Things are going much slower than I would have liked. Here’s where we stand:
Orders placed this week: haven’t had a chance to do anything about them yet. We’ll post them as soon as we can, definitely by the end of next week.
Orders without eShapeOko kits, without MakerSlide, placed before this week: all done, all shipped. Phew.
Orders without eShapeOko kits, but with MakerSlide or camera sliders, placed before this week: all MakerSlide is quality-checked and packaged securely, and all the parts are picked. Some orders are on their way already, some are packaged and will go out tomorrow, some have the parts still in plastic bins waiting for me to pack them. A few will make the courier cut-off for tomorrow, the rest will be ready for pick-up on Monday.
The one order with tapped MakerSlide, received just before I had decided not to offer the tapping service anymore, ships tomorrow.
Finally, the sore point: the eShapeOko kits. You’ve overwhelmed us! We’re working hard to count the little bits. That’s about 80% done, but there has been a setback. To my dismay, I have discovered that, months ago, I had labelled a box spacers incorrectly, so we now have plenty of a kind of spacers we don’t need, and not enough of the kind we do need. The supplier did not have them in stock. They are due on the 16th. We have enough for all kits ordered on the 7th and 8th of August (that’s lots of kits: those were busy days, first two days after we had turned ordering back on), so those we’ll finish packing this weekend and send out on Monday. If your order number starts with 130807 or 130808, expect a tracking number from us on Monday.
For the rest of the kits, we’ll get all the other orders ready for the spacers, so as soon as those arrive, we’ll ship your kits too. After that, I’ll sleep for two days straight.
What about orders that start with 130809?
Yeah what is with the orders of the ninth? I am getting now real angry. First you saying when you will re-open the order system for kits it will be enough material for all orders. When i have ordered on the 9th it was told it will be shipped end of the month, this was acceptable.
And since then i am hearing, yeah we will send your order soon, yeah we will ship your order within this week and now delayed to nowhere because of missing parts.
Real angry, would i have the possibility i would order somewhere else. But lucky you, nobody else sells them in europe.
I personally am very happy with your updates.
As a 130827 order I obviously haven’t been waiting as long, but I really appreciate the communication that we have all been receiving.
Let’s first highlight that this is not an online superstore. From what I’ve been able to ascertain this is a hobby project of one guy in the UK who saw some problems with existing designs and acquisition methods, and decided that he could do it better.
For that I applaud you.
Secondly, the reason for the delays is really a series of unfortunate events. He had to go somewhere for 2 weeks, and when he got back there was a huge backlog that was waiting for him, and even more orders rolling in. And then I can only imagine the feeling in the bottom of his stomach when he opened a box that should have been one kind of spacer, but wasn’t. And then finding out that the kind he needed was still a few days out from the supplier.
So instead of not telling anyone and waiting for the problem to fix itself, which I’m sure 99.9% of online stores would do, he kept us informed and continued to sort through parts to get systems 99% ready.
For that I applaud you too.
In summary, there is no point in getting angry. You are right when you say nobody else sells them in Europe, and in fact nobody sells them anywhere else in the world (I’m waiting in Australia for mine to come) Instead count yourself lucky that this man has an excessive amount of integrity and is doing the best he is able to.
If you honestly think he is doing a bad job, maybe you should open up a competing store and try doing it yourself.
Thank you, this means a lot to me. Thank you. By the way, you’re spot on, except one small but very important detail: my wife helps me a lot with this! So we’re really two guys in the UK.
I totally agree with all this and, in my case, I’m not mad at all. I am very excited, though, and slightly anxious to get my hands on the kit! An update like this more often would be more than enough: http://amberspyglass.co.uk/blog/2013/09/09/progress-2/