Potential Price Increase Explanation
I always strive to be upfront and honest about anything regarding the pricing of everything in the store. When tariffs were announced on imports, almost instantly, certain companies raised prices on items like motors. It’s understandable, they are imports and since they cost more to bring in, that company needs to attempt to keep their profit margin steady. Our prices have never increased. In spite of filament becoming slightly more expensive, our barrel shroud has stayed at $20; primarily because I viewed the profit on the shroud as a minimal short term gain compared to getting the name of the store out on the market for people. Regretfully, this has led to some ledger issues; primarily due to the custom nature of what we do. When someone orders an exotic color that costs $20 or more for a roll of filament, that cost comes out of our pockets without a guarantee that anyone else is going to pay for something similar in that roll. When you add the power consumption and materials used to box up the order, for us to produce a $20 product, it costs us approximately $30. Now, we do not pretend to charge an entire roll of filament worth of price when there will be maybe only a third of it used; however, rather than say we will not offer the item, we are implementing a pricing scheme that will offset the risk without penalizing the customer either. As such, we will be offering an exotic color shroud option which costs $7.50 more. This allows us to deliver the color preferences our customers may want without breaking the bank.
Our original barrel shroud will remain at the $20 price point for now as we find ways to mitigate the costs to ourselves as a business without sacrificing quality for the sake of profit.
Please note that I have also been informed that there may be n increase in postage by the USPS within the next couple of months. While I don’t expect this to significantly increase shipping costs, it will increase somewhat. As such, I have already taken the action of merging our websites shipping options with my corporate USPS account that allows me to get a discounted rate on ground advantage shipping. This enables me to pass on additional savings to you as our customer. It is my hope that when the rate increases, the savings will offset the increase cost so you will see no difference (here is hoping).
I will do my best to keep everyone updated regarding that in the future.
-Norm.
One year in…
When we first started the Big Blaster Consortium, we were surprised at the length of time it took for our first order to be made. A couple of months of paying out for listing fees on Etsy and zero income in return. All of that changed seemingly overnight with the arrival of the Motorized Piston Pump by X-shot. Almost immediately, our smaller print shop became inundated with orders that we struggled to meet; often times working 20 hour days to meet demand. Like any new business, we have had our growing pains and have had our moments of struggle when dealing with things from articles of incorporation to dealing with catastrophic printer failures (let’s not even get into dealing with spousal doubt on the entire business venture). Each time we have been knocked down, we have stood back up, brushed the dirt off of our shoulders and have continued on. Why? Because, simply put, our dedication to providing you with the best possible product is unmatched in our hobby.
There are companies out there that will boast to have the “best in business” guarantee by touting that they have a 30, 60, 90 or even a one year warranty on their products. We’ve slowly sat back and laughed at those claims because to date, we have yet to see someone offer a warranty on their prints the way that we do. Some would wonder why? 3D prints are borderline consumable products. They aren’t meant to necessarily last forever and often times can break. Why sell something to someone once when we could sell it at a slightly lower price, not guarantee the product and allow the person to repurchase it at full price? Simply put, that is the level of customer service provided by a store no longer in service. Instead, we choose to go after the “gold standard” and surpass it by every measurable metric regarding customer satisfaction and, judging by the emails we have received from people, we have succeeded.
That isn’t to say that everything has been flawless in execution; like any other company, we have had our flaws and our errors. However, when they have been brought to our attention, we have done our absolute best to ensure that the customer remains informed as to what led to the error, how we intend to fix it and implement that fix as quickly as humanly possible. We’re proud to say that in that case, we are 100% on target. There is a reason that one of our customers (who does not know our owner personally) now has his number to text him about upcoming designs for high end blasters and offers to purchase day one.
Moving into year two; we are hoping to expand on the foundation we have laid regarding our top-notch customer service and dedication to the Nerf fanbase. Who knows, we might even surprise you with a couple of things we are attempting to produce.
Watch this space for more regarding that… in the future.
-Norm