Please calm down.
over 4 years ago
– Mon, Sep 13, 2021 at 12:08:56 AM
Good day. An update since there has been a lot of activity here since I last posted. Your books are being sent out. I have posted almost half of all the books. The international books are posted (mostly) via economy shipping. I mentioned this in my last update that this method can take up to 12 weeks for books to arrive. UK books were all sent out but I have seen that some people did not get theirs. I am unsure why and am looking into it.
The reason I have been quiet is because some of you think its ok to find my personal social media accounts and send abusive messages to me, my wife and my family members. This is not on. Anyone doing this will be refunded and banned from the kickstarter and will no longer be receiving their books.
I am doing my next wave of address updates so anyone who posted about changing addresses but has not had a message will get one today. I have around 1000 more books to ship out this week.
To those of you who have recently mentioned the idea of me scamming them, do you really think I would have gotten 6000 books printed and held in storage for months, also sending out several thousand already just for a scam? Seems kinda elaborate and stupid if that was the case.
I'm working as fast as I can, trust me, I want this process to be over too.
A somewhat positive update.
over 4 years ago
– Tue, Jul 27, 2021 at 06:56:52 PM
Hey everyone. I have a few updates for you today regarding shipping of the books.
I have spoken to my shipping handler and managed to find a way to reduce the shipping costs by around 20% which is great news. Especially after speaking to some of the board game creators on the platform and seeing some of them report increased shipping costs by as much as 9 times.
Firstly, the UK based backers will be receiving their books in the next week or so. They have started shipping and the rest will be sent out on Monday morning.
Next, European and US based orders will begin shipping in the next couple of weeks, but to reduce costs the shipping method will take a couple of weeks rather than a 2 day courier. This has been the biggest saving method and will mean I can start to move out of the storage unit I am currently using as it is costing me £800 a month, which is obviously eating into my shipping budget.
For backers in further afield locations such as South America, Australasia and the Far east, shipping will be sent out soon but the method may take up to 12 weeks for the books to arrive, I'm afraid this is the only way I can get the books to you as the cost to ship the books using the standard methods have increased almost 4 fold.
I saw quite a few people mention on the last update that they would be willing to donate some additional money to top up the shipping costs. I am not asking anyone to do this, but if anyone would like to I will prioritise the shipping of your books so you get them earlier, think of it as an expedited shipping method.
If anyone would like to do this, you can send additional shipping funds via Paypal (goods and services please, I want everyone to feel safe) to admin@greedymimicgames. Please leave a comment with your name and backer number. Again this isn't required, but will speed up the shipping of your books. Additional shipping costs would essentially be the same as the original shipping amount paid during the campaign. I came to this number by removing all of the PDF only pledges and UK based pledges, then averaging it out.
Again, please don't feel obliged, I am just making this an option due to people offering on the last update.
If anyone needs to change their address, please leave a COMMENT on this update stating "ADDRESS UPDATE REQUIRED" And I will message you to sort that.
Apologies for the radio silence.
almost 5 years ago
– Fri, Jun 25, 2021 at 11:25:53 PM
Good day everyone. First of all I'd like to apologies for being quiet over the last few weeks. Its been a bit of a shocking few weeks. Let me explain where we are with shipping and I am going to be as open with you as possible.
The books are all packaged up and ready to go. However due to Brexit, things have become complicated. As the UK government were insistent on leaving the EU without getting any trade deals in place (they only had 4 years to sort that out after all), prices have changed on all imports and exports as of January 1st.
When I was organising the shipping of the books last year, the price I was given by the shipping handler was roughly £72,000. This would be absolutely fine as I still have more than this ready to use. However, as of the changes of January the 1st, my new quote is roughly £135,000. This exceeds the remaining funds available after Kickstarter fees, Backerkit costs, manufacturing costs, storage fees and taxes from last year.
As a result I am attempting to source additional finance to get the books out to you all ASAP as well as looking into alternative methods of shipping. I know some of you expressed your opinion that the shipping costs were high when the campaign was live, but please feel free to check the prices of sending 1.8kg parcel from the UK. It's not pretty.
