Groundspeak Budget (release)?

[+TheWeatherWarrior]

Does anyone know if Groundspeak releases it's budget information. They have got to making a killing nowadays, but I haven't yet found any budget information.

[+A & J Tooling]

Is it a public or private company? If it ain't public, none of your dang business...

[+larryc43230]

Is it a public or private company? If it ain't public, none of your dang business...

It is a privately-held company, and it is none of our business.

 

And I seriously doubt that they're "making a killing." Just a guess.

 

--Larry

[+Chokecherry]

Last job that was posted here for Groundspeak had a very very healthy benefit package in this economy. I would guess a lot of money goes towards salaries and benefits just like any other place. Then after that building and server costs.

 

They might not be making a killing but they are hardly suffering.

[+St.Matthew]

Signal the Frog lives in a solid gold castle paid for by Premium Membership Benjamins.

[+Gitchee-Gummee]

Personally, I would like to hear why you think that they are "making a killing".

 

While I would surmise that they are doing OK, somehow I just don't think that making a killing is in the picture. I could be wrong. Has happened before and will probably happen again. Too, it could be semantics -- making a living, doing OK, being comfortable, and making a killing are different things to different people, what?

Edited July 15, 2011 by Gitchee-Gummee

[Mr.Yuck]

Last job that was posted here for Groundspeak had a very very healthy benefit package in this economy. I would guess a lot of money goes towards salaries and benefits just like any other place. Then after that building and server costs.

 

They might not be making a killing but they are hardly suffering.

 

Put me down as the first one to say they're making a killing.

 

Purely speculation though, as it's a privately held company, and no one will see these figures, as the OP requested.

[+Markwell]

Does it matter?

[+StarBrand]

I think with all the employees, building, servers, bandwidth and etc that the term is a lot closer to "living comfortably well" rather than "making a killing".

 

Good for them. They have made it work.

[+Danbike_Lizbike]

IF you know someone or have access to a D&B report, run it.

[+cache_test_dummies]

Like most private companies, Groundspeak doesn't make their financial records available to the public.

 

For what it's worth, one could make a guess about Groundspeak's annual revenue by counting the icons on the About Our Team page, multiplying that number by the average annual salary for people working in the Seattle area, and then multiplying the result by 2.5. But that wouldn't tell you where the money goes.

 

But I will say this: every year I pay $30 to Groundspeak. I don't care what they do with it, but I'm hoping that at least a portion of my $30 is budgeted to go into some sort of retirement fund for the hamsters. Seriously - those little guys can only 'run the wheel' for a few years when they are young, and then they have to be replaced by younger hamsters. Once off the wheel, their working days are numbered, and then what?

 

Sure, they can probably help around the office for some time, answering the phones and making coffee. Some of the smarter ones might even make it into middle management, holding meetings and shuffling paperwork. But eventually they all have to leave the Lily Pad.

 

I really like to believe that Groundspeak cares about the hamsters, and has established some type of financial support system to help these hardworking, dedicated creatures when they reach their golden years.

[knowschad]

Does it matter?

I don't know about you, but I'm curious about a lot of things that don't really matter.

[+Chokecherry]

I'm just curious about it too since many people talk of buying memberships like it's not a business but rather trying to support some barely thriving non-profit or something.

 

I see this as a business providing a service and product that I pay for. Not something I get warm fuzzies from.

[+kwcahart]

I guess some people just sit around trying to think of something to post about. I don't care what they do with their money.

[+PokerLuck]

There's a very easy way to tell if a company is making a killing. If they are, other companies will quickly form, ones that are willing to make a slightly lower killing and provide a better product, and competition will drive down the price. Yes, there are situations where imbalances occur, but it's usually only when a product first comes out (like people paying $700 for an iPhone), but after a while things balance out. After 10 years of geocaching, the fact that there are only 1 1/2 companies selling geocaching database services leads me to believe that nobody's making a killing.

[+geodarts]

I'm just curious about it too since many people talk of buying memberships like it's not a business but rather trying to support some barely thriving non-profit or something.

