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Post by lightning on Jan 28, 2016 1:46:58 GMT -9
I hope this is the right place to ask. I am wondering if there are other vendors in Europe and if any of them are selling through their own shop. Reason for asking is the kind of crazy VAT handling regulations since 2015 and how they deal with it.
Also I am wondering, are OneBookShelf, RPGNow, DriveThrough etc. all the same?
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Post by bravesirkevin on Jan 28, 2016 2:33:55 GMT -9
I hope this is the right place to ask. I am wondering if there are other vendors in Europe and if any of them are selling through their own shop. Reason for asking is the kind of crazy VAT handling regulations since 2015 and how they deal with it. I'm not in Europe but I do sell through my own shop, www.papercraftdungeon.com. I started it out that way in part because I wasn't aware of other vendors at the time and I was just doing what made sense at the time. It's a lot more complicated running your own shop and there are a lot of expenses so unless you're getting a lot of sales and don't mind the admin it's probably a lot simpler and cheaper to just sell through OBS in spite of their 30-35% commission. Unfortunately I don't know much about European VAT regulations so I can't comment on that part. The BSGTony (lordzsezse) crew might know. Yes, they're all shops controlled by OneBookShelf, but they're not necessarily the same. RPGNow and DriveThruRPG are actually completely identical sites, just with different skins. Wargame Vault is a sister site to those two, but focused on wargaming rather than RPGs, so they have a different selection of products though there is a little overlap. There are also a bunch of specialist shops under the OBS banner like "Dungeons and Dragons Classics" which is specifically reserved for Wizards of the Coasts products, and "Dungeon Masters Guild" which is for selling third party content designed under their new Dungeon Masters Guild licence. The latter two probably won't be of much interest to you, but occasionally you'll get sales notifications from them if someone has your stuff in their cart and they check out from one of those sites. There are a few other shops around that aren't part of OBS, like Paizo.com, but generally the OBS stores are where people go when they want to buy print-and-play so that should probably be where you hang your flag to start off with.
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Post by lightning on Jan 28, 2016 4:30:19 GMT -9
the EU VAT regulation now is that I have to know the customers location and pay the VAT according to that country regulation resulting in a huge amount of administration and responsibility. before I just payed my fixed rate VAT in my country. its a huge mess and a lot of small business are rebelling. not delivering to EU clients anymore actually etc.
so it makes a lot of sense for me just for that to deal with an intermediary like OBS. also as I have my other products there from 6 years ago it would be my natural starting point for now.
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Post by pavaro on Jan 28, 2016 5:03:04 GMT -9
I had a similar problem and join to thread. I still don't know how to sell own models.
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Post by mproteau (Paper Realms) on Jan 28, 2016 6:27:26 GMT -9
The $$$ that OneBookshelf takes from your sales is more than just for hosting a catalog and processing orders. Their customer support has been GREAT for me so far. They have a lot of machinery in place for marketing your work. They have a huge built-in customer base. They seem like good people trying to make a good ecosystem for sharing this stuff. I had no interest in trying to make my own storefront and handle all the design, development, marketing, accounting and support given the peanuts I ever expect to make from the process. Of course I don't know what it is like to sell through them outside the US. I do know that I've seen emails come through from all over the world for purchases.
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Post by glennwilliams on Jan 28, 2016 6:59:03 GMT -9
Another vote for OBS. It's really easy to list your product on the multiple sister sites. As to the cut they take, I'm willing to pay simply to avoid the hassle of one more thing I have to handle, and their vendor support really is great.
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Post by BSGTony (lordzsezse) on May 18, 2016 21:04:40 GMT -9
Sorry for the late reply lightning . There are different rules in Europe modified by every country that is using the common EU law so I don't know exactly what is yours. As Black Scrolls Games I started my own section, so from the second of May I'm self employed in that. I also had to find solution for the crazy EU TAXes and invoices I can also recommend you OneBookShelf stores as mproteau (Paper Realms) has written before, because they provide you many things, they pay the VAT after the products and create invoices to customers, provide you space enough to upload products, print option, customer service, banners, you can send emails to your customers who allow it, etc. So the money you get from them is basically 'clean' money. You have to do with it nothing but make your Tax return based on it. Yep, they cut the 30-35% of your income but you don't have to pay the 8-27% VAT (that you should from EU if you had an own store) after the sales and create invoices after each because they do it. I've found another option to sell things easily on my site and this is Humble Bundle page. They offer widgets: www.humblebundle.com/developer/widgetthat you can place anywhere. They pay you only if you reach at least $250 but they cut only 5% after the sales if you are from the EU. (There are different %s if you come from the USA and you have larger company, but basically it is 5%). They offer you sales options, coupons, PWYW products, custom thank you text, product update option, etc. So it's kind of great. It will look like this on website: blackscrollsgames.com/product/the-marble-sanctum-digital/They send the product to e-mail address and you can download it anytime from your Humble Bundle account.
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Post by lightning on May 20, 2016 20:55:35 GMT -9
Thanks for the update Antal. I have not heard from this site and will check it out.
Cheers Chris
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