Happy 2018 everyone! The last few weeks have been crazy, to say the least.
For those of you that haven't been keeping track, Manaforge started shipping out to backers less than a month ago. I was hoping that the shipping process wouldn't have too many hiccups, considering that I was shipping over the holiday season. And, all things considered, I guess it wasn't too bad. Still, it's far from perfect.
Slow Shipping
Because of the time of year, my contact at GamesQuest had mentioned multiple times that their shipping queue was overloaded, and that I shouldn't expect my games to go out before the new year. So I was overjoyed when I was informed that the games would go out before Christmas. While not many backers actually received their games in time for the holiday (mostly just backers in the U.K. got theirs early), it meant that most backers should have their games before the end of the year. Or so I thought.
I was happy to start getting reports that backers were receiving their games. But rather than a large number of reports all at once, it was more spread out. A few one day, a few the next. Even now, almost a month later, I'm still getting sporadic reports that people are receiving their copies. And that's bad, because there are still some people that haven't received theirs. It makes it difficult to determine if those games are just very delayed, or if there was actually a problem. Right now I'm just trying to be patient, but I can't wait forever.
Pallet Shipping
At the same time that I ordered the games to be released to backers, I also ordered a shipping pallet containing approximately 100 games to be sent to the Indie Game Alliance's storage. They're located close to me, so by sending the games there, they should be comfy until I need to pick some up, and it also makes the games available to IGA for demos and sales at conventions and such.
I figure that pallet would have gotten here by now. But it's still in transit. Apparently, the holiday shipping season slowed that down significantly as well, couple with a report from my contact at GQ saying that there was some extra paperwork to deal with. Ugh.
This is also bad for my backers, because many of my friends local to my area requested that I hand-deliver their games to them. (This both helps me out on shipping costs, and allows me to sign their copies.) So because of that slowdown, those people that entrusted their games to me are now also stuck waiting. :(
Missing/Extra Copies
I did expect a few copies of my game to get lost and/or damaged in the mail. Unfortunately, because of the delays, it's hard to tell if a game was just held up or if it's never going to make it to its destination.
However, what I was not expecting was a couple of backers receiving more copies than they asked for. I asked my contact about this, and his response was that is a very rare occurrence. But it's happened two times so far, and I'm starting to wonder if that's just the more outspoken backers contacting me first.
I don't know the right way to handle this; GQ has offered to provide return shipping labels for the extra games, or in extreme circumstances just reimburse me for the extra games entirely. Still, I'm trying to think of this in terms of the backers. If I received extra copies of a game, I don't know what I'd do with them. What option would involve the least inconvenience on the part of a backer? Just let the backers keep the extras and write them off? Offer free shipping back to the warehouse? Allow the backer to buy the extra games (at a discount, of course)? Have the backer sell/donate the games to a FLGS? What would you do?
I'm getting close to the point where I'm going to post an update, asking who hasn't received their games yet and who has received extras. I'm a little scared of the response I'm going to get. :(
Shipping Costs
As far as the shipping costs go, the numbers to ship to individual backers came out about where I expected. (I estimated about $15 to ship a single game to backers in the U.S., with discounts for multiple games going to one destination. The shipping itemization I received after they all went out came out pretty close to that.)
However, I was hoping the cost to ship a pallet of games to me would be significantly less. It was not. I don't understand why, but the estimate I received for that was close $1500, also coming out to about $15 per game. I have no idea why shipping in bulk would be so expensive, and I have not received a satisfactory answer from GamesQuest regarding that. This cost will make selling games locally a more expensive proposition, something I'm going to have to work around. (Especially because I have a few game stores in my area that are interested in buying some copies. What's a reasonable price to sell to a retailer when I have to recoup heavy costs to get the games into my hands?)
So that's what I'm struggling with right now. That, on top of trying to get my web store up and running (should be soon!), and do some work on my Islands game prototype.
Oh, and thinking of Islands, Expedition Prototype Con 2018 (EPiC) is coming up in a month. I need to have my prototype in a stable spot before then. (The mechanics are good, but I'm currently working on a re-theme.) I hope lots of people will be able to go; the more developers and playtesters that attend, the better it is for everyone involved.