 

I see this as a business providing a service and product that I pay for. Not something I get warm fuzzies from.

 

Jeremy has been quite open about how they have "built a sustainable business with geocaching," The business model that they use incorporates a community; relies on a network of volunteers; and offers its basic product for free. By doing so, they were able to take something that began when one guy left a container in Oregon and build it into a near monopoly (in terms of its listings and participants). I do not think you could do that without being a business and making decisions accordingly.

 

As far as I know, Jeremy does not fly to various places on Groundspeak's corporate jet (although I have often wondered about their rumored fleet of black helicopters), and I hope that the employees are paid well. If everyone went on strike I would have to rethink things since I do not cross picket lines.

 

Other than that, I am more interested in the decisions that Groundspeak makes that effect this game; whether they will turn some of their resources into truly developing whereigos; what happened to Groundspeak's Mighty Egg game; whether they will be able to convince me to care about whibbit any more than I care about Waymarking. Everyone I have dealt with seems like they are nice people who like the game, but what they do with their listing service and various projects are ultimately up to them. And the business aspect of it is their business.

 

So I wish them continued success but do not get a warm fuzzy feeling when I renew my membership each year. I save my warm fuzzy feelings for when I see other cachers or find a unique location through caching. To the extent that Groundspeak makes this possible, I am happy.

Edited July 15, 2011 by mulvaney

[+TheAlabamaRambler]

After basic operating costs, including the huge expense of paying the Reviewer staff, Jeremy's Ferrari, the corporate jet and the Malibu retreat they probably don't have a lot left over.

[+Texas Charles]

What does it matter to me how much Groundspeak is making. They are charging me what I consider a fair price for my membership. I am happy and hope they are doing well. If they are not doing well they will disappear and my fun Geo Caching will end. If they start charging too much I will drop my membership and do something else in my spare time.

 

Texas Charles

[+Scubasonic]

Does anyone know if Groundspeak releases it's budget information. They have got to making a killing nowadays, but I haven't yet found any budget information.

 

Why is it any of your Business???

[+Sioneva]

I knew sooner or later someone in the government would start taxing GPS usage... thsi is clearly the first step!

[+Redfist]

My only hope is that they are making enough keep this hobby going. Ideally, I hope they're making enough to splurge on making this hobby better. Beyond that, I don't care at all.

 

What can I say... I'm a capitalist.

[+TheAlabamaRambler]

Does anyone know if Groundspeak releases it's budget information. They have got to making a killing nowadays, but I haven't yet found any budget information.

What's your annual income and how do you spend it? I'm sure you have a budget, let's see some numbers! Out there spending time and money hunting broken McToys, man you must be making a killing!

 

Joking aside, I do understand your curiosity. This very issue is why I use Credit Unions instead of Banks... my deposits in the Credit Union buy me an ownership interest, I have a say in how my membership fees are spent. My membership fees in Groundspeak only buy me membership benefits and no peeking under the tent.

[+Sol seaker]

It is funny some people get so wrapped up in this.

It seems a lot of people think Groundspeak shouldn't be making money. Like somehow geocaching should be a free non-profit. Weird.

 

I like to compare it to cable TV. Some people pay 150. a month in cable bills. Why doesn't anyone think that should be non-profit? It's also just for entertainment.

 

We pay 30. a year (those who pay anyway).

Groundspeak pays the full-time salary of what? maybe 20 workers or so? These people all need to pay rent and eat on this money. They pay rent on a building in the Fremont section of Seattle, which is not cheap. They pay benefits to those employees. They pay equipment costs, which keep increasing as the number of people who cache increase.

 

And we only pay 30 a year.

 

I just can't see that going really far. It takes a whole lot of cachers just to pay one person's wages. What I pay doesn't even cover one employee for one day.

 

I've been to the headquarters.

These guys have a bare-bones place that is small. Definitely nothing fancy about it. Just an office space upstairs in an office building. Not even like they even have a building of their own, much less a jet.

