Quick but important and necessary update for a very minor percentage of backers— Failed payment pledges.
Pledges without a successful payment (first payment for POT backers) will be canceled on March 9th.
You should've gotten an email from me a few days ago if this applies to you. This is your final warning.
Disclaimers: In order to see if your pledge can be successfully charged through your survey before this date, your survey must be locked even if you requested to not lock your survey. Neither I nor Backerkit staff can unlock your order after it's been charged through the survey. BUT I am still able to edit your survey choices manually (but I can't add or remove add-ons). If this applies to you and you want to edit your choice(s) after prototypes but find your survey to be locked, please email me at [email protected] and I'll make the edit for you.
If you completed your survey with a failed payment and added more add-ons, your initial charge will include all of those add-ons. I caught this on a few pledges and did a partial refund of the discrepancy between your initial pledge amount and your add-ons amount. It's currently unknown to me if I'll be able to charge you again for those add-ons before production.I’ve confirmed that I will be able to. I'm very sorry for the inconvenience. I'm just working with what Backerkit's Pledge Manager allows me to do (which, I'm finding out, is very little and it's incredibly frustrating).
I was told "backers will have a chance to fix their failed payments in surveys," but I was not told about all these caveats. Needless to say, this has been a huge, stressful headache. In future campaigns, failed payment pledges will not receive surveys until they fix their payments.
Since smoke tests have gone smoothly, I've decided to just send out all surveys a few days early! Please check your emails and fill it out ASAP. It can take some time for all emails to arrive, so just keep an eye out for them :3 💜
Fill out your survey by March 2nd and receive a FREE spot-mirrored gold star Ploosh sticker to show off the real MVPs of the Patchkins campaign — YOU!
Completing your survey sooner than later will only help give me a rough idea of manufacturing numbers. It will also show me how many people are interested in the stretch goal plush (Rowan, Teacup, and Jolly)! The sooner they unlock through surveys, the sooner they can be put into production with the others :)
Surveys won't close until all plush have prototypes! You're free to change your choices as prototypes are updated (as long as you don't select to lock in your choices in the survey).
POT Backers: You will qualify for the survey freebie if you fill out your Backerkit survey within a week of paying off your pledge! I also emailed POT backers who have confirmed first payments a Google Form link over the weekend as an unofficial survey to let me know your intended choices. Thank you to those who have already filled it out!
Failed payment backers are also able to correct their payment information in the surveys. Please fix your payments ASAP or risk your pledge getting canceled!
Here are all of the unlockables via stretch goal add-ons in the survey/Pre-Order Store!
From here on out, updates will slow down to roughly once per month on Backerkit during prototyping and production, unless it's something that requires backer input. Updates will be cross-posted from the Discord server, which is now open and linked below for backers to join 💜
Thank you!
EDIT: We had a few hiccups when surveys first went out that have been addressed—
There was an issue with the UK not being a shipping option when surveys first went out. No idea what caused it, but it's been fixed! Sorry for the inconvenience 😭
There was also an issue where a plush pledge level did not automatically apply the dango keychain freebie. I've gone through and manually added it to those pledges.
If you are a non-plush tier but you add-on a plush in the survey, I will manually add the dango keychain to your pledge before shipping!
Thanks to you all, we managed to unlock SEVEN plush and their enamel pin counterparts, ALL stickers and acrylic keychains, a free sticker for ALL reward pledges for reading 200 backers, and a free embroidered keychain for all pledges with 1 or more plush!
Here's a quick rundown of info while we wait for surveys to go live:
All surveys will go out on Thursday, February 26th!
Smoke tests for surveys will go out Monday, February 23rdSunday, February 22nd, which is just a small percentage of backers to help me test if there are any problems. I won't post an update for smoke tests, but I'll post one when all surveys go out to show off the sticker freebie you'll get if you fill it out within a week!
