Happy day-after-Frankenstein-anniversary. The EU customs debacle is still a bit of a mixed bag, but based on your feedback, I think it would be appropriate to move forward now that things have settled a bit.
I will work on an updated timeline for everyone and publish it this weekend, and if any specific EU customers have concerns about receiving their order, please do reach out at our email, [email protected] to discuss options.
I appreciate everyone’s patience so deeply and am glad that this project will sail on. I can’t predict the outcome, but I’m glad we paused to make sure it wasn’t a total sinkage based on these new regulations. My goal is to get production back on the table in the next two-ish weeks, and with any luck get your your packages by the new year ( winter is still applicable to our theme, no? ). But I’ll give you a more specific timeline in the coming days when I’m able.
Thanks again to everyone for your patience as we navigate worldly challenges. I’m so excited to bring this back to unlife. Reach out with any questions or address changes please, I will also be reaching out to failed or straggling payments before the final production order!
Thank you so much for your patience as we navigate these new shipping regulations. Production has been on hold for some time and I’m really hoping to kick it into gear very soon; unfortunately, the consensus is still unclear. Different projects are having different experiences, some fine going forward as is, others experiencing difficulties with getting packages to their owners. I’ve been chatting with the other mods and monitoring some other zines and small businesses, but before I share any possibilities or maths associated with our options, I’d love to ask any EU backers if they’ve had any experience receiving packages from out of the country in the last month? Have you been getting your items or are you experiencing losses or delays? I’d love to hear from you all for first hand experience, and any other opinions you may have on the matter.
I hope to have news of production very soon, but there needs to be a bit more data gathering before we surge forward.
Hello monsters. Some quick housekeeping before the heavy hitter:
firstly, we have received the lenticular charm sample and it rocks! I'll try to get it posted on socials soon for a sneak peak. It is hinged and lenticular, so it was a challenge to get a manu to see the vision, and took a bit to bring to life, but we got there! Keep an eye out for that (Some may have seen it already on the IG story a few days ago)!
secondly, charges for any add-on books will automatically go through on August 30th. This is your formal warning!
Now, the big update::
Production of AOAM's physical fulfillment is temporarily on hold. We have not yet ordered many items due to edits and customs issues, and it all worked out well for this reason: the new shipping legislation in the EU is creating a MASSIVE roadblock for lots of projects and small businesses. In order to protect our customers and creators, we are pausing/delaying our ordering and subsequently order fulfillment in an attempt to understand these new challenges better. At the moment, it seems like there are no straight answers about how this will affect projects like ours and even if they can continue to function. We have a EU based mod who is keeping us updated and we are monitoring other projects and creators closely. This is an unfortunate situation for artists all around, and we want to make sure we have a solid plan of action before any collected funds are used.
Here are some simplified questions and answers about the current state of AOAM: What's happening? ANATOMY OF A MONSTER production is currently paused. We have not yet bulk ordered anything, only samples. We will NOT bulk order our items until we have a resolution for the EU situation.
Why does it matter? A decent amount of both our contributors and backers are based in European Union countries. As it stands, we are unable to ship to these people. This means we would have to consider refunding these people if there is no resolution. If we have to refund a large portion of orders, it could lead to the cancelation or shrinkage of the project as a whole. This is the worst case scenario and we are hoping that the legislation changes due to pushback or becomes clearer and easier to navigate with time. This affects ALL backers by nature of crowdfunding. We raised a specific amount of money that is allowing us to produce what we've set out to produce - loosing any of those funds would mean changes to the products or a dismissal in the worst case scenario. AOAM IS NOT CANCELED, BUT DELAYED.
Why haven't you guys ordered the products yet? We are still tweaking the files - we had some additional pages to add to the book, were waiting on samples, and needed to do additional file work for some of the merchandise. These delays ended up being a blessing in disguise - in the case that the project must concede, all funds are available for refunding still since no orders have been placed on the backend yet. This protects you and your pledge amount and us at the creators, saving us from scrambling to make back the money in the case refunds become necessary.
When will we receive our orders then? Unfortunately, I don't have a straight answer. These regulations went into affect last Wednesday, and there is still little information about how they're working in practice, which means we are unable to create a plan of action or decide next steps at this time. I can tell you that it will probably not be in September as originally planned since we still need to factor in printing and shipping times. I would love to still get these to everyone before the end of October (spooky szn), but I cannot provide an estimated/updated timeline yet. As soon as I know more, you will too. We deeply appreciate your patience with us as we try to find answers and communicate in a timely manner.
