Doublesix Dice: Roll Better

Over a thousand packages sent out.
about 9 years ago – Mon, Sep 21, 2015 at 10:46:56 PM

Dear Team Doublesix,

Summary:

• All the dice are safely in my house (not my driveway).
• 1,020 packages were sent out on Saturday via USPS, and are trackable.
• Most basic orders (US, not bulk, and no add-ons) were mailed out, and you can find your tracking number in your Backerkit account. 
• I am going lean to save on money, time, and resources.  This means no packing slips (unless needed) or thank you notes in packages: just your dice. 
• More packages will go out on Monday, Wednesday, and next Saturday.

Details:

• The dice spent two nights in my driveway, untouched (ie. not stolen). 
• After some attempts to ask neighbors to move them while I was at work all day Monday and Tuesday, I had to rely on professional help.
• Movers had big minimums, and my family wasn't comfortable with me bringing day laborers over, so I found Mario on Taskrabbit.com.
• His fee was $65/hr, and it took about 2.5 hours to move all 160 cartons from the driveway into my house.
• You can see the video below of my video proposal of the job, a photo of Mario, and what it looked like after he was done.

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Packing:

As mentioned, we are starting with the basic orders (US-based, no add-ons) to get a good handle on shipping and fulfillment.

• All US-based First Mover (118), Early Bird (116), and Standard (786) orders were mailed out on Saturday (see video below) at $2.22 per package. 
• I sent out some trial packages to Canada and Australia to see how they do.
• Most of the packing was done by my mother, who is upset that you guys have been waiting for over a year.  Also helping were my wife, two neighborhood boys, Junior and Anthony (who also filmed the video below), and some others. They are getting paid US minimum wage.  
• Basic Doublefudge pledges (67; US-based, no add-ons) should go out on Wednesday.
• Basic Triplefour pledges (160; US-based, no add-ons) will go out on Monday (photo below of my mom and buddy, Imran, packing these).

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Because of some inconsistencies with Shipstation (my postage and labeling software), I noticed some cheaper rates one day that then disappeared.  This eventually made me aware of an obscure deal that USPS had (thanks to the email from my Shipstation contact, below).

I am looking to get a USPS Parcel Select Lightweight permit on Monday.  Once I get this, I can print out way more labels (for Bulk and anything more than the 5 oz. standard 12 dice and 14 stretch goal dice) at a cheaper postage rate.

• I can mail out 5 oz packages (12 Classics/regulars and 14 stretch goal dice) at $2.19 instead of $2.22, with more savings as the weight increases.
• Bulk packages (100 dice, no add-ons) are about 16 oz, and I can possibly mail them in the US for about $3, not $5.20 (small flat rate box fee).
• This may help costs with global orders, and everything else. 

Here is a video of labels getting printed, Eden packing one mailer, and me taking packages to the Post Office:

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Because I plan to use USPS for all orders (domestic and international), this means there will be tracking.  Shipstation should be sending out emails with this information, but it hasn't been working so well (I am looking into this).  However, you should be able to find your tracking number in your Backerkit account (access it via this link). 

• These Kickstarter updates should give you a sense of if your package group/batch has been mailed out.
• Only after your packing label has been printed, will you get the tracking number. But only after your package has been dropped off at the post office will that number work. 
• Once you have your tracking number and know it has been dropped off, you can enter it HERE.
• Please don't contact me about this until you are sure your package group/batch has been dropped off and you can't find your tracking info in your Backerkit account.

Error rate:

• Because my mom wanted to make sure you got what you paid for, she began opening and counting the dice in each ivory bag and black stretch goal bag (they were packed in China).  
• She found an error rate of about 2.5% for the Ivory bags, and 0% for the black bags.
• Specifically, in the 120 Ivory bags she checked, one had 13 Classics, one had 9, and one had 4 red dice!
• She stopped checking when she realized that there were about 7,000 orders.
• If your order is not correct, please message me and I will take care of you.

Next:

• Once I get the Parcel Select Lightweight Permit (about $250), I will start packing and shipping out First Mover backers with Add-ons, and international First Mover backers.
• This will require printing out packing slips that match the labels with the correct postage. This may take a little while to perfect. 
• I will also mail out a few Basic US Bulk (no add-ons) orders.  Since the Bulk packages are a hair above 16 oz, I will have to see if they can make it through with the 15.999 oz postage rate, which will be much less in cost than the 16+ oz rate. 
• Random Rolls will be a significant challenge, as I will have to figure out how to first calculate the correct postage before printing out the labels and packing slips (which indicates how much the package will weigh).  
• I will attempt to move to weekly KS updates to keep you apprised of the progress.

Continuing with Phase 3...

