Hello there, I would like to say a few words on behalf of myself, my wife and partner Nancy and my oldest daughter Natalie who now works with us as a full time member of our team. We have completed what has been a most painstaking year mostly spent on playing catch-up with the large orders from the past two previous years. Though we made what we consider to be great progress in 2002 by successfully getting a total of 38 orders done by the end of our shipping period (roughly 6,000 figures in assorted scales), we could have accomplished more if it had not been for the overwhelming heat waves that plagued us all summer long.
They cost us another 9 weeks or so of precious painting time because we do not have the luxury of A/C in our painting area or our home/office. There were days when the temperatures reached 45oC or 110oF with the humidity making it feel even higher. The paint would congeal on our brushes before we could apply it to the figures we were working on and under these conditions, aside from the fact we had perspiration dripping into our eyes, it is simply inhumanly possible to work...So if you include the time we lost last year to this (roughly 20 weeks) because of our moving to new quarters and the painful tumor I had to have removed on my right hand, we are still pretty much behind in our orders though things are improving alot. Also, 2002 has been a slow year in the ordering sector and we as well as many other industries are still recovering from the after effects of 9/11.
Dave Cowie our friend and former partner in Australia has left our team in April of 2002 and has decided to go into business for himself selling unpainted miniatures and offering a painting service on his own. If you are interested in visiting his site go to MILMOD HOBBIES.
We have all learned over the past 5 years, that to give firm deadlines for customer orders is simply unrealistic... We can give, tentative time frames but so much can happen as it did to us over the past two years to throw our painting schedules for a loop that we can in all honesty not predict an exact completion date for ANY of our customers orders... All we can ask is that our customers will bear with us and continue to be patient and understanding. We have not neglected or forgotten your orders, we are working on them, and we will get them out to you all as soon as humanly possible. I personally work about 12 to 14 hours a day on painting with the odd break to answer e-mails, eat and a short sleep period. I work from 9:00AM till almost 1:00AM seven days a week. Weekends are just another work day, and we haven't had time to take a holiday in over five years now. I don't regret this, as I love doing what I do, but, it is hard on both me and my family at times to find the justification...As Nancy puts it: "There is a lot to be said for working a 9 to 5 job for an employer and getting a regular pay cheque, paid vacation and benefits!". Being an entrepreneur has a lot of ups and downs. When the ups come, it is great! But when a series of downs occur, it makes life difficult and productivity and the quality of life in general suffers from it.
It has been suggested to me by others and from customers that perhaps we should put a stop to taking orders until we were caught up, but, this is not a viable option for us. Both Nancy and I are retired and apart from a small pension that we get every month which is not even enough to cover our rent here, both Nancy and I rely heavily on orders for painted miniatures and a little work from Nancy's Computer Consulting and Web Page Design business. So, we really cannot afford to stop taking orders or the bills would not get paid and we would be out on the street without a place to live or work... That is the stark reality of the situation as it stands and because of the economic downturn we have suffered since September 11th, 2001 orders are not coming in as regularly as they did in the past so we are living pretty much from week to week to make ends meet.
We still have that ever looming backlog of orders from 2002 and a few from as far back as February of 2001 which we must first still deal with but these will be cleared up for the most part before the end of September 2003 (we hope).
In these online pages we have decided to go a completely different route than in previous years. First let me begin by saying that we have given lengthy and careful consideration before making these changes and that because of many factors involved, we have come to the conclusion that we will no longer be offering to supply miniatures to our customers for our online painting services any more... That said, let me reassure all our curent customers who have orders with us for miniatures to be painted, that we will honor your current orders, but any future orders received by us from you, it will be your own responsibility to provide us with the miniatures you wish to have painted by us.
The reasons for these changes are many... But the most pertinent are as follows:
- We have been spending far too much time online on updating and re-pricing our online catalogue pages because of constant changes and price hikes from our distributors and suppliers. Time I might add, that could have been better spent on working on your miniature orders.