This is freaking me out. I want to cancel my pledge. I am going to ask that everyone please wait until we know more before jumping to any conclusions. If we start getting order cancelations, regardless of if we can eventually ship to the EU, we will be unable to promise the scope of merch that was initially advertised. We were able to add so many new items thanks to the stretch goals - if we backtrack at all, we will have to drop some of those additional items for everyone. I promise all of the collected funds are sitting safely and have been untouched - if we must resort to refunding the project, everyone will be appropriately compensated, but again, that is WORST CASE! Lets all plan on getting our zines by the end of the year:) If push comes to shove, we will also discuss alternative ways to make this project available to the public. We will cross the cancelation bridge if/when we get to it.
I have information about the new shipping legislation that might be helpful. How can I get you guys this information? On the off chance someone has already had experience with these new circumstances, please share your findings with us via email - [email protected]. You can also direct any additional questions to this address and I'll do my best to respond, or via backerkit help. Any insight is extremally helpful. We have an international team and finding the right info can sometimes be challenging.
Lets all cross our fingers and toes that this sorts itself out. When I have more info about the issue and a better idea of our new timeline, I will make another update ASAP. Please disregard the dates on the story page going forward as they are no longer up-to-date.
When I started this project, I set out to create a smooth path to the final step. As a contributor, buyer and former mod on other projects, I've personally seen so much financial mishandling that I thought I could do it better myself. And thus far I have - but the world decided still to throw a wrench into the system. I hope to still accomplish my original goal, but its somewhat out of my hands.
Thank you everyone for your incredible pateince and understanding. We want nothing more than to bring this project to unlife, and we are truly so close. Unfortunately, this problem is way out of our scope to solve personally, so its a waiting game. Please feel free to email any additional questions and anything pertinent to the scope of backers will be posted here as an update.
Firstly, we had a backer recently ask about our plan with the current state of customs in the USA. If you’re unaware, customs is ramped up for particular products and there has been some strange mishandling regarding anything they might assume is “made for children”. Rest assured, we’ve spoken with our manufacturers and they’ll be providing the proper paperwork to move our items through customs appropriately ( as we don’t have any items - like plush - that should be flagged, but better safe than sorry )! We’ve been carefully monitoring other zine projects and merchandise experiences with customs at this time.
Secondly, customs in the EU - with recent legislature change in the EU, customs prices have surged for folks receiving items in affected countries. Again, in conjunction with other projects currently facing similar issues; we believe we have come to a solution that’ll keep the price as low as possible for items entering your countries. Ultimately, we cannot control what customs do or charge, but know we will be making every indication possible when shipping to try and get it to you as cheaply as possible!
Thirdly, because of these multiple logistic related issues, we have held off some of the bulk ordering until a solution was reached - our goal is still to get packages out in September, but know that items may be delayed into October worst case scenario. We’ll keep you updated if this ends up being the case. Apologies for the delay, but we wanted to make sure everything could get to us safely and to YOU safely before we allocated any of the raised funds into production. This serves you as customers and us as creators!
Expect more updates very soon. Our sample charm has finally shipping out and once that’s in hand, I’ll be happy to share it with you! This also hopefully gives us the green flag to move ahead with bulk ordering the rest of the items. We are currently doing minor corrections to the book, and it’ll be sent to print ultra soon ( if you ordered extra books as add-on, expect another update about charging soon ). Thanks everyone for your patience, and we’re getting closer. When I have more specific timeline info post-ordering, I’ll come to you with haste!
Oh, and, happy Frankenstein physical release! have you seen the beautiful criterion cover art? What do you think? I can’t wait to see all the BTS content!
Many of you have completed your surveys and locked in your orders - thank you! Zine formatting has wrapped up and we are now in talks with our manufacturer and have ordered samples for certain items - the project is well on its way!
I am missing survey responses from 22% of our backers. PLEASE fill out the survey ASAP! As a reminder, orders lock on July 15th. Therefor, you have one week to fill those out.
Thanks again for your support and patience! We're so so excited to bring this to life. And let me tell you... Our format mod, Abriel, did a PHENOMENAL job with the book. I can't wait to share it with you all!
Happy mid-summer haunting. Hope to have this all to you by spooky season. More soon!
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