Ive noticed a drop off in activity as well, and not just here at this forum. I can remember the first day the UC systems were introduced by CC, and IMHO it is not near the same today as it was then, especially with service and "Quality Control". Started seeing lots of complaints as of late and problems either with the hardware of the system or a issue keeping the system/plants stable. Have seen some of the most seasoned vets having issues as well so its not just the "newbie" factor at play.
Sometimes success can change a company in unwanted ways.......hopefully that is not the case with CC...........
Fortunately I was reviewing threads today and saw some activity and comments it seemed need addressing.
About a month before this site crashed we had issued a post letting readers know we would be discontinuing responses on this thread and to instead contact us directly at CC. Given the amount of growers we provide tech support we needed/need to focus our efforts so making this change was/is a necessary move. Upon making this post, we closed the thread and left it as a sticky so as to be accessible to anyone interested.
It seems that after the site crashed and was rebooted, our statement proclaiming our focus to servicing all tech questions in house was not carried over to the new format and the thread was reopened. Apparently this has caused some confusion so it seemed appropriate to make this clear now given the topic at hand.
As for diminishing quality of our products:
Agreed, the UC's are not the same now as when first introduced commercially in 2007. In fact they're noticeably better. We've consistently improved the quality of our UC components ranging from our custom injection molded lids to most recently our unique 8" net pot design. Add to this that our California based company still produces all our products in the USA.
Besides being the innovators of our Sub
Current Culture style of RDWC, we're committed to continually improving our design and ease of use. Many of these improvements will be unveiled very soon, others in the years to come. Rest assured that our focus on innovation and attention to detail has not waned and in fact is burning hotter and more focused than ever before.
As for diminishing customer service/tech support:
Let us be clear in that we offer tech support and service to some of the most experienced and professional water culture growers in North America. The large volume of commercial growers we service is not something we typically advertise, but given the topic at hand it seems important to address. The fact of the matter is the threads you see in this forum are but a sliver of the systems being used abroad. And in many/most cases, are posted by growers new to water culture and eager to get input from the many here on this site that have experience.
Over the past years the concentration of large (300-500 lamp) Canadian growers we service has taken away some of the attention we'd previously been able to focus elsewhere. If this has led to anyone's questions and tech support not being tended to we sincerely apologize. Having said this, we'd doubt this is the case given we diligently tend to all correspondence be it via email or phone as we've always done. As well as servicing all warranty issues is a timely fashion as we've always done.
The fact of the matter is that it's often a few very time consumptive growers that end up dominating the majority of our time offering tech support. In many cases they are growers that have not supported our company by purchasing our systems, but yet still choose to take advantage of the expert grower support we provide on a daily basis. Unfortunately, in some cases this lends to us being overwhelmed with correspondence, leading to delayed responses to messages.
With this being the case, we've now focused all our efforts in house which is why we no longer respond to this thread. It has been left open and on line because it has a variety of good insight that is no doubt useful to growers.
To be certain there is no confusion, and this statement is seen by all, this thread is being closed.
For anyone with specific questions they'd like opinions/answers to from CC, please don't hesitate to contact us directly via our website (which is currently being upgraded and revamped), email [email protected] or phone 559-266-4769.
Thanks to all for your continued support! You can count on that we'll continue Cultivating Hydroponic Evolution in the years and decades to come.