- Only too often have we suffered delays because of suppliers not delivering miniatures to us either on time, in entirety without back orders, or un-damaged and not requiring us to re-order more miniatures to replace the damaged goods to fill our customers orders.
- We and our suppliers have also been plagued by a number of lost shipments and as a result have found it necessary to request that all goods shipped to us be registered and insured which has proven very costly and as a result forcing us to increase our prices well above what we felt was fair for our work.
- Lastly, over the past 5 years we have been in business, we have accumulated a VAST stockpile of overage in extra figures, some of which we may or may not ever sell because suppliers do not always allow us to order only what we need to fill a customers order and rather send us packages of 100 or so figures at times when we only require 24 or less figures of a particular number or type. Though we have insisted that certain minimum quantities of figures be ordered of one type by our customers, this still left us barely breaking even in many cases and we were still left with THOUSANDS of added and un-necessary miniatures. These same miniatures tend to take up a considerable amount of precious workspace, need to be sorted and indexed and lets face it, they are heavy as the blazes and if we get many more we will have subflooring problems in our workshop...
In the year 2003 other changes to our ordering and shipping policy will come into effect as well. We have found that by not limiting the size of a customer's order in the past that some customers took advantage of this and sent us extremely large orders sometimes exceeding 3,000 figures or more at a time. Because of our current policy of working on each order in the numerical sequence in which they are received, some of our other customers' orders have been seriously delayed by as much as 10 or 12 months or more. Therefore, we no longer accept orders of unlimited size but have adopted the following policy below:
- Orders for 6mm miniatures will not exceed 300 pieces per order
- Orders for 10mm miniatures will not exceed 200 pieces per order
- Orders for 15mm miniatures will not exceed 150 pieces per order
- Orders for 25mm miniatures will not exceed 75 pieces per order
- Orders for 30mm and larger miniatures (to be discussed before ordering).
This however does not mean that a customer will only be allowed one order at a time from us. We do ask however that customers if they wish to send us more than one such order at atime do so at intervals of 1 to 2 months apart to allow other customers to have a chance at having their figures worked on as well. These other orders must must still adhere to the maximum amounts per order and these will be treated in the sequence in which they are received. Effectively, under ideal circumstances, a customer could in fact expect anywhere from 2 to 3 finished orders from us per year. (this amount may vary up or down depending on how busy we are at the time).
Even though we now have 1 full-time painter and one part-time working on your orders we are still experiencing delays in getting your orders out on time. This was partly due to delivery of figures from our suppliers (which at some times can be most frustrating) but mostly, simply by the sheer volume of work as it is at the moment and let's not rule out ill health and lost time caused by working conditions. As you can see from the photo at right showing our orders pending lined up in plastic trays we are still very busy.
Though we have tried to add to our painting staff again in 2002, we have not had any success whatsoever. We have screened 9 applicants all of which did not meet our quality of workmanship or the necessary knowledge of military uniforms. Also, it is one thing to be a good painter, but a totally different matter to be a good painter of military miniatures. All applicants we tried so far, sorely lacked in military miniature painting experience or general knowledge of military uniforms & history.
Now, regarding shipments of figures from customers who would have us paint their figures for them and who already have their own figures and do not require us to supply them or do not have the figures but are ordering them and will be sending them to us for painting:
- If these figures are packaged in original packages by the manufacturer, please remove them from such packages and be certain that there are no prices attached to them.
- Include detailed instructions along with your figures as to how you want them painted. The more detail we have ( i.e. Campaign period, Regiment name or number, Battalion number etc.), the better
- Do not send your payment or instructions for painting the miniatures along with them in the package but rather as a separate letter to us
- Send us your figures by Air Mail shipment or Express Post if in Canada, and if you wish to ensure delivery send them by registered mail if possible as we will not be held responsible for lost or damaged shipments from our customers.
- We cannot receive any shipments by courier service here in the rural area where we live so please no UPS, Fed EX or DHL etc.
