Backerkit dates and deadlines
about 2 years ago – Sun, Mar 27, 2022 at 09:42:54 PM

Hi everyone!

Hope you are doing well. I myself have been bedridden these past 5 days with a nasty flu that fortunately was not Covid (if the four home tests I took were to be believed). Finally emerging from the haze of Dayquil and congestion with a steadfast reminder that there are other bugs out there that don't make the headlines...

We have started to assemble our timetable for fulfillment, however, and want to prepare you for the following dates and deadlines:

Because we will be fulfilling this campaign very soon with two other campaigns (ARSENE LUPIN and recent ADRASTEA), we will need to finalize our item count for all projects and send the final order data to Quartermaster no later than April 15th so they can be ready to start fulfillment in May. Therefore, we will start to lock orders on Friday, April 8th! We will send reminders throughout the week until Friday, April 15th, at which point Credit Cards will be charged. If you have not completed your survey by that date, your pledge will have to fall into a "phase two" fulfillment window that may not go out until August. (This is particularly true for international backers; late domestic backer orders may be able to go out sooner.) So please please PLEASE be sure to complete your orders before that deadline. Booking international freight is tricky these days so we can't (literally) hold the boat for a handful of stragglers.

Some notes:

• We will be manually confirming which orders qualify for the free shipping bundling credit during the week of April 8th. Once we have confirmed which orders/pledges qualify, we will manually credit out the appropriate shipping fee from the qualifying order(s). Don't worry -- this will be done before credit cards are charged on the 15th, so you will have time to confirm that the proper amount is being charged.
• If you are unsure where you will be the last week of May/early June, don't worry -- Quartermaster (or Spiral Galaxy/Aetherworks) will send a final address confirmation email to everyone prior to actually shipping your package.

If you have any other questions about your pledge, please feel free to message us and we will address your issue directly.  Things seem on track with the printers and other vendors to have everything ready for a mid/late-May fulfillment date, but we will keep you posted in case anything unforeseen comes up. I think we've allowed for plenty of buffers, but you never know these days.

Thanks again, everyone! And again -- stay healthy!

Boxed Set photos!
about 2 years ago – Fri, Mar 18, 2022 at 02:23:20 AM

Hi everyone!

Just a quick update to share some photos of the advance copy we received from the printer of the OGRE GODS Box and FIRST BORN!

These will be on a boat (along with ARSENE LUPIN, GENTLEMAN THIEF and ADRASTEA) as soon as the new Covid lockdown in Shenzhen and Hong Kong is lifted and our printer can book a freighter. We fully expect everything to be on hand for fulfillment in May as planned, however! Just imagine getting all three of these beauties in the mail...!

There are still 24 hours left to back Adrastea!

The campaign ends at 5pm CST tomorrow! Check out the latest update for pix of that beautiful book, as well as status on the many stretch goals already unlocked!

And if you missed out on ARSENE LUPIN , you can still pre-order through Backerkit until April 1st! We will be locking all three campaign Backerkits on that date so that we can make a final unit count in order to start preparing for fulfillment in May.

And as a reminder: if you order all three, you can combine them into a single package to save on shipping! This is especially helpful for international orders, considering the skyrocketing cost of shipping these days...

It's going to be a great summer full of some wonderful reading material!

Casewrap proofs! And the next big thing!
about 2 years ago – Tue, Mar 01, 2022 at 08:49:39 AM

Hi everyone!

Happy Friday! We got something cool from the printer in the mail today: a treated casewrap sample of FIRST BORN!

This is an unbound, fully wrapped cover on 3mm boards, just without the interior pages and endpapers. It looks sweet, like the previous volumes in the series -- the intricate detail that is highlighted by the spot UV is really nice:

The only difference is that these case samples haven't been stamped with debossing to match the previous volumes. The finished product will resemble these on the front cover when finished:

...and those are just the covers. The story and stuff on the inside are the REAL premium content... 😎

Everything is going as scheduled and May fulfillment is right on schedule, so there's not much to report as things move into full-scale production. We'll keep you posted, but in the meantime, while you wait for that, you can kill a few minutes hopping over to this website we set up and PRE-REGISTER FOR OUR NEXT CAMPAIGN LAUNCHING ON TUESDAY!

ADRASTEA by Mathieu Bablet

For those of you who backed our campaign for SHANGRI-LA and CARBON & SILICON last year, you probably know how amazing Mathieu Bablet's work is. (International backers, you will soon... they're on their way to you as we speak...!) Set in Greek mythology, this new book is equally beautiful, poetic, action-packed, quirky, and epic. It tells the story of a man who cannot die, so after 1000 years of watching loved ones die and his empire crumble, he sets out on a quest to demand answers from the gods of Olympus...

