DV Mentholyptus

[topcoats]

I am hoping to receive a reply to this post directly from Jason as I cannot get a satisfactory reply from any member of staff I have spoken to. My question to Jason is:-
Why oh why have you stopped stocking  DV Premier Mentholyptus? It was stopped without any fore warning and yet in the 'flavour poll' its way out in front. In fact, a member of staff told me that it is one of the most popular flavours. I have been a loyal customer for a very long time and feel very let down. Also I don't particularly want to get into 'mixing my own' - although at the moment this seems to be the only option available to me.

[pillbox38]

Hi thanks for the question..
 

And your correct it was one of the DVs Pre mixed juices that was well liked.
My rationale for stopping selling the DV range and the Patriot Range is quite simply this. Economically its not viable, it has taken months at half price to sell down most of the stock and still we have not cleared the shelves.

I cannot afford to re-stock at this selling price, at full price both ranges most flavours stood virtually un-sold.

Im sorry it isnt the answer your looking for but its the truth.. I will have a think on a few flavours but cant make any promises..Its late and if someone can post me the top 5 flavours in the poll i will see what i can do..

[caz]

Apple Pie
Menthol
Cafe Brasiliano
Absinthe
Black Cherry and mentholyptus  are tied  at 5th 

[TonyF]

I can vouch for Absinthe being up there as a superb flavour Jason. I have had previous discussions with Nick about it and he explained why the concentrate was no longer available, due to the plastic bottles. My suggestion was for it to be supplied in glass bottles with maybe a little extra charge for the more expensive container?

If Absinthe pre mixed is not going to return, what about a happy compromise on the concentrate?

[blindsoup]

I can vouch for Absinthe being up there as a superb flavour Jason. I have had previous discussions with Nick about it and he explained why the concentrate was no longer available, due to the plastic bottles. My suggestion was for it to be supplied in glass bottles with maybe a little extra charge for the more expensive container?

If Absinthe pre mixed is not going to return, what about a happy compromise on the concentrate?

I second that....when the sale started, i stocked up on Absinthe not knowing if the concentrate would ever be available....im good for the next year, so Nick - you have some time to find a solution  - Im shocked that Green Cow and Doppio Esp wasnt in the top 5.....(Black Cherry =  )

[KentFog]

How accurate is the poll though? How many customers are there who would bother to look at the forum, or vote?

A better way would be to look at the sales history from say May to July (prior to the discount period) in order to get an accurate reflection on what were the popular flavours.

Note I am saying May and not before cos I beleive Doppio Espresso is a relatively new introduction and I dont want it to be disadvantaged in any sales analysis ...ha ha 

[Astrecks]

I would hope Jason can base his selection on sales in a set period.

I don't know if it would be possible to produce a list by the number of sales, if it is possible, then I think I would select the top five sellers and sell them in 18mg & 36mg in a choice of 10 or 30ml bottles, I would then review the sales after say 3 months, and replace the least selling flavour out of the 5 with the 6th most popular flavour, and so on, reviewing every 3 months, in this way a lot of people may get a chance to purchase an erstwhile unlisted flavour occasionally.

Of course, it may just be a logistical nightmare..  lol

I wish this was a possibility with the PR Pillbox 38 Mad Dog..  (in the UK)

[0xDeadC0de]

I would have liked to make an sql example but did an example in php instead.. I got stuck trying to do it in an sql stored procedure mostly due to lack of experience with them (I tend to do more of my processing in script than in a db).. I don't intend for it to be perfect or even work properly - but instead intend to show how it's possible to fairly easily calculate the 'best selling products' from a list of sales and product list using relational ideas (id numbers where possible to link them together) common to all relational database systems.. This example can work without converting it all to sql by simply hooking the example into the database, extracting the actual values from the database and filling the arrays of products and sales from those values.
I haven't tested or checked for typos.. but whatever.

This example creates a list of 'fake' products and one of sales, then calculates sales of products that contain 'DV' in their product short description, then sorts the results from highest to lowest. Untested and whipped up in 5 minutes. If the values where extracted from a database - it would be VERY easy to only grab the sales between specific dates by modifying the select query...

