. And you have to prove your integrity in the times when things don't go great. An example of integrity is proactively finding the whoosh issue, finding a solution, communicating the issue and the solution to EVERYONE. An example of a company not having integrity is this anthology mess. Shutting down the forums when they did with such little notice was absolutely because of the impending deliveries of the anthology - they wanted to stifle criticism - even though that criticism is very valid and if taken to heart could only help them improve and grow. Promising certain things and not delivering them and then hoping no one notices but when they notice it, not responding to it or only offering to speak to people over DM or the phone - nah man. That's not integrity. (It's also not illegal. But it sure is fishy.)
It should not be incumbent upon the customer to find the issues. Sure, everyone once in awhile is fine. But it seems like VMP uses its customers as its QC. They are caught with their pants down so often, it is embarassing.
I am saddened to see so many people sour on VMP. But it mirrors the journey a lot of us have been on. I used to be a stan - it was awhile ago. I became salty after all the constant issues.
@Lee Newman came along and took my place as the stan. (Not picking on you at all, Lee, we've just spoken a little about this) And he and I would butt heads when I was salty and he was stanning. His VMP journey progressed and I think he saw a bit of where I was coming from. As more and more people progressed on that VMP journey, it only made sense that it would be exhibited on the forum. And the constant refusal of VMP to take any of it seriously, learn from it, adapt, anything at all, was maddening. We were all just screaming into the void, weren't we?
I really am so sorry that this is happening to more and more of you, especially when the stakes got higher in price. VMP could have been so much more. And if they had lived up to their potential, sheesh, it is mind boggling to think what they could do. But unless there is some big come to jesus within their ranks, nah. And I don't see that change happening especially with how their CEO treated the forum - not just in the last few days of it but also the last several years. It was pretty well known he hated the forum.
VMP messed up. They thought we were whiney, toxic and negative. I will point to THIS WHOLE FORUM as proof otherwise. I welcome this new forum and all the good feelings that come with it. I appreciate the threads where you all have valid criticism and complaints about VMP because you are still being civil and showing that you care. I don't see VMP recovering from this, I could be wrong. Perhaps they will monetarily flourish. But I believe the integrity, goodwill and respect that they may have had (and were working really hard to erode for years until they finally just nuked it into oblivion) is gone for good.
I hope the rest of the anthology albums due to arrive have zero issues. I hope they give you more than a FB group and a podcast. I really really do. You all paid good money for it.
But what I really hope is that this place continues to be fun and a place that I want to return to daily. Keep up all the positivity and good feels!!!!!