Matt

PS.  Here is the email from my Shipstation rep after I asked why the postage rates were different on different days:

• "Stamps.com was previously giving the Parcel Select Lightweight option to all ShipStation merchants, but in most cases the service was being used incorrectly (an example being not meeting the volume requirement). Here is some more information on the service http://pe.usps.gov/text/qsg300/Q250.htm For this reason, USPS had Stamps.com remove the service so it does not show up by default. ShipStation was unaware of the change until it was reported by some ShipStation users. The good news is this service can be turned back on if you get approval through USPS. After you get approval, Stamps.com can turn it back on for your account."

The Eagle has landed.
about 9 years ago – Tue, Sep 15, 2015 at 12:20:29 AM

Dear Team Doublesix,

Summary:

• The dice have arrived!
• Video below shows cartons, some unboxing, and some set-up.

Here is a quick update, since I need sleep:

• The cargo luckily did not go through a complete CET exam, as feared.
• The dice arrived at my house this morning, while I was at work.
• Mailing addresses will lockdown any moment now, but don't worry, I can make any changes, if needed.
• I will send out some trial packages on Wednesday, including international ones.  
• While I wait to make sure they reach their destinations intact (no problems with postage, weight, label, packaging, customs, etc), a bunch of us will start packing basic orders (without labels) throughout the weekend (ie. no add-ons).
• Meanwhile, I will continue to transfer all the info from Backerkit to Shipstation (where I will pay for postage and print out labels).  
• Once I finalize a system that efficiently coordinates labels with packing slips with proper postage, we will start packing more complex orders (Random rolls, and those with add-ons).
• I will send out another update this weekend. 
• Meanwhile, check out this Kickstarter game campaign by a fellow backer: Cogs in a Machine.

Photo taken by my neighbor.

Photo taken by my wife.  That is my daughter, Eden. She is 4. 

Video of cartons in driveway, unboxing, and mailing prep.

I opted to not pay over $200 for a POD container to store the dice in for just a day or two before moving them into my house.  As you can tell from the video, I have some mild fear that they may get stolen overnight.  It is a calculated, and minimal, risk. I hope I don't regret it. 

...

And now, on to the hard part...

Matt

Customs has detained our cargo; Backerkit closed.
about 9 years ago – Sun, Aug 30, 2015 at 11:58:20 PM

Dear Team Doublesix,

SUMMARY:

1) Backerkit is closed and credit cards have been charged. You can't change your order (though you can still update/edit your mailing address).

2) The dice are in the US (at a Container Freight Station in NJ), but are being held up in customs (the Contraband Enforcement Team (CET) wants to open up the container and take a look, but we have to first wait in line for what could be several weeks.  And no, they are not a superhero group).

3) First reviews are in.  Two China-based backers got their dice (directly from Longbright). "They are awesome...satisfied with the quality" said one backer (plus his full review below), and "they are beyond great," said they other. 

4) Next steps will included passing the CET exam and paying for it, before trucking the dice to Baltimore.

...

DETAILS:

1) Backerkit orders are closed, and credit cards have been charged. 

• Mailing addresses are still open for updating and editing.  Those will lockdown when I have the dice ready to ship. 
• At the moment, 39 credit cards have been declined.  Folks should have gotten an email asking them to update their credit card info.
• There are still 311 Lost Backers.
• Turns out that Backerkit, though it is locked-down, will still allow the Lost Backers to come home. So I guess I could have locked down Backerkit some time ago without my fear that the Lost Backers would be locked out.  Sorry about all the unnecessary drama and hassle of keeping the Backerkit open.    

2) Customs

• The dice arrived in NYC on Aug 24th, one day behind schedule (there was a delay in the Suez canal).  Econocaribe is our consolidator (works with Sam) and charged $332 so far.

• Next, the container went under a non-intrusive VACIS exam (Vehicle and Cargo Inspection System), which uses gamma ray technology to find contraband (like guns, drugs, currency, and Haitian goat hide drums).  

• Apparently, I will have to pay for this exam, as well as any trucking required to get to the exam site. If a full container exam is about $350, my charge (portion) should be a fraction of that. 
• Probably based on the VACIS exam, for whatever reason, our container has now been flagged by the US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) for an intensive and intrusive physical exam by the CET (Contraband Enforcement Team). 
• The container will next be moved to an off-site CES (Customs Examination Station), where it will be placed in a queue to be physically unloaded and inspected.
• The container may be in line for a week or more. Doug, our resident Backer shipping expert, checked and thinks it could be several weeks.

• This intensive exam can cost me from $500 to well over $1000, which includes a fee to the steamship line for having one of their containers tied up.
• I am not sure about this, but maybe I won't have to pay anything, but will still have to wait, if a separate cargo in the container is being intensively inspected (and not the dice).
• Here is a great summary of these exams HERE, and an article and in depth discussion in comments HERE.