Code:

<?php
class a_sale {
public $sale_id;
public $product_id;
public $customer_id;
public a_sale($sid, $pid, $cid) {
      $this->sale_id = $sale_id;
      $this->product_id = $pid;
      $this->customer_id = $cid;
}
}

class aProduct {
public $product_id;
public $product_short_desc;
public aProduct($pid, $psd) {
$this->product_id = $pid;
$this->product_short_desc = $psd;
}
}


class b_result {
$product_id;
$amount;
public function b_result($pid) {
$this->amount = 1;
$this->product_id = $pid;
}
}
function calculate_best_selling_product($sales, $products, $pattern) {
$results = array();
foreach($sales as $sale) {
$prod = null;
foreach($products as $product) {
if($sale->product_id == $product->product_id) {
$prod = $product;
break;
}
}
if(strpos($prod->product_short_desc, $pattern) !== false) {
$found = false;
foreach($results as $res) {
if($res->product_id == $prod->product_id) {
  $found = true;
  $res->amount++;
  break;
}
}
if(!found) {
$results[] = new b_result($prod->product_id);
}
}
}
return $results;
}
function sort_res($res) {
// Not the most effecient sort algorithm I know.. Kind of a copy-bubble sort 
// hell I don't even know for sure if it sorts properly..
// supposed to sort from highest first to lowest
$tarr = array();
$lr = null;
$worked = false;
foreach($res as $r) {
if($lr != null) {
if($r->amount > $lr->amount) {
$tarr[] = $r;
$tarr[] = $lr;
$worked = true;
} else { 
$tarr[] = $lr;
$tarr[] = $r;
} 

}
$lr = $r;
}
if(!$worked) return $tarr;
$tarr = sort_res($tarr);
return $tarr;
}
function display_prod_result($products, $r) {
foreach($products as $p) {
if($p->product_id == $r->product_id) {
$name = $p->product_short_desc;
$id = $p->product_id;
$amount = $r->amount;
print("<$id> \"$name\" sold $amount<br/>";
return;
}
}
}
function display_results($results, $products) {
$re = sort_res($results);
foreach($results as $r) {
display_prod_result($products, $r);
}
}











// Now to run it...




// Fill in some basic and fake product information
$sales = array();
$products = array(); 
$products[] = new aProduct(1, 'DV Kola Kick');
$products[] = new aProduct(2, 'DV Coconut');
$products[] = new aProduct(3, 'DV Green Cow');
$products[] = new aProduct(4, 'TW Tornado Compact');


// Create some fake sales
$sales[] = new a_sale(1, $products[0]->product_id, 1);
$sales[] = new a_sale(2, 1, 1);
$sales[] = new a_sale(3,2,1);
$sales[] = new a_sale(4, 3, 1);
$sales[] = new a_sale(5,4,1);
$sales[] = new a_sale(6,1,1);

// Now beat the meat (Humor!)

$re = calculate_best_selling_product($sales, $products, "DV");
display_results($re, $products);

[StevieD]

Or as a more simple method, pull up the orders that TW have made for the product and plug it into excel or whichever spreadsheet of choice, select your columns and sort the data with one click. Lol, why is it coders love databases, whereas mathematicians love spreadsheets ?

[CraigHB]

I think I'd have to vote for spreadsheets, though I've done my share of coding.

[0xDeadC0de]

Bad mathematicians maybe. A good mathematician will write it in a pure functional language, with their data stored inside a *gasp* database, then never have to write again.

You could copy/paste into a spreadsheet - It will get it done, but will take up a lot more resources than any other method, + time is money. Why would you copy/paste each field one at a time, when you could write a script, then run the script every time? And then - on top of that, what if you're making 10,000 sales in a month, do you really want to copy 30,000 fields manually? Even export then import takes more effort than running a written script, and is FAR less reliable - You have no idea how many times I've seen exports and imports utterly fail, and if they didn't completely fail they partly fail (Encoding issues, quoting problems, date formatting issues, and all kinds of other nonsense). We're also not talking about 'product', we are talking about 'products'. Not a 'sale', but 'sales'. Even with a spreadsheet it's not as simple as 'click the column to sort LOL', you still need to calculate (1st grade adding) how many of each product were sold over the specified time period.

The point is, doing it as a script or (better even) doing it inside the database as a stored procedure is always far superior and wastes much less time than doing it via spreadsheets.
someone with half my skills could write a script or a scripted webpage to calculate all this in a half hour or less, then that script can be used forever - instantly on demand with the newest values in the database - without even needing the coder anymore.

When data entry can be avoided it should be, or we all end up spending our short lives copying crap back and fourth.
In order to understand redundancy one must first understand redundancy.

[StevieD]

IF we were talking 30000 fields I'd agree, we're not though, as I suggested analysing the few orders for restocks rather than the thousands of individual sales and a sledgehammer is not the tool for cracking nuts. But again, you will note that I said, in effect, that one loves the tools one uses. A different tool for the same job will feel wrong to different people... and right to others.
Happy vaping.... whichever way you get to it