I had hoped to be working on shipping right now, but alas. Im having to get several of the designs remade, which my manu has greatly apologized for thankfully. I waited a bit to update on this so i could be sure they were going to do so. There were much higher flaw rates and one whole design has issues with the dyed metal which ill attach. For referenc expect about 5-10% of the pins i order to be b grades. Thats acceptabl to me and i order enough to cover it no problem. This was closer to 60-90% for most of them. I can only assume they hired someone new or were panicked trying to finish them too fast from the tarrifs, because ive seen a lot of pins from them, including other artists in this event, and none had these issues TT.TT
Regardless! They are being remade now, hopefully arriving this month in a few weeks. Ill keep you guys updated as i know more.
Im attaching some of the flaws so you guys can cry with me
Her metal looks like a sweet tart. Not exactly what i had in mind...
Screen print way too close to main color and the metal is totally tarnished
My friends helping me grade these went and got my their spiced rum around this point lmao
Weirdly the two designs that faired the best were the squid and the whale.
Hey everyone, I'm sure you are getting a bunch of updates relating to this right now so i'll make it quick as I can.
Production continues, everything is slowly being made. I am still making all the pins, you will still recieve them as previously agreed, nothing will change there. What might change is the timeline for me shipping these out. My manu is a delight and has agreed that if there are still these issues when production ends they will hold them for me for a time hoping that the tarrifs will lessen or drop. I am hoping this wont be necessary but for full disclosure if i have to pay 104% tarrifs on this i will have to get another job or do a huge amount of sales or something to pay the extra several thousand dollars this will cost me and i didnt budget for. I was blessed to go over my goal to a degree but not enough to cover that. Ill do that if it comes to it. But you can probably guess thats not ideal. Hell of a time to have my best (and most expensive) project TT.TT. That said, policy is changing daily so who knows! Im not settled on moping yet, just wanting to be honest that it might take longer to get everything to everyone. This will also change how I set my goals and prices up going forward. Im hoping not to raise prices by much, but my goals will need to have much more padding on them with this going on. I dont love it, but it is what it is.
All that said, if you would like to do something to help me, and any other artist/small business out, please please please reach out to your officials. This is a site that can help you do it quicker and easier. If you are in a secure position it would mean a lot for you to do so. Im doing my best to remain hopeful, I'm still going to be doing projects going forward this year, I will likely just be doing them much more cautiously and on a smaller scale than before. I love doing huge projects with 3 inch pins and 25 designs but even if I'm lucky enough to fund all of them its not safe right now. As always, I appreciate you all for being a part of this journey with me and for going through these ups and downs. We'll figure it out! 🖤
First: let’s get the new stuff up here
I’m still doing a few little edits on the carrier and babe but you get the idea 😅
I hope you guys all like how it turned out! I’m really pleased with it. In addition I was given a genius idea, what if the big eye squids eyes were shakable. So that’s our new shaker!
I’m so happy with how everything has gone and I’m so thankful to each of you for being a part of this project! I can’t express enough how excited I am about getting these little guys made. Let’s have a great last day! 🖤
We have unlocked the sperm whale! Thank you guys so much for voting, I’m really excited to have the big guy in the project. I’m gonna go back to the drawing board and see if we can get some sketches going for other designs, we’ll see if we need another vote before the project is over.