Track the container:

• You can track our container on the Econocaribe website. In the top right, under Cargo Tracking, choose "LCL Imports Container #," and then enter SMLU-851545-8. For cargo details, the House Bill # is KPNYK02510. 
• At the moment, the container is at a CFS (Container Freight Station) in Secaucus, NJ.

Why did we get flagged?

• Not sure.  Could be our cargo, where a no-name, first-time individual like me is trying to get a shipment of half a million funny-looking dice delivered to a home address near Washington, DC.  As Doug said, though, we will never know. 

3) Full Review of Dice:

Matt

Dice on the Water! And Backerkit to close this weekend.
over 9 years ago – Wed, Aug 12, 2015 at 11:48:08 AM

Ahoy, Team-mateys!

SUMMARY:

1) Dice are en route, having left China on the 26th, and due to dock in the US (NYC) around August 23rd. You are on track to get your package during September.

2) Backerkit orders will lockdown (ie. close) at the end of this week, so please confirm your final order.

• To recover your invite, please visit this page: https://doublesix-dice-roll-better.backerkit.com/
• After orders are locked-down (ie. you will not be able to edit them), mailing addresses will still remain open for editing/updating (I will lock those down right before I start mailing packages out).
• For those of you that still have yet to open your invite, I have emailed you directly from my gmail account (since spam filters may be detouring Backerkit and/or Kickstarter emails). Please look out for it and answer it ASAP. 

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DETAILS:

If the dice could talk, this is what they would sing:

(Source: The Lonely Island's music video: I'm on a boat).

And to be more precise, this is the boat that they are on:

Her name is the Lena-S, aka APL Indonesia. 

She left Shenzen with the dice around the 26th, docked in Singapore, and is now en route to Columbo, Sri Lanka.  At the moment, this is where she is:

To track her, visit this LINK (thanks to Doug Houseman).  Estimated Time of Arrival in New York City is about the August 23rd.  But I need her to dock in Baltimore. 

Since the last update:

• July 4th: 20,000 plastic bags (for 6-packs) arrived to factory.
• July 7th: Longbright ran a quality inspection, and wanted more time (July 14th) to produce more dice to replace the defective ones.
• July 14th: remaining balance negotiated, determined and wired.
• July 15th: dice all packed into bags and cartons; labeled and ready .
• July 16th: dice picked up from factory.
• July 16th: I learned that I need to take care for the ISF (Importer Security Filing; example below), better known as the 10+2, before the dice can even board a ship. 
• July 17th: I found a customs broker (Fedex) who will assist the the ISF.  A $550 customs bond was required (since the value of the cargo is over $2500).
• July 20th: I continued communication with Sam in China in order to complete the ISF.
• July 22nd: Missed that vessel due to customs complications.  ISF eventually filed ($40).
• July 26th: 163 cartons were scheduled to be loaded onto the next ship, the Lena-S (photos, and Bill of Lading below).
• July 31st: I actually confirmed that they made it on the ship.

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For those of you interested in these sorts of things...

Here is part of what an ISF looks like:

Here is the Bill of Lading (document issued by a carrier which details a shipment of merchandise):

Again, thanks much for your patience!

Matt

Production should finish this week.
over 9 years ago – Fri, Jul 31, 2015 at 07:24:18 PM

Dear Team,

Summary:

1) I still hope to get you your dice by September.  Looks like the dice are almost complete!  Today's email from Will stated: "The adding order dices will finish in two days," which I hope means all of them.  There will be a few more days of packing them (into your dice bags and into 6-packs).

2) We still need about 970 Backerkits to be answered.  I just now (at the same time this Kickstarter Update posted) resent the invites to folks who haven't opened their invite. If you still haven't gotten it, please check your spam folder in the next couple of hours.

3) Our freelancer Emma visited the factory and sent me some photos, as well as random samples (and bags).  The dice look great (video below), but did not float in my salt-water (so I wasn't able to balance test them). 

4) However, the glossy black with red looks a little like glossy black with orangish (see photo below).

5) Instead of ivory blank dice, I am producing marble purple with black, and those will replace the ivory blanks in Collector's Mix #3.

6) Shipping individual orders to Asia-based backers directly from China will not save much money at all, so we will NOT be doing this.  

7) Freight forwarding is being arranged, and will cost about $2,000.  

....

Details. 

1) It has been hard to get a clear answer all along, but I am hoping that "The adding order dices will finish in two days," means they will be done shortly.  "Adding" could mean additional dice (I will ask them tonight).  They did say they would be done in 12 days about 14 days ago, so hopefully we are on track to be ready by the end of the week.

