Buying Strategy: Logos Academic Professional
Any of you forum friends able to give me advice on the least expensive way to buy Academic Professional? The rep via online chat priced me out at $1,199 after student discount. Before buying, I wanted to check and see if any of you with more experience knew of a way to reduce the overall cost. I read somewhere that some have used a strategy of buying a smaller package and then upgrading. Thanks for any help you can offer!
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Welcome! [:)]
Matthew Nash said:I read somewhere that some have used a strategy of buying a smaller package and then upgrading. Thanks for any help you can offer!
I don't know if this will help you or not. The strategy is to purchase the package with the GREATEST discount first. The cost of the package you are talking about suggests that you don't own much currently, so you would not benefit much from "dynamic pricing." The first thing you should do is to start at the lowest academic package and look at the percentage savings. Which one has the GREATEST discount for you?
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Also, you should probably wait for sales. When Logos 8 was on its introductory sale, I picked up 2 or 3 starter packages of different denominational packages. I don't know if others could verify but it seems buying the smaller packages on sale looking for the best discounts and building that library is the best strategy. (Dynamic Pricing and sales is what you are looking for.)
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When I started with my first Logos 4 package, I did it totally by faith. I neither had a student discount and I couldn't even do it lump sum. I bought it with a payment plan
If you are a serious student, the cost of the Academic Professional at the price you are quoted is chump change to what you are getting. And it's all core stuff, no real fluff at all. It is one of the finest packages I've ever seen.
Do it with a payment plan if you need to bring it home on a budget. I think you will be very blessed. And pray. When I got my first package, I committed it to God. And a couple days later, someone gave me the full amount to pay off my payment plan.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Mattew,
What specifically do you need (not want) in this package?
What do you own right now?
For me, I wanted BDAG. The other things were not something that I needed right now. I purchased Platinum, and the entry level academic package. This got me a host of other resources. Plus I got some of the key resources of the academic professional package, but not all. The ICC commentaries would be good to have but, they are not geared towords preaching. So I pick the ICC volumes up individually when they are on sale. Same goes for some other items in this package. Speaking as a past student, most of the ICC are good but old. Seminaries like you to react with current or more recent commentaries. Yes, they are valuable, but not current.
If you are in seminary, other comentaries may be a better investment rather than the ICC.
Ask around your seminary if anyone uses ICC or if other commentaries may be more helpful.TODT would be good to have, but I have the NICOTTE, which is costs less, goes on sale about once a year and covers similar content, though not as detailed. NICOTTE is an evangelical in its stance from Zondervan. If you need TODT, then going to the academic professional package would get it for you.
In the end, it's what you can live without now, and what you need.
If you need all these items, or that package is the most cost effective way of getting them, then go for it otherwise buy what you need now and this will bring the package price down in future.
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Thank you all for your replies! A couple of quick questions:
1. Dynamic Pricing - Do the packages go on sale with any sort of regularity, or more infrequently? I wouldn't want to wait too terribly long if possible.
2. In the end, the resources in the Academic Professional is where I'd like to land. This includes TDOT as well as some other items included only in professional. That said, I'm open to getting there by a graded approach if it's cheaper. Navigating this seems related to the post above?
3. ICC - This, for me, is the worst part of the deal. I do not want, nor will I ever plan to read, the ICC. As you said, it's often outdated and often critical. I asked the Logos rep if I could swap it out even for a less expensive commentary, and he gave me a fairly firm "no." There are a host of other commentary sets that I'd be interested in, but the ICC is not one of them. Though the rest of the Academic Professional is worth it to me, it does seem like a waste to receive the (expensive) ICC even though I won't use it.
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You're right to pick and choose the more pricey resources based on your own needs.
Personally, I find the lower packages more appealing. Just get those!
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Matthew Nash said:
In the end, the resources in the Academic Professional is where I'd like to land.
Matthew, I personally find the Academic packages underwhelming. I don't mean this in an insulting way, but those who want them must have needs that are very different from mine. The commentary offerings are terrible. Pro does have TDOT. If you have to have TDOT it is $700 separately so you have to weight that against what you are getting that you don't want.
Have you compared Academic Professional with any of the standard packages? I know these other libraries contain material you may not want, but Standard Platinum has a very good set of commentaries to get started with. It's more money for that reason, but if you want some of those commentaries, you won't get them cheaper. It also has a good set of original language texts and tools (absent TDOT). And you can get academic pricing on it.
If other libraries don't meet your needs, your best approach is to buy Academic Pro and wait for the occasional sales on other items you want.
Pastor, North Park Baptist Church
Bridgeport, CT USA
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I am very happy with the new Academic packages and I think many international customers will benefit from them. These packages fill the gap that was left by the discontinued Original Languages package, and possibly also the gap left by Bibleworks.
Mark Smith said:those who want them must have needs that are very different from mine.
I have studied theology at a Dutch university (with a "duplex ordo" structure) and the Logos 8 Academic Standard would have been perfect for my undergraduate studies. Only at the seminary level do you really need a large library with homiletical commentaries.
As regards the International Critical Commentary, I agree that it is not helpful for sermon preparation and many volumes are outdated. It does have some value in matters of textual criticism and philology.
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The ICC is really language oriented. There are some gems in there. It fits in an academic package. What I would do, if it were back to scratch is combine the Academic Professional with a standard package to bolster the commentary selection. The commentary area is the one you build on more slowly. When I began with Logos, my commentary library was all bound book so I began to replace what I had and sell off my paper library to help finance the changeover.
Don't worry much about commentaries out of the gate. Concentrate on reading the text and checking all the cross references.
The mind of man is the mill of God, not to grind chaff, but wheat. Thomas Manton | Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow. Richard Baxter
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Matthew Nash said:
Dynamic Pricing - Do the packages go on sale with any sort of regularity, or more infrequently? I wouldn't want to wait too terribly long if possible.
”Dynamic Pricing“ in Logos terms isn’t about sales. It means that “you never have to pay for a book twice.” Typically, the higher the package, the GREATER the percentage discount. Some completely made up numbers: Small package 50% discount. Medium package 65%. Large package 80%. However, if you happen to already own some of the resources in the various packages, the percentage discount <may> be GREATER for one of the lesser packages. In that case, it Would be better to purchase the smaller package (with the greater discount) first. It sounds like Dynamic Pricing may not be an issue for you... do you own much of anything yet? As I suggested before, you should view the percentage discounts for each level before making your purchase.
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