Announcement April 12th, 2024

We are currently in the process of re-verifying pharma reseller vendors, you may see new ones appear and some go away. No cause of alarm just doing some spring cleaning :).

Announcement April 10th, 2024

Astrovials is being unlisted, a choice that is not influenced by (but does fall in line with) other index sites.

This is due to the recent choice to start "pre-ordering" vials due to a mistake in accounting or supply (information has not been forthcoming on the exact mistake). Pre-orders are not typically done in this market because they are simply not needed. Most of the raw materials needed to make vials themselves are cheap, as are the disposables. What is expensive is skill, equipment, and operational security. To mess up so much that you need to pre-order vials is a seriously concerning matter; to require pre-ordering vials after doing the volume of sales Astro Vials was doing requires a significant amount of mismanagement.

In the past, pre-ordering vials has only led to situations often called "exit scams," such as what happened with OELabs. Pre-ordering vials allows people time to take significant amounts of orders before the house of cards falls. Pre-ordering of vials is what gives people the ability to cause harm in the community. By making pre-ordering a taboo, and unlisting sites that do repeatedly and openly do it, it greatly decreases the incidence of "exit scams" on our community.

Obviously, there is the matter that Astro Vials could end up okay and ship all pre-ordered vials, and normally we would put some trust in that and only recommend people not pre-order while maintaining vendor listings. However, this is not the first time Astro Vials has made a similar mistake. Astro Vials initially started as the homebrewer OELabs, but after significant issues that left some people with paid yet unfilled orders, they shut down. OELabs rebranded into the homebrewer Astro Vials after this incident. This was initially allowed due to OELabs closing down due to understandable circumstances; however, we cannot, in good conscience, continue to list Astro Vials after this risky behavior.

Announcement April 1st, 2024

I have decided to separate the cafe from the previous moderation team due to past drama and issues including but not limited to neglect of duties, serious misuse of donations, and internal conflict. Due to this the cafe has been transferred to me, rebuilt fully, and I have been running it solo for over a month at this point, any future official staff additions will be made here, outside of that there is currently no other admins responsible for day to day maintnaince or managment of the site. Due to this major change and how it is being done I am losing all access to prior financial accounts, I am not taking any community donations currently. This is possible due to my cost optimization work over the last few months reducing our operating costs by over 90% so I am running the cafe out of my own pocket.