My Plate Lunch

[Mel in Hawaii]

This may not seem tax board related, but give me a moment of your time.

I don't go out to lunch/dinner as much as I used to... Too much work to do, with the kids taking up much of my time, I guess. Years ago, I used to go out to the local Chinese place (man I loved going to the Jade Palace) and picking up a number 8. It was my favorite thing to do after work before I headed home. Being single, I hated cooking for one and if I didn't eat out it generally meant Mac-n-cheese. Every time I went, I generally would get a number 8. It was a huge plate of food and after going 30-40 times, I finally started to take some home with me. Eventually I learned that if I divided up my meal while I was there, I could make it into 4 satisfying meals and it was hard to imagine that I actually ate it all in one setting months before.

Fast forward to today, being a single dad with kids, I generally make my lunch while I am making the kids lunch for them to take to school and bring it with me when I go to the office. The sweet and sour chicken fingers have been replaced by a sandwhich which probably has 1/10th the calories, and yet it satisfies me. Today I ran out of bread when making the kids lunch, having just enough for theirs so I decided that I would go out to lunch. Looking at the menu, I could get a full plate lunch for five something or a 'mini' plate for 4. Sure the full plate lunch is cheaper per pound, but I wouldn't be eating that much and don't have a way of storing it, hence it is a waste for me. So, I picked up the mini plate and took it back to the office with me. About halfway through the meal, I just couldn't finish it. I can't imagine how people could eat the regular one and started to think that I needed a 'mini' mini plate. Would they consider this? No, it would cut into their sales of the larger plate and take just as much time to prepare, hence costing them money.

This brings me back to the constant discussion of the 'packaging' of the software program. Years ago, the company offered such a slice and dice of the program where you could basically make any combination that you wanted that it cost the company a lot of money solving the logistics of selling such a program. It wasn't just the extra complexity of the catalog, there was the extra printing costs of extra pages, training the sales staff to understand what was for what, duplication machines capable of handling every possibility, duplication of forms throughout multiple programs requiring extra disks for installation, extra disks mean heavier packages and more money for the physical disk... I am sure I missed some of the 'extra' logistics required, but you can see my point. Finding a 'middle ground' that satisfied many users but wasn't so expensive that people would balk was important and hence the 'Package X' aka Saber Pro and the later names. Eventually the smaller little programs were dropped to reduce costs (which would have been passed along eventually). Yes, moving to a CD distribution solved a lot of the Physical logistics since everything could be packed onto the CD, the training and printing costs remained, plus trying to explain to the customer what they were getting and comparing it to what they needed extended the length of sales calls requiring more staff.

Yes, I can see the customer's side of things, having all those other programs available made it really convenient to get 'just what they needed' with no added expense, but it actually upped the cost for everyone. Since they are paying less, then the other guys have to make up for the lost revenue and increased expenses. The small guy was forced to go to the bigger package and was unhappy about it, but the larger customer was happy that he didn't have to buy ALL of the smaller ones to get the functionality of the bundled one. It was a compromise and one that was actually not hard to find the point of by modeling it after the IRS publication X at the time.

Remember when you try to request a smaller package, that ATX's cost of servicing you remains the same regardless of what you order. It doesn't make sense to sell a package that is only $29 and does a couple forms as the cost of shipping updates will excede that price. Plus, if you are really looking at a small package such as the 'City' packages, there are very few customers to spread the cost of designing those forms over, hence requiring a higher price. Is it worth it to you with that higher price? Is it really worth it to ATX to produce it?

Just how small does the company really want to make it's plate lunch available for? The smaller amount of rice only probably translates into a savings of a few cents, a few cents for broccoli and tofu isn't that expensive either... It isn't woth it to them, so I guess I will be forced to buy the bigger one and throw away what I wouldn't be able to eat.

[jainen]

>>I will be forced to buy the bigger one and throw away what I wouldn't be able to eat<<

Or you could bring a friend and share the goodies. You would have a bigger selection to take care of whatever your appetite strayed to, and your split of the cost would be a lot less.

[Pacun]

>>I will be forced to buy the bigger one and throw away what I wouldn't be able to eat<<

Or you could bring a friend and share the goodies. You would have a bigger selection to take care of whatever your appetite strayed to, and your split of the cost would be a lot less.

That's illegal. This is a buffet... all you can eat. You don't bring your friends to a buffet and pay only for one, do you?

[GeneInAlabama]

Pacun, you are right on target. I have bought Max for the last several years and I use only a very small fraction of what it is capable of, but the rest of it is there if I need it, and if I had to pay a nickle and a dime for each part I do use, it would cost me a whole lot more than what Max costs. Also, I have used Microsoft Excel for quite a few years and I also use only a very small fraction of what it is capable of, but what I do use is well worth what I pay for the program.

Gene

[jainen]

>>You don't bring your friends to a buffet and pay only for one, do you?<<

On the contrary, this fine company INVITES you to bring two friends to the Max buffet, at no extra charge!

[Pacun]

>>You don't bring your friends to a buffet and pay only for one, do you?<<

On the contrary, this fine company INVITES you to bring two friends to the Max buffet, at no extra charge!

Provided you all 3 share the same back bone, correct?

I think you have licenses for 3... (you, your secretary and your assistant) on the same network back bone but I might be wrong.

[kcjenkins]

Pacun is right. You can have up to three users, for the same price, but they must all be part of the same 'firm'. What is not allowed, because it is not fair to the company, is for two or three individual firms to all 'share' the same program. The price is so fair, IMHO, for all that you get from ATX, that it is really totally unacceptable behavior to try to rip them off by 'sharing' your program with another sole proprietor, for example.

[Mel in Hawaii]

"Or you could bring a friend and share the goodies."

I still have a vivid recollection of this one time I took a friend along to the Jade Palace (many many years ago), she ended up costing me over $100 for the meal. I sat there with amazement as this very skinny lady packed away so much food that I couldn't understand where it was physically going. I didn't say anything to her, but it was on my mind the whole meal.

I don't know if the same attitude towards the licensing of the software remains, but the license for the network was meant to cover people in the same office so if you were using it in an office with a couple partners, sharing the goodies was actually encouraged. Yes, thinking of having the users all connected to the network is a good thought, but it also covered the partner working on his laptop that he took to the clients offices. It was an important distinction that they were all part of the same 'company' though. So, in the concept of the plate lunch, it would be like taking my son and daughter with me while going out to eat. They all can share from the same plate as they are part of the family, but it wouldn't work with me bringing in the guy from down the street as we wouldn't be willing to share from the same plate.