Errored Payments
Currently, there are still 31 errored payments which equal almost an entire stretch goal's worth of funds that I've yet to receive. Common log reasons for these errors include insufficient funds, card declines, and incorrect card numbers.
I've heard from many people who supported Pintopia projects that banks will flag Backerkit as fraudulent. It is up to the backer to fix this error by contacting their bank to allow the charge to go through.
If your payment is not fixed and received by the beginning of March, I will cancel your pledge.
This includes backers who chose Pay Over Time and their first payment has errored.
I'll send a personal email as a final reminder before canceling, so you have time. Please contact me via email at [email protected] if you need to discuss your payment situation.
Production Timeline
Now for the more fun part— Production!
Prototypes for Gizmo, Taffy, Remi, Kipper, and Lune will be ordered around February 26th (pending campaign funds deposit). Stickers are already ordered. But enamel pins, keychains, and Ploosh/Echo will have to wait for surveys to get a better idea of numbers before I can order.
I should start getting pics for round 1 prototypes around March 23rd (stc). I anticipate at least one round of revisions will be needed for everyone, which will put round 2 updates around April 15th (stc). And then we'll go from there :)
I'll keep you all posted with prototype updates and pics as needed!
Backers should wait for surveys to go out to purchase add-ons and help with Rowan, Teacup, and Jolly stretch goals! You'll be charged shipping twice if you're a backer and also place a preorder, since Backerkit sees it as two separate orders. So just be patient and spread the word to your non-backer friends! :3
I have hope that we could pooossibly unlock Rowan at least. I might even order his prototype just to have for a future campaign... he's very near and dear to me 💜
That's all for now :D Just hang tight and we'll get the ball rolling with surveys and production soon! Thank you all so much again!!
Quick update to say (minus any huge cancellations) Lune’s plush is unlocked!!! You are now able to add them back to your pledge! Thank you guys SOOO much! I’m on mobile right now, so I’ll update their unlocked graphics when I get to my computer.
Lune’s enamel pin and the free dango keychain for all pledges with one or more plush are still available if we reach $18k!
ETA: If we stay above $18k and you added the dango keychain to your pledge as an add-on, I'll refund the cost of the add-on if your pledge qualifies you to receive it, if you don't choose to remove it. The keychain will remain available for Add-On so non-plush pledges and Pre-Order store backers can buy one.
Since we likely won't reach the $18k goal in these last 48 hours, and in an effort to help us unlock Lune, I've added the dango embroidery keychain to add-ons!
If we do somehow skyrocket to $18k and unlock the free dango keychain for all pledges with 1 or more plush, I'll refund the cost of the add-on if your pledge qualifies you for it.
As I said in previous updates, I am still willing to unlock Lune's plush if we can reach at least close to $17,500.
I did previously think we would have no problem reaching this goal. But unfortunately, that's no longer the case. Again, if you're waiting on Lune, please keep an eye on funding and updates in case you need to edit your pledge. I'll make another update if we unlock them before the campaign is over to let everyone know.
Pre-Order Store & Post-Campaign Surveys
Just as a head's up, the Pre-Order Store will open after the campaign has ended, which is just a way for non-backers and people who missed the campaign to get something.
Original Backers should wait for surveys to order other add-ons! If backers order through the Preorder store, you'll be charged shipping twice— once for your original pledge and once for the Preorder store.
Surveys will go out on February 26th with a special freebie (TBD) if you complete it within a week! And I will have a Google Form unofficial survey for Pay Over Time backers so you can qualify for the freebie, since Backerkit won't allow you to fill out your official survey until payments have been completed.
Rest assured that the survey freebie is only so I can gather general numbers to know how much stock to order. You will have the opportunity to change your survey choice(s) if you're waiting on prototypes and you will not be charged for shipping until production is completed. It's just an incentive to fill it out sooner rather than later!
I've also added Philippines to the available shipping countries list!
We're in the home stretch now :) Thank you guys so much for your support! 💜