Also, it appears the drivethru link still hasn't activated despite me contacting them several times. Please go to the following google drive link in order to download the pdf if you need it. This is accessible by everyone.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/18NmWUt_0ZA26CVj-kv32mw_2-J-2W50N/view?usp=sharing
I'll try and be more communicative with you all as I find a solution. Also, I am aware some of you didn't see the update regarding locking addresses etc or have moved very recently. I will make any amendments needed before getting the books sent out.
Between the Covid-19 pandemic, Brexit and the extreme popularity of the book compared to what I was originally anticipating, this has certainly been a learning experience. Thanks for your patience. I really do feel awful about this.
Locking addresses and shipping
almost 5 years ago
– Thu, May 27, 2021 at 10:09:17 AM
Hello everyone. I have just locked your addresses with final notice. You have 48 hours from now to make any amendments to your delivery address in your backerkit account. Whatever address is attached after this time will be where the books will be sent.
Apologies for the lack of comments and replies to messages, a few weeks ago I had a bit of a breakdown with my mental health, my meds stopped working and honestly I have struggled to get out of bed most days. Luckily I have had a couple of workers packaging up all of the books for me and I just need to double check the packages with spell trackers and dice towers etc before they will be sent for distribution. I have a meeting tomorrow with my fulfilment agent whereby I will arrange for them to come and collect the books soon and begin the shipping process.
A few people mentioned not being able to find the pdf of the book on drivethru, instead please log into your backerkit account and check the digital downloads section there. You should have access.
Regarding import tax to your country as they are now being shipped after Brexit, I will need to double check with my agent, but I am pretty sure there will be no charges on your end providing the agent completes the import/export documentation properly. will ensure this happens.
This entire process has been a massive learning curve for me. What was expected to be a small project quickly turned my entire life on its head and changed everything. The project quickly grew in both size and scale with stretch goals and number of backers increasing dramatically. Looking forward, if I were to do another book I will be employing a couple of full time staff members to help me manage everything and take some of the stress away from me. Ideally I will have someone handling the social side of this for me as some of the abusive messages I have had in my inbox have really set my anxiety off and honestly it's just not nice. I appreciate how patient you have all been with me with this being my first book and all, but trust me, I wish you all had the book in your hands months ago. Between the pandemic and everything else, it's been manic.
I will update you all once the books have been collected, but in the mean time I will try and be more responsive to my messages. It is 1.30am here right now so I am going to attempt to get some sleep and will get around to reading them in the morning.
Thank you
Please lock in your delivery addresses.
almost 5 years ago
– Sat, May 01, 2021 at 12:39:58 PM
Greetings everyone. I have started packaging the books up today to get them all sent out to you all ASAP. I have made the decision to ship the books and cards separately as I am still waiting on the cards to come from China. I have been trying to get in touch with the printers for the last few weeks but have had no responses to my emails. I will be waiting another 2 weeks and if no response comes I will begin the process of filing for a refund for the printing process and I will then find a company in the States to print and ship directly to customers based in the Western continents and I will be finding a European based printer that provides a similar service for the rest of the world.
I have 3 people helping me package up the books so hopefully it will only take us a week or two and then we can get everything sent out. Other addon items (spell trackers and dice towers) have been manufactured en masse and will be shipped with the books. In the next couple of days I will be emailing any backers who pledged for these items to find out what colours you would like sending through.
For those of you who have asked about purchasing digital copies I have added the book to Drivethrurpg, it is just going through the approval process before it will be made public. But you can find the file at the following link
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/355708/Menagerie-of-Magic
If you get an error page, the file is still waiting on approval. It will automatically become public once approved by drivethru.
If anyone has moved home since the project started, I ask you to log into your backerkit account and change your postal address. I will be locking the addresses in 2 weeks. If your address has not been changed by that point then the books will be sent to whatever address you have on file there.
Apologies again for the delay in getting the books sent out. Obviously when I originally set the delivery time for the book as December I wasn't expecting the project to be anywhere near as popular as it was. The stretch goals almost doubled the length of the book and the global pandemic has caused production and delivery issues which I have not been able to help. If I do any projects in the future I now have some experiences to help me gauge how long things take and I will be able to adjust everything accordingly.
Thank you all for your patience and continued support. While this project has been extremely stressful for me, it has given me a sense of purpose and I have some genuine pride in what I have accomplished.