 

They are paying the wages of people, but you won't be finding Jeremy on the Forbes list any time soon.

 

And even if they were making a killing off of it? So what? That would just insure it would be around a long time.

[Clan Riffster]

They have got to making a killing nowadays

I hope they are. The folks at The Lily Pad are responsible for giving me a hobby which I have been bonkers over since the first time I tried it. A company that provides a worthy product should be rewarded financially. Questions like "How much?" and "Where does it go?" matter little to me.

[+Manville Possum]

Signal the Frog lives in a solid gold castle paid for by Premium Membership Benjamins.

Word is that a blue Squirrel that works for some BIG corp bought a lot next to his and is building a castle too with geocachers $'s. The Frog thinks the Squirrel's castle is a Shack, and hurts his real estate.

[+docsigma]

I really like to believe that Groundspeak cares about the hamsters, and has established some type of financial support system to help these hardworking, dedicated creatures when they reach their golden years.

Signal throws them into an industrial paper shredder when they're too old to be of any use any more.

[+hzoi]

I think folks get wrapped around the axle too much with the premium membership fees. They are certainly income to Groundspeak, but not the sole source.

 

- Every time you buy a geocoin or travel bug, part of that money goes to Groundspeak, which owns the tracking codes. In early 2008 they were $1.50 per, but they may have gone up. Custom icons and prefixes cost more as well.

 

- They sell their own swag, and they get licensing fees for the swag they don't sell.

 

- ADVERTISING. This can be a pretty lucrative source of income. My wife works in the newspaper business, and advertising is their bread and butter, MUCH more than subscriptions. Since the site isn't as plastered with ads as a typical newspaper page, it's probably not being used as much as ait could be, but even with premium membership, you still get ads.

 

That's just off the top of my head. I'm sure someone else can come up with others.

[Mr.Yuck]

I'm just curious about it too since many people talk of buying memberships like it's not a business but rather trying to support some barely thriving non-profit or something.

 

I see this as a business providing a service and product that I pay for. Not something I get warm fuzzies from.

 

This is a great point!! So many people have posted comments along the lines of "pony up, cheapskates", or "pay it to support the website". And of course the infamous "I make all my caches PMO to reward people for supporting the website" in these threads over the years. Killing or not, they're doing fine, and I don't get the warm fuzzies over my $30, any more than I do plonking $30 down at Wal-Mart.

[+sword fern]

Personally, I would like to hear why you think that they are "making a killing".

 

Think about it. There are about 5,000,000 geocachers worldwide and lets say about 3,000,000 of em are premium members.

 

Each premium member pays 30 dollars.

 

That would be $90,000,000. Don't forget that most PM's renew their membership an average of three times- so that would be-

 

about $270,000,000 dollars. Also remember about the other things like the official app, the geocaching store etc.

 

But $270,000,000 is probably what GS probably makes out of PM's.

 

Just a guess.

Edited July 15, 2011 by sword fern

[+jipow]

Other than that, I am more interested in the decisions that Groundspeak makes that effect this game; whether they will turn some of their resources into truly developing whereigos; what happened to Groundspeak's Mighty Egg game; whether they will be able to convince me to care about whibbit any more than I care about Waymarking. Everyone I have dealt with seems like they are nice people who like the game, but what they do with their listing service and various projects are ultimately up to them. And the business aspect of it is their business.

 

So I wish them continued success but do not get a warm fuzzy feeling when I renew my membership each year. I save my warm fuzzy feelings for when I see other cachers or find a unique location through caching. To the extent that Groundspeak makes this possible, I am happy.

 

I agree!

[+Warturtle]

Personally, I would like to hear why you think that they are "making a killing".

 

Think about it. There are about 5,000,000 geocachers worldwide and lets say about 3,000,000 of em are premium members.

 

Each premium member pays 30 dollars.

 

That would be $90,000,000. Don't forget that most PM's renew their membership an average of three times- so that would be-

 

about $270,000,000 dollars. Also remember about the other things like the official app, the geocaching store etc.

