received the following response from Mike at UltraTac:
I am so sorry. But for A7, it is only a low price and mini size but well built flashlight, we need to control the cost and the size. That's why we did not hide strobe. But A7's default mode is High, with no menory. If you do not like strobe, just turn off the light and turn on it after a moment, it will become high mode again.
For A1, I will try to apply a discount for BLF, but may be later, because we do not have enough inventory in Amazon. I will inform you the discount after we prepared enough inventory. Thank you.
In reply, I thanked him for the discount offer.
I believe that the A7 is designed as a flashlight that looks and feels good, but is seldom used. A good work-flashlight, IMHO, should allow the user to go from High ->Low->High without seeing strobe.
I get the feeling that the A1 price fluctuations on Amazon are tied to inventory levels. That is to say, as the inventory drops, they raise the price. So the trick is to buy right after a new shipment arrives and the price is at the lowest.
I emailed Mike at UltraTac an invitation to join us on BLF:
Mike, you may communicate with Budget Light Forum (BLF) members directly by: 1. Creating a BLF account here. 2. Reading the rules for commercial sellers here. 3. Posting here. Members will provide you feedback. Please let me know if you have any questions, and Thanks! Alan
Did I leave anything important out?
Update: Moderator007 and I traded PMs on this topic. He stated the steps above are correct for a seller to join and participate in BLF, but warned against sellers using PMs for solicitation unless initiated by a member. But otherwise, sellers can use PMs like any other member. If UltraTac joins BLF, I will pass this on to them - probably by PM.
You can get alerts on Amazon price drops using camelcamelcamel, but most of the times the info is hours old. Here is a chart from camelcamelcamel on UltraTac A1 price movements since it first came out on Amazon:
FWIW, I've got a price alert on camelcamelcamel for A1 price < $12.
Yup, camel works well on items that have infrequent price changes. On items that change price every couple of hours, not so much. By the time you get notified, the price would have already changed again.
FWIW, the 10% discount code SS6TRV2E is no longer valid on the purchase of an UltraTac A1 on Amazon. This change occurred less than 24 hours ago - I know because I keep an A1 in my shopping cart and check the price there at least once a day. This has become my favorite flashlight to give away to muggle friends, and might think about picking up more if I can get a serious deal.