saplanet originals™

Is it tad too early to review the year that is still passing through? I don’t know about you, but 2011 has been seeing many changing – changes that are not fully settled in yet – for me, in every aspect of my life, not just the business segment.

It’s like a year of multiple turning points. Year of grasping new revelations; Year of renewals. With all the new events and things marching forward – yeah, I think ‘marching’ is the right word, since the changes are impending and seemingly undeterred – and replacing old beliefs and values, it’s quite a whopping lot to work on.

On the business front, it’s been a blessed year of busyness. The coming year will be a year of changes, when we put things in places and decide what stays, what leaves – for good.

[ Changes to expect in 2012 ]

Supplies – Safety Eyes & Noses

We will be expecting a well-stocked inventory for safety eyes and noses section. By mid 2012, we should be able to offer most of the sizes – which should increase by then too, from 4.5mm to 24mm- in bulk and loose packs.

Supplies – Yarns

Due to space constraint, we will not be carrying more yarns than we already have. In fact, the cotton series will be discontinued.

Finished Products (Made-to-Order)

The turnaround time* will stretch much longer – projected to be 2-3 weeks from payment. Currently, the turnaround for dolls and most finished products is 5-7 working days (more days for more quantity).

*turnaround time refers to the production time to make the product. This does not include the ‘wait time’ for the order to be made according to the order schedule; and does not including shipping transit time.

Finished Products (Custom Designs)

Custom designs refer to designs that are new and different from our existing designs. Customizing colors and making minor changes – such as switching hairstyle from one design to another of our existing designs etc – do not count as custom designs, as they are manageable requests that do not need rebuilding the doll construction.

Depending on the request and volume of the order, the turnaround time is estimated to be 2-6 months.

Project Kits

We have pulled out all our project kits since the first quarter of 2011. This is one of our best selling products, that’s why it is taking us forever to make this decision. There is a chance that this section will be removed completely by 2012. We are unable to pre-pack all the large collection of our amigurumi designs, due to space constraint and practicality, and it is too time-consuming to pack different kits on daily basis. Unless we decide to get more help with packing, we are sorry this has to go.

Patterns (eTutorial)

With all the changes in place, we are hoping to have more time to work on new designs on a more regular basis.

Shipping & FAQ

We are expecting to clean up our eShop by 2012, when some sections will be removed from the eShop. We will include a FAQ page, heavily targeting on popular topics such as Shipping.

We already have Shipping Policy page that provides quite a comprehensive spread of information on shipping matters, but we are receiving emails on questions about shipping on a daily basis.

The new FAQ page will serve as the reply page. The link to the page will be included to the amended Auto-Response email, and we are unlikely to reply if the question is straight-forward and the answer can be found on the FAQ. We encourage buyers to go through the shipping policy before shopping with us, as it will facilitate better decision-making when choosing the method to ship by weighing the advantages and risks.

Promotion – Crazy 8

The Crazy 8 promotion was a blast! A little hiccup with the payment stage because PayPal was conducting a maintenance schedule at the exact same time.

We have received numerous feedbacks and suggestions to hold the time-sensitive promotion separately. Oh well, I guess I can do that, but it will not be perfect.

Changes:

1. Venue – the promotion will be moved to our eShop instead of the Facebook plugin cart.

2. You will need to be registered with us to shop on our eShop – so you might want to do that soon, before the next promotion launch.

3. Restriction control – we will have a better control over the restrictions and reduce the time and effort to credit the reward points after the transaction. The reward points will be credited automatically once the order is shipped.

4. Combined shipping – purchases of Crazy 8 promotion items can be combined with other regular purchases. This is especially useful when we run promotion on physical products. In addition, you will be able to choose different shipping method as per your preferences.

5. Time – The promotion will be held in 2 time slots; probably 12 hours apart. You will have to decide which time slot fits your time zone and schedule better. Like I said, it’s not perfect, but this would be the best I could do. If I hold it on our eShop, I could run one of them before I go to sleep – which might be the day time for some of you – and leave the promotion running, since the cart is capable of controlling the quantity.

6. Payment – During the promotion period, only PayPal is accepted; eCheque is not acceptable too.

That’s all for the boring stuffs – they are quite exciting changes for me though. Meanwhile, I am working on a very tight schedule, but a new pattern will be launched in September (this is a hint that the promotion will be launched too!).

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