 

But $270,000,000 is probably what GS probably makes out of PM's.

 

Just a guess.

Wow.

 

How did you come up with 3/5? First of all, I don't know where you got 5 million. This link says that geocaches have been found by 4 million collective people. Think about how many of them are still active, probably not many. Maybe in the range of ~100,000. How many of those do you think are actually PMs? If you make a conservative estimate, that's 20,000 PMs. I'm sure that number could be off, even by a large margin, but I am also 100% sure that it is closer of an estimate than "3 million".

[+Redfist]

Personally, I would like to hear why you think that they are "making a killing".

 

Think about it. There are about 5,000,000 geocachers worldwide and lets say about 3,000,000 of em are premium members.

 

Each premium member pays 30 dollars.

 

That would be $90,000,000. Don't forget that most PM's renew their membership an average of three times- so that would be-

 

about $270,000,000 dollars. Also remember about the other things like the official app, the geocaching store etc.

 

But $270,000,000 is probably what GS probably makes out of PM's.

 

Just a guess.

Wow.

 

How did you come up with 3/5? First of all, I don't know where you got 5 million. This link says that geocaches have been found by 4 million collective people. Think about how many of them are still active, probably not many. Maybe in the range of ~100,000. How many of those do you think are actually PMs? If you make a conservative estimate, that's 20,000 PMs. I'm sure that number could be off, even by a large margin, but I am also 100% sure that it is closer of an estimate than "3 million".

 

And back to the point a previous poster made... if this was a QUARTER OF A BILLION DOLLAR BUSINESS, they'd have real competitors out there. They don't and thus they likely are nowhere even close to your figure.

[+_Wolverine]

Quarter of a billion dollars? Thats it! I'm going to start a new GPS game.. gpsstashing ... thats right.. virtuals will be allowed, you don't have to log physical caches.. NO RULES.. send me $30 a year. I'll have the website up soon.

[+user13371]

...lets say about 3,000,000 of em are premium members ... Just a guess.

My guess is that your guess is way too high. My guess is currently fewer than 100,000 premium members and it took years to build up to that and not everybody renews - they come and go. And even at $30*member*year, it doesn't all go straight to GC folks' salaries, it costs soething to keep the lights and servers running.

 

I'm making this up as I go along, of course. But I didn't ask where you got your numbers either

Edited July 15, 2011 by Portland Cyclist

[+Coldgears]

It is funny some people get so wrapped up in this.

It seems a lot of people think Groundspeak shouldn't be making money. Like somehow geocaching should be a free non-profit. Weird.

I think the real issue here, is that without competition, you have nothing to compare the prices too. People want to know if they are paying too high, or too little for something. It is human nature.

 

Groundspeak owns a monopoly over GPS games. They make money off of advertisements, considering the huge amount of traffic they get to their website, they must be making a lot off of them. In fact, many websites strive solely off of Advertising, look at Kongregate, a flash game website, has huge traffic with 40K people on the site AT ONE TIME at all times a day. Keeping in mind that it is a flash game site, they have to pay a ton of money on servers, as the users have to download the game to their browser to actually play it. Solely off of a couple advertisements, they make enough to pay for servers, to give out $250 to the highest rated game weekly, and $1500 to the highest game monthy, pay out $1 per 1000 views on each game, considering that the highest rated games get nearly 2 million views, and most games that get badges have a couple hundred thousand, that is A LOT of money to give out. That's not the end, they still find a way to pay nearly 15 employee's wages, including two people who do nothing but give badges to a game (All it involves is picking a new highest rated game, checking if the API works, then adding a badge based on challenges in game), and... They only badge about 2 games a day. This isn't even mentioning the random contests they hold for games, like two themed ones, one of which has 15K in winnings, and another in 25K winnings. This is 100% run off of just advertisements.

 

A few other totally ad run websites with plenty of employees and bandwidth, google, youtube, facebook, myspace ect.