Thanks everyone!
For those of you that haven't been keeping track, Manaforge started shipping out to backers less than a month ago. I was hoping that the shipping process wouldn't have too many hiccups, considering that I was shipping over the holiday season. And, all things considered, I guess it wasn't too bad. Still, it's far from perfect.
Slow Shipping
Because of the time of year, my contact at GamesQuest had mentioned multiple times that their shipping queue was overloaded, and that I shouldn't expect my games to go out before the new year. So I was overjoyed when I was informed that the games would go out before Christmas. While not many backers actually received their games in time for the holiday (mostly just backers in the U.K. got theirs early), it meant that most backers should have their games before the end of the year. Or so I thought.
I was happy to start getting reports that backers were receiving their games. But rather than a large number of reports all at once, it was more spread out. A few one day, a few the next. Even now, almost a month later, I'm still getting sporadic reports that people are receiving their copies. And that's bad, because there are still some people that haven't received theirs. It makes it difficult to determine if those games are just very delayed, or if there was actually a problem. Right now I'm just trying to be patient, but I can't wait forever.
Pallet Shipping
At the same time that I ordered the games to be released to backers, I also ordered a shipping pallet containing approximately 100 games to be sent to the Indie Game Alliance's storage. They're located close to me, so by sending the games there, they should be comfy until I need to pick some up, and it also makes the games available to IGA for demos and sales at conventions and such.
I figure that pallet would have gotten here by now. But it's still in transit. Apparently, the holiday shipping season slowed that down significantly as well, couple with a report from my contact at GQ saying that there was some extra paperwork to deal with. Ugh.
This is also bad for my backers, because many of my friends local to my area requested that I hand-deliver their games to them. (This both helps me out on shipping costs, and allows me to sign their copies.) So because of that slowdown, those people that entrusted their games to me are now also stuck waiting. :(
Missing/Extra Copies
I did expect a few copies of my game to get lost and/or damaged in the mail. Unfortunately, because of the delays, it's hard to tell if a game was just held up or if it's never going to make it to its destination.
However, what I was not expecting was a couple of backers receiving more copies than they asked for. I asked my contact about this, and his response was that is a very rare occurrence. But it's happened two times so far, and I'm starting to wonder if that's just the more outspoken backers contacting me first.
I don't know the right way to handle this; GQ has offered to provide return shipping labels for the extra games, or in extreme circumstances just reimburse me for the extra games entirely. Still, I'm trying to think of this in terms of the backers. If I received extra copies of a game, I don't know what I'd do with them. What option would involve the least inconvenience on the part of a backer? Just let the backers keep the extras and write them off? Offer free shipping back to the warehouse? Allow the backer to buy the extra games (at a discount, of course)? Have the backer sell/donate the games to a FLGS? What would you do?
I'm getting close to the point where I'm going to post an update, asking who hasn't received their games yet and who has received extras. I'm a little scared of the response I'm going to get. :(
Shipping Costs
As far as the shipping costs go, the numbers to ship to individual backers came out about where I expected. (I estimated about $15 to ship a single game to backers in the U.S., with discounts for multiple games going to one destination. The shipping itemization I received after they all went out came out pretty close to that.)
However, I was hoping the cost to ship a pallet of games to me would be significantly less. It was not. I don't understand why, but the estimate I received for that was close $1500, also coming out to about $15 per game. I have no idea why shipping in bulk would be so expensive, and I have not received a satisfactory answer from GamesQuest regarding that. This cost will make selling games locally a more expensive proposition, something I'm going to have to work around. (Especially because I have a few game stores in my area that are interested in buying some copies. What's a reasonable price to sell to a retailer when I have to recoup heavy costs to get the games into my hands?)
So that's what I'm struggling with right now. That, on top of trying to get my web store up and running (should be soon!), and do some work on my Islands game prototype.
Oh, and thinking of Islands, Expedition Prototype Con 2018 (EPiC) is coming up in a month. I need to have my prototype in a stable spot before then. (The mechanics are good, but I'm currently working on a re-theme.) I hope lots of people will be able to go; the more developers and playtesters that attend, the better it is for everyone involved.
Thanks everyone!
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