They still need to finish packing the dice into the dice bags:

• 2,049 Ivory bags with 12 glossy ivory with black dice (for Early Birds, First Movers, and Standard orders).  I will pack the Random Rolls in the US.
• 4,950 Black bags with 14 mixed Stretch Goal dice (2 Black/white; 2 Red/white; 2 KS Green/black; 2 Black/KS green; 2 Marble Blue/white; 2 Marble Red/gold; 2 Marble Green/gold)
• 1,920 ivory bags filled with 50 glossy Ivory and black 
• 1,920 black bags filled with 50 mixed Stretch Goal dice (6 Black/white; 6 Black/red; 6 Red/white; 6 Red/black; 6 KS Green/black; 2 Black/KS green; 6 Marble Blue/white; 6 Marble Red/gold; 6 Marble Green/gold)

And then many into plastic bags as 6-packs.  You can see the number of 6-packs to be packed in column C of this spreadsheet. 

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2) For those Backers not getting or reading these updates, I will soon resend the Backerkit invites again, then send out the Kickstarter surveys asking those backers to check their spam folders. Hopefully, that will get many more Backerkits filled.  Once way more are filled, then I will shut down the order part of the Backerkit (with a warning update; then your credit cards will be charged; but your mailing address will still remain opening to be edited).  

This production process has gone on for so long, I am sure that some backers have forgotten about this Kickstarter, and/or changed email addresses or something. 

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3) Emma, our freelancer, has been truly amazing.  She is quick, responsive, thorough, intelligent, great with English, and playful.  It is also great how we are able to chat over Whatsapp in realtime trying to clarify and plan most recent weeknights.  

I arranged for Emma to visit the factory, to get photos and random samples (I wasn't satisfied with Will sending me hand-picked samples).  Will (fyi: Will is female) was sick that day, so the boss Ben picked Emma up from the train station (she lives several hours away) and took her to the factory where the dice were being made.  Here are some photos:

For many more photos, click on this LINK Emma set up to go to a cloud-storage site where you can download the pdf. 

Emma later confirmed that the factory workers picked the dice in the video below (not herself), but that the process of picking them looked random.

In the video: 45 total dice (5 each of 9 types). Both final dice bag samples also shown. Also included: footage of a die NOT floating in salt-water (balance testing attempt, suggested by Matthew).

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4) Here is a photo of the glossy black with red.  It looks a little bit orange.  Not sure why three different red samples were made initially, but as I looked over the emails that involved the final confirmation of the red, I see how there was some miscommunication on my part.  Sorry about this. 

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5) It took me a while (even after some backers warned me early on), but I realized that blank Classics were not worth much more than regular Classics.  You can paint and cover the black pips with a new color just as easily as painting in blank pips.  

So I made a game-time decision and added marble purple with black.  Why that color? Because marble purple bases were one of the final base colors being produced, and I could easily add 2,500 more, to be painted black later.  This is in addition to the 5,000 being painted white.  

These will be replacing the blank in Collectors Mix # 3.  I know, there will be the very similar looking marble pink with black, marble purple with white, and marble purple with black in the same 6-pack.  My apologies. 

They also won't formally be added to the Backerkit this late in the game.  But if you are dying to get a 6-pack of these, message me about swapping out one of your current 6-pack add-ons.  

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6) I thought it might be cheaper to airmail orders to some Asia-based backers.  Not really, other than the two Backers who live in China (it will cost about $4 each).  So I will ship them from the US, where I have more control of the shipping and handling.  

Here are some of the costs Emma researched:

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7) The shipping of the cargo is being facilitated by Sam Chen, of ShenZhen C&Y Logistics Co.,Ltd, who was referred to me by Emma. 

The LCL (less than container) load of about half-a-million dice will be about 176 Cartons (34.5 x 34.5 x 22.5 cm), each carton being about the size of a big printer.  The approximate load size is about 7.75 CBM, and the weight is 2,410 KG (5,313 lbs).  Yes, that is two-and-half tons of dice, my friends.  Here is the following breakdown in cost:

• USD 150 is the cost for pick up and transport of the goods from the dice factory to the shippers warehouse. 
• USD 980 is from their warehouse to the boat (Shenzhen port), then ship to USA, to their warehouse in Baltimore. It will take about 31 days. 
• USD 740 at destination includes charge to their Agent in USA, and charge for the Baltimore warehouse. 
• After that, I will need to arrange a US company to do the custom clearance for me (charge is about USD 200-300). 
• After all the above, then I can pick up the goods from the Baltimore warehouse. Fedex and UPS are options for the last two steps. 

Hoping to get these bad-boys on the water frickin' ASAP,

Matt