Customer service rep just told me that “a big part of the Hubs listed here are students” and “that some of them would rather get other Hubs to help them complete orders, rather than decline them”.
Basically, some hubs are “student businesses” that get orders, send the orders to other hubs and get their 25% discount, and then pocket the profit. 3D Hubs taking a double cut along the way.
Doesn’t surprise me one bit.
while disingenuous, i don’t see anything in this allegation that really needs to be fixed.
student discounts are an opt-in feature; you don’t HAVE to opt-in.
if i start getting abusive orders from students i’ll just opt-out. i suggest you do the same.
This is Capitalism and how your typical American business works. I do find this amusing though. The profit is probably less than you would think, those are fairly small margins. That seems like a lot of work for such a small return. Also, you have the option to turn off the student discount for your printers if the issue is that common.
I’m not a student. I am also not a business. My goal is to provide inexpensive resin printing while my printer is not printing jobs for me personally. Am I also ripping other hubs off with my very low pricing? I worked out my costs per mL of resin which includes all consumables (including alcohol, gloves, trays, power, etc.), every couple of months I update my costs using actual print data downloaded for FormLabs to determine how many mL, hours printing, job count, success rate… My costs have continued to be more accurate and have also continued drop. Since my pricing would never allow me to survive as a full time business doing this, is it unfair?
Not unfair at all. I think many of us are in the same position as you.
Most student orders, or real student orders, are rarely worth it. They need it for a class in 3 days and their model is not designed for printing. But if I’m in a slow period I opt in because why not help… even if the huge discount effectively kills the profit margin.
What bugs me though is that the student discount is intended to help those getting started in learning the field. Students who can’t afford an expensive print but they’re kids and they’re learning.
3DHubs though is letting actual businesses retain their discount which is misleading. I’ll get an order from a “student” and give 25% off, but in reality it’s a business that is sending an extra order to me and then charging a customer full price.
Whether or not I opt in or out it allows former students to take advantage of the system, and us, and 3DHubs LOVES it because they get two cuts.