 

Imagine ground speak is making even a quarter of that money off of ads, they still would have enough for the little bit of bandwidth that pocket queries take up. Now, I have no idea what they are making off ads, and it could be considerably less, because you don't have to watch any ads, and arguably don't have as much traffic, as there alexa rank compared to Kongregate is 3,500 which is about 2500 highest (Less traffic) then kong. But I assume that it should equal out, while less traffic = less ad money, less traffic also = less money spent on servers. This is all just random guessing though.

 

Now, assuming that Groundspeak doesn't make enough money from ads to run the site, they still have revenue from trackables, they make you spend an insane amount of money for a trackable code, even more for a unique icon. I'm not so sure how much bandwidth 25X25 pixels picture takes up, but I'm assuming it doesn't cost $500. And to randomly generate a number surely can't cost $1.50 a pop.

 

Keep in mind, they have their own Groundspeak store, which I'm pretty sure they buy a product in bulk from another geo-store, and sell them for higher price, either that, or they work directly with that geo-store, and the geo-store pays them a small slice of the profits. Honestly though, this probably is not a big revenue source, I rarely see any official (Ones sold on the store, third party stuff is official with permission) as a geocache, or on other geocachers, and the small slice of profits would make the money they make very slim. Can't complain much here, but it is money made none-the-less.

 

Another big thing is the official app, they released it on the Iphone, the Android Market, and WP7 market. It is on the VERY high end of apps, at $10. Many app developers, who are full-time employed to make apps/games for these phones, make enough to support the entire development team, and still have enough money left over for two more projects, sell them for $1. yet, they charge ten. Not to mention repeat buys, I spent $30 buying the app three times. I bought it on the Iphone, before switching to the android, and more recently the WP7 (Which they haven't updated at all yet, and is worse then C:Geo in terms of GPS stops updating randomly).

 

All this and they charge $30 a year for many trivial things that probably should be free (Does the map customization really cost them any extra, or is it just holding back features to make people want to pay more money). The one thing I can say that truly justifies the price is the Pocket Queries, legimately, these things take up a huge amount of bandwidth, especially as most people run multiple ones daily, if it was free people would probably stop paying for premium, and all the free members would take advantage of it, so they would have to pay much more in bandwidth, and receive much less in money.

 

It all depends on how well off they are before you take premium membership into account. If they are making enough to pay for pocket queries for free, and still have millions left over for jeremy (After paying everyone that works at Groundspeak) then understandably people can get upset.

 

Until Groundspeak releases some sort of financial data all we can do is speculate, for all I know Groundspeak could be struggling, or they could be filthy rich. It all comes down to people wanting to know whether they are getting their money's worth. I feel as though I am, which is why I continue to pay for premium membership, but others may feel that with all that was mentioned above, that they are not receiving enough for their money. Without some sort of reassurance, either by competition then charges more/less, or by finical data that shows where your money is going, people will begin to wonder where it goes.

[knowschad]

Does anyone know if Groundspeak releases it's budget information. They have got to making a killing nowadays, but I haven't yet found any budget information.

 

Boy, your innocent little question sure has caused quite a stir, hasn't it?

 

To answer your question, "No, they don't".

[Mr.Yuck]

 

And back to the point a previous poster made... if this was a QUARTER OF A BILLION DOLLAR BUSINESS, they'd have real competitors out there. They don't and thus they likely are nowhere even close to your figure.

 

Did someone say One (quarter) BILLION DOLLARS??

 

[+cache_test_dummies]

I really like to believe that Groundspeak cares about the hamsters, and has established some type of financial support system to help these hardworking, dedicated creatures when they reach their golden years.

Signal throws them into an industrial paper shredder when they're too old to be of any use any more.

[+cmar22]

A person comes up w/ a novel idea and through hard work and good decisions have built a great little company. From this novel idea they created jobs for people (that pay taxes) and for side companies they sale products associated w/ the hobby. All w/o the almighty federal governments help. Capitalism what a wonderful thing. Hard work makes good things happen. So however much they make I wish them the best. Live in mansions, drive expensive cars, or live like a miser it is none of my business nor anyone else's. Sorry for getting a little off topic.

