Hi Everybody,
The short version of the update is:
We're still in active communication with a number of possible non-US fulfillment solutions. What we've looked at so far is expensive or onerous for a team of our size. But we are still in discussions.
Current Recommendation:
If you are outside the US, and have concerns about shipping/fees/etc we recommend that you pick up a copy of Knave 2, when it's complete, from a retailer. The following retailers in the EU and UK have told us they plan to carry it:
Germany: Spharenmeisters Spiele (
https://www.sphaerenmeisters-spiele.de/)
UK: Dungeonland (
https://www.dungeonland.co.uk/)
Poland: Erpegowe Piekiełko (
https://rpg-piekielko.pl/)
Italy: Stratagemma (
https://www.stratagemmaonline.com/)
Czech Republic: Imago (
https://www.imago.cz/)
We have reached out to other retailers and are hopeful this list will expand between the conclusion of the Kickstarter and the print run. If you don't see your country or a retailer you love on this list (admittedly it's a short list) please reach out to your friendly local game shop and ask for Knave 2. Customers going into the store and asking for something can make a big difference.
What about the premium cover?
That's a very good question and is still being decided. Retailers will likely be able to purchase premium copies, but it is uncertain how that will that work with demand, and it will ultimately be in the hands of those retailers. You could potentially miss out on a premium copy if you choose to go through a retailer.
A More Indepth Recap
Part of the reason it's taken so long to get this update done, is that parterning with international fulfillment options is a "sales onboarding" process. Getting this information requires scheduling meetings. It's not typically a "Have a price list" experience. Here are some of the problems/complications/fees associated with dropping a pallet of books in a non-US warehouse and having them fulfill the orders.
To be explicitly clear, would we like to do this? Yes. Is it simple, straightforward and uncomplicated? No.
Problem 1: Kickstarter does not make backer data exportable until after the Kickstarter concludes. When I reach out to a fulfillment service, their first question is: How many backers do you have in each country, (and please break that number down by pledge level)? We can manually go look at each backer, but there's not a way to easily say with certainty "We currently have 300 backers located in the UK."
Problem 2: We don't have a final page count for Knave 2. It doesn't seem that it will be far beyond 80 pages, but without a locked page count we don't have a spine width and a weight. The second question asked by these fulfillment services is: "What is the final weight and dimensions of your packed packages?" We don't have this. We can guess. We can estimate, but we can't *know* for certain yet.
Aside: One of the things we need to do is set customer expectations. When you're dealing with estimations and don't have hard data, choices have to be made. For example, my educated guess is that Knave 2 will weigh 11 oz. Adding packaging and the weight should still be under 1 pound. For packages sent from the US there's a price difference for packages under a 1 pound and over 1 pound. It's also feasible (not likely but possible) that Knave 2 could weigh 13 oz, and if packaging is 3 oz it could hit that 1 pound weight. Do we quote everyone the lower shipping price upfront and hope for the best? Or do we quote the higher shipping price upfront and hope we can come down once we have firm data? With thousands of backers, a mistake becomes harder to "eat" because it adds up faster.
Problem 3: I have been told, by multiple fulfillment services, that in order to utilize their non-US fulfillment locations, we need to:
Register the business in the UK, EU, Canada and Australia.
Collect VAT.
Remit VAT quarterly to those governments.
One service's sales guy says "they think they have a work around but they're still looking into it" and I haven't yet heard back from them. Another service says we should be able to use their IOSS number, but we can't use it for packages with a value higher than 150 Euro (meaning the highest pledge tier is ineligible). This is a difficult problem.
Problem 4: Fees.
Most of these fulfillment services offer "self service" (meaning packages ship from the US). The prices of the self service are either the same that we quoted initially, or they're approximately $1 cheaper. In order to lower the shipping price for backers individually, we need to use their local fulfillment services. Fees vary, and I'm not going to go into specific details, but here are some examples of the types of fees that happen:
Intake of the items. Charges based on weight or quantity and how they're packed.
A fee for each SKU (meaning a charge for standard Knave, premium, Summer's End, Maze Rats, the patch, etc)
A fee for each item picked for an order
A fee for packing each order
These fees are pretty standard, and they happen with US warehouses too. The purpose for bringing them up is that the US warehousing situation is "handled" with as much automation and processes as can be mustered. There are also some outstanding questions like: How do they need to receive the data and requests for orders? Some have a proprietary system/web portal. Some need a special spreadsheet. Some will accept our spreadsheet, but then charge a "conversion fee".
On top of this the shipment needs to be broken up at the printer and sent to 5 different global shipping hubs. Increasing the overall freight bill.
Some of the services, in order to use all their features, want to collect the shipping fees directly, but to do that they charge a fee per Kickstarter backer.
And finally, most of the fulfillment services don't handle or process returns of any kind. If an address is incorrect or the shipment is refused for any reason the entire package is lost. Others can accept them, but have a separate fee for this situation.
Overall
Assuming there aren't horiffic price spikes between the end of the Kickstarter and the printing of the book, the shipping costs we've provided so far are "worst case scenario", and we're working to reduce them on multiple fronts.
Knave 2 is not going to be limited to the Kickstarter. If you can't back at this time, there will be opportunities to get your hands on it in the future. If you're not able to pick it up directly from us, we are actively partnering with retailers to carry the book after the fact, and you can legitimately help get this book into stores, by going into those stores and asking them to carry it.
)