Like our recent campaigns, we'll be offering a limited edition items, including the campaign-exclusive "Immortal" Bundle with a bunch of nice extras, as well as the usual array of stretch goals and bonus prints for pre-registering and pledging on Day 1.
Plus:

*** FREE SHIPPING for backers of OGRE GODS or ARSENE LUPIN! ***

If you backed either of our previous two campaigns for THE OGRE GODS SAGA or ARSENE LUPIN, GENTLEMAN THIEF, or pre-order either from their Backerkit stores before closing at the end of March, we can add your physical pledge items from this campaign to your previous order so that they ship together at no extra cost! Free shipping will be applied to all qualifying pledges during pledge management in Backerkit.

This is going to be another beautiful book, a perfect companion to SHANGRI-LA or CARBON & SILICON, and we're excited to give ADRASTEA the spotlight treatment it deserves!

Why so soon?

Some of you may wonder why we are launching another Kickstarter campaign so soon when we haven't even shipped OGRE GODS yet... a perfectly fair question and concern!

We have found Kickstarter to be an incredibly active community for us, and fulfillment is something we have gotten very good at (after 18 successful campaigns)... As an "account in good standing" Kickstarter knows that we will follow through with these campaigns as quickly as promised. In fact, only by having these three campaigns open at the same time are we able to offer the "free shipping" savings, by combining and bundling those pledges into a single shipment; it saves you, it saves us, it saves the environment. Everybody saves.

We absolutely understand how it might feel like we're switching dance partners and simply working our way around the room quickly, but we have committed to every promise made on all of our campaigns, and we don't plan on stopping anytime soon... we have too many excellent ideas to share with you in the months and years to come!

Certainly, not every book will appeal to everyone, but that's why we offer so many types of campaigns; each one brings new people to the party. We've found that with each campaign, up to 90% of the backers are brand new to our books. And while the number of repeat backers continues to grow (THANK YOU!), we love to see the greater community flourish. We're proud to say we've amassed over 10k customers since our first Kickstarter, and we're just getting started!

So please check out the pre-registration landing page today and join us next Tuesday at 10am CST! There will be cake! (Not really, but there will be early-bird discounts for the first 250 backers!)

We hope to see you there!

Campaign feedback survey - win an Amazon Gift Card!
about 2 years ago – Sat, Feb 19, 2022 at 09:10:40 PM

Hi everyone!

Things continue to grind here at the mill, and with all the things we've got going on, we want to know what you think is important for us to focus on as we move forward. So we've made a short (15min) survey here that we would love for you to fill out! Not only do we really want to know what everyone thought of these recent campaigns, but we want to know enough to give everyone who responds $.50 in Backerkit credit to lessen your shipping balance a tad. And, when the survey closes we'll choose one random winner to receive a $25 Amazon Gift Card as thanks! For real! We have done it several times on many previous campaigns! Look it up!

So please, visit the survey here or shoot/click on the QR code below to begin.

THANK YOU!!!

Only 48 hours left to back ARSENE LUPIN, GENTLEMAN THIEF!
about 2 years ago – Fri, Feb 11, 2022 at 02:48:51 AM

Hi everyone!

Just a quick update to let you know that there are only TWO DAYS LEFT to join the ARSENE LUPIN, GENTLEMAN THIEF Kickstarter campaign before it ends! You don't want to miss out on the fabulous package of exclusive, limited-edition bonus items that have been unlocked to be included with all physical pledges for FREE! Right now, that's about $40 worth of exclusive collectibles that will not be available anywhere else once this campaign is complete. And you can get this whole beautiful art package for simply pre-ordering the $30 base tier or $40 Limited Edition Cipher Edition tier! 

And since you backed the OGRE GODS campaign, you can get FREE SHIPPING by bundling both packages into one! Both will ship in May, so it's the perfect way to save on the skyrocketing cost of shipping these days.

We're hopeful that we'll unlock the numbered bookplates at $90k, but if even a portion of you non-backers watching this campaign come on board in the next 48 hours, everyone will benefit from having a matching "Holmes" lapel pin added to the set. It really is a bargain worth taking advantage of! (Can we hit that last stretch goal to make it $50 worth...? The lapel pins are sweet...)

Oh, and of course, there's THE FABULOUS BOOK ITSELF! 😊

Please check it out and help spread the word!