[+Chokecherry]

I'm just curious about it too since many people talk of buying memberships like it's not a business but rather trying to support some barely thriving non-profit or something.

 

I see this as a business providing a service and product that I pay for. Not something I get warm fuzzies from.

 

This is a great point!! So many people have posted comments along the lines of "pony up, cheapskates", or "pay it to support the website". And of course the infamous "I make all my caches PMO to reward people for supporting the website" in these threads over the years. Killing or not, they're doing fine, and I don't get the warm fuzzies over my $30, any more than I do plonking $30 down at Wal-Mart.

 

That's my biggest issue is that you're some how not supporting the "cause" if you don't buy a membership. Never mind how many people buy trackables from ground speak? Or how many people buy swag? Or forget the fact that I paid how much for the phone app?

 

Nevermind that they have advertising supporting them. I'm quite sure the geiko deal was not out of the goodness of their hearts or any of the corporate pairings they've had as of late.

 

I'm just sick of people guilting non-premium members and doing the "cup of coffee" talk when people don't buy a membership. They're offering a service for that money. Right now I'm willing to pay for the service but I won't be forever for sure because I don't use many aspects of the paid services. But I will likely continue to buy travel bugs and the occasional branded item.

 

It's not a cause to me. I'm not here to support the cause. I'm here to purchase a service or items. Simple as that.

[knowschad]

A person comes up w/ a novel idea and through hard work and good decisions have built a great little company. From this novel idea they created jobs for people (that pay taxes) and for side companies they sale products associated w/ the hobby. All w/o the almighty federal governments help. Capitalism what a wonderful thing. Hard work makes good things happen. So however much they make I wish them the best. Live in mansions, drive expensive cars, or live like a miser it is none of my business nor anyone else's. Sorry for getting a little off topic.

 

Well, actually it was Dave Ulmer who came up with the novel idea, but you are right that creating a website to capitalize on Ulmer's novel idea was probably a novel idea, too. It certainly was the novel idea that made the most money from Ulmer's novel idea.

[knowschad]

I'm just curious about it too since many people talk of buying memberships like it's not a business but rather trying to support some barely thriving non-profit or something.

 

I see this as a business providing a service and product that I pay for. Not something I get warm fuzzies from.

 

This is a great point!! So many people have posted comments along the lines of "pony up, cheapskates", or "pay it to support the website". And of course the infamous "I make all my caches PMO to reward people for supporting the website" in these threads over the years. Killing or not, they're doing fine, and I don't get the warm fuzzies over my $30, any more than I do plonking $30 down at Wal-Mart.

 

That's my biggest issue is that you're some how not supporting the "cause" if you don't buy a membership. Never mind how many people buy trackables from ground speak? Or how many people buy swag? Or forget the fact that I paid how much for the phone app?

 

Nevermind that they have advertising supporting them. I'm quite sure the geiko deal was not out of the goodness of their hearts or any of the corporate pairings they've had as of late.

 

I'm just sick of people guilting non-premium members and doing the "cup of coffee" talk when people don't buy a membership. They're offering a service for that money. Right now I'm willing to pay for the service but I won't be forever for sure because I don't use many aspects of the paid services. But I will likely continue to buy travel bugs and the occasional branded item.

 

It's not a cause to me. I'm not here to support the cause. I'm here to purchase a service or items. Simple as that.

I never do the "cup of coffee talk" until they try to tell me I'm an elitist snob. But really... if you can afford internet, a GPS, and gas to go caching... I'm not going to feel too sorry for you.

[Mr.Yuck]

A person comes up w/ a novel idea and through hard work and good decisions have built a great little company. From this novel idea they created jobs for people (that pay taxes) and for side companies they sale products associated w/ the hobby. All w/o the almighty federal governments help. Capitalism what a wonderful thing. Hard work makes good things happen. So however much they make I wish them the best. Live in mansions, drive expensive cars, or live like a miser it is none of my business nor anyone else's. Sorry for getting a little off topic.

 

Well, actually it was Dave Ulmer who came up with the novel idea, but you are right that creating a website to capitalize on Ulmer's novel idea was probably a novel idea, too. It certainly was the novel idea that made the most money from Ulmer's novel idea.

 

The only novel idea, to be quite blunt, was for Jeremy Irish to whip out a credit card and pay $10 a year for the domain name Geocaching.com before anyone else thought to do it. But he did a good job with it, I'd say. I mean I could have thought of it first, and put it up on my 10 MB web space that my ISP gives me with my HTML 101 skills, and it probably would have turned out differently.

[+baloo&bd]

Does anyone know if Groundspeak releases it's budget information. They have got to making a killing nowadays, but I haven't yet found any budget information.

 

Like most businesses, I am sure GS is constantly looking at the PM's to get a balance of value vs costs. In an effort to help them decided if the $30 is valid, would you mind posting your banks statement for us to discuss?

[+Chokecherry]

Does anyone know if Groundspeak releases it's budget information. They have got to making a killing nowadays, but I haven't yet found any budget information.

 

Like most businesses, I am sure GS is constantly looking at the PM's to get a balance of value vs costs. In an effort to help them decided if the $30 is valid, would you mind posting your banks statement for us to discuss?

 

How is a personal bank statement comparable to a business which is making money off of people? I don't understand this statement which has been made twice now along with personal income (though I had to laugh about it because some of us have public jobs and therefore public salaries).

[jholly]

A person comes up w/ a novel idea and through hard work and good decisions have built a great little company. From this novel idea they created jobs for people (that pay taxes) and for side companies they sale products associated w/ the hobby. All w/o the almighty federal governments help. Capitalism what a wonderful thing. Hard work makes good things happen. So however much they make I wish them the best. Live in mansions, drive expensive cars, or live like a miser it is none of my business nor anyone else's. Sorry for getting a little off topic.

 

Well, actually it was Dave Ulmer who came up with the novel idea, but you are right that creating a website to capitalize on Ulmer's novel idea was probably a novel idea, too. It certainly was the novel idea that made the most money from Ulmer's novel idea.

 

The only novel idea, to be quite blunt, was for Jeremy Irish to whip out a credit card and pay $10 a year for the domain name Geocaching.com before anyone else thought to do it. But he did a good job with it, I'd say. I mean I could have thought of it first, and put it up on my 10 MB web space that my ISP gives me with my HTML 101 skills, and it probably would have turned out differently.

Back in the day it was a bit more than $10 a year. There was no Go-Daddy around.

[Mr.Yuck]

A person comes up w/ a novel idea and through hard work and good decisions have built a great little company. From this novel idea they created jobs for people (that pay taxes) and for side companies they sale products associated w/ the hobby. All w/o the almighty federal governments help. Capitalism what a wonderful thing. Hard work makes good things happen. So however much they make I wish them the best. Live in mansions, drive expensive cars, or live like a miser it is none of my business nor anyone else's. Sorry for getting a little off topic.

 

Well, actually it was Dave Ulmer who came up with the novel idea, but you are right that creating a website to capitalize on Ulmer's novel idea was probably a novel idea, too. It certainly was the novel idea that made the most money from Ulmer's novel idea.

 

The only novel idea, to be quite blunt, was for Jeremy Irish to whip out a credit card and pay $10 a year for the domain name Geocaching.com before anyone else thought to do it. But he did a good job with it, I'd say. I mean I could have thought of it first, and put it up on my 10 MB web space that my ISP gives me with my HTML 101 skills, and it probably would have turned out differently.

Back in the day it was a bit more than $10 a year. There was no Go-Daddy around.

 

True, I think I was paying $20 per year for a domain I bought in 1998, and held for about 5 years. That's where I learned those HTML 101 skills I talked about. I wouldn't have the slightest clue how to make a web page with all this newfangled stuff they have now.

[Mr.Yuck]

I'm just curious about it too since many people talk of buying memberships like it's not a business but rather trying to support some barely thriving non-profit or something.

 

I see this as a business providing a service and product that I pay for. Not something I get warm fuzzies from.

 

This is a great point!! So many people have posted comments along the lines of "pony up, cheapskates", or "pay it to support the website". And of course the infamous "I make all my caches PMO to reward people for supporting the website" in these threads over the years. Killing or not, they're doing fine, and I don't get the warm fuzzies over my $30, any more than I do plonking $30 down at Wal-Mart.

 

That's my biggest issue is that you're some how not supporting the "cause" if you don't buy a membership. Never mind how many people buy trackables from ground speak? Or how many people buy swag? Or forget the fact that I paid how much for the phone app?

 

Nevermind that they have advertising supporting them. I'm quite sure the geiko deal was not out of the goodness of their hearts or any of the corporate pairings they've had as of late.

 

I'm just sick of people guilting non-premium members and doing the "cup of coffee" talk when people don't buy a membership. They're offering a service for that money. Right now I'm willing to pay for the service but I won't be forever for sure because I don't use many aspects of the paid services. But I will likely continue to buy travel bugs and the occasional branded item.

 

It's not a cause to me. I'm not here to support the cause. I'm here to purchase a service or items. Simple as that.

 

I don't know, people just roll with the $30 to support the website talk, and don't think about the other stuff. Well, they can all think about this. It's been mentioned in this thread, and I just mentioned it in a similar thread in "The Hunt, the unusual" last week. They gots $1.50 (or more) cut of every single solitary Geocoin ever manufactured I won't get ridiculous and say a quarter billion dollars or anything but I think that makes 100,000 or so people paying $30 a year chump change.

[+FraenCache]

To put some tinder back in the discussion about numbers, I just had to look at my GC Homepage. It says:

There are 1,452,094 active geocaches and over 5 million geocachers worldwide.

 

So Mr. sword fern was pretty right with at least this number. So I think, it´s almost rediculous to talk about 100.000 PMs ... Well, some americans always seem to tend to forget, that there are a bit MORE countrys spread over that beautiful planet ... and things DON´T happen exclusively in the great US nowadays. Ok, some do, but this would be off topic ...

 

On the other hand, I agree that Premiums aren´t the biggest part. But 5 million people tend to CONSUME STUFF ... Merchendising isn´t just a funny joke out of Spaceballs ...

 

All in all, yes, it may cost to keep an international gaming platform running but it must also cost a fortune to keep something like facebook running and they DON´T sell merch (are they?) or PMs and THOUGH they are one of the worlds most valuable companies meanwhile ... think about that ...

 

Anyways ... Big ups to the rich or poor folks from GC for providing a game that changed my life! LOVE!

[+baloo&bd]

Like most businesses, I am sure GS is constantly looking at the PM's to get a balance of value vs costs. In an effort to help them decided if the $30 is valid, would you mind posting your banks statement for us to discuss?

 

How is a personal bank statement comparable to a business which is making money off of people? I don't understand this statement which has been made twice now along with personal income (though I had to laugh about it because some of us have public jobs and therefore public salaries).

 

Sounds kinda silly, doesn't it? Yet this thread is asking GS to show us their personal bank statement. I have never thought to ask my dog groomer to show me her statement so I can see if what she is charging is justified, it is none of my busness. Nor in any of my businesses would I show you mine.

 

Reality is that while Jeremy and others are probably comfortable, no one is getting rich off this site. It cost money, a lot more than you think, however if they each get salaries exceeding $50 million a piece (GO JEREMY) or taking home $35,000 A year, it is none of our business and is very offensive to even ask. If you don't feel it is worth it, don't pay it. GS still welcomes you onto the site and to use it or your welcome to use one of the other sites available to you. If you do feel it is worth it, cache on, but mind your own business when it comes to the finances.