- When declaring the value of your figures for customs purposes, please note that any customs clearing costs we incur to receive your figures will be your responsibility and if you declare any amount on your parcel, that you should understand that you will be held responsible for a charge of $5.50 Cdn. for handling charges as well as a 15% tariff tax based on the Canadian Dollar echange rate value at the time of receipt of your figures.
- To avoid such added tariffs, we suggest you declare the parcel and its contents as a "GIFT" and if you must put a declared value on your raw miniatures, make it less than $20.00Cdn. as any larger amount will be subject to customs and duty as mentioned above.
I would also like to point out that; although we basically started out as a Napoleonic Military Miniature Painting Service, and this is still the mainstay of our business with Ancient miniatures coming a close second, we also paint miniatures from just about any Historical period or even Fantasy & Sci-Fi. Just drop us a letter or e-mail and we will be happy to discuss your needs with you. One last note, we deeply regret, but, we will no longer be accepting commercial orders from retailers requesting a discount for our work. It is simply no longer economically feasible to do so as we are virtually working for a mere 50% of the figure value in so doing and let's face it , we wouldn't be in this business if we didn't need the money! So we apologize for this but we have no choice in the matter... Our time is precious and materials are expensive and we have bills to pay like everyone else!
Now for a few words from my wife and partner Nancy pictured in our nerve centre and office area at right : "Hi there, just want to say thank you to all our customers for a great 5 years and we look forward to your continued patronage and our continued efforts to be the best and most reasonably priced hand-painting service available anywhere on or off the Internet. I would like to take the time to explain a bit more about the way we operate our little venture here at our home based office and workshop".
OPERATING PROCEDURES
- When we receive an order from you, we immediately send you an e-mail notifying you of its arrival.
- We attempt to give our customers an approximate shipping date of between 16 to 20 weeks for the finished order from the time your payment clears our bank. But, as John put it above, this is not written in stone and should be considered merely as an approximate guide.
- Though we try our best to keep each and everyone of you informed as to the status of your order's progress, it is not always possible to contact each and every one of our customers on a regular basis. Rather, if we anticipate any particular delay in delivering your order on a promised date we will contact you to inform you of this and why.
- If you have any enquiries as to anything about our site, we ask that you first please check our FAQs Page to try and find the answer to your question before writing to us. Answers pertaining to shipping and handling charges can be found on our Order Page.
- When we receive an e-mail enquiry from you, either I or my husband John will reply to you as soon as possible, (usually within 24 hours) and try to answer your questions in an informative and detailed a way as we possibly can. If you have any comments or suggestions we are more than happy to receive your observations and thank you in advance.
- Effective July 1st, 2003, we have decided that 50% of your order value be made payable to us up-front along with your miniatures. The reasoning for this is we no longer have to put out our own money to order in miniatures from suppliers for your orders.
- When your order is complete, we will again contact you to verify your current mailing address and to inform you that your order will be shipped upon receipt of the remaining 50% of your order value.
- We highly recommend and cannot stress enough that you have your finished figures insured and sent back to you by registered mail. If you have any problem with your order such as broken miniatures though so far we have been lucky in this respect and not many figures have been damaged in shipment though some parcels appear to have been drop kicked to you, you will then at least have a chance to recover your losses for any damaged figures if this occurs from the postal service. We will not be held responsible for any lost or damaged shipments of figures not registered and insured so govern yourself accordingly. We do our utmost to ensure that your figures are packaged in as secure a way as possible taking great pains to wrap each figure individually in plastic zip-lock bags and labelling each bag for ease of identification. These are then packed in a combination of styrofoam peanuts and bubble wrap and placed in a strong shipping carton then wrapped again with durable brown wrapping paper.
- If you are going to be moving prior to receiving your order from us, please, contact us and let us know well in advance that we may make note of your change of address and update our records. This is very important!
- If you are unsure about the quality of our workmanship, we recommend you either view our Gallery of Painted Samples or better still send us one of your figures to obtain an actual painted sample of the scale and figures you are interested in.
- Do not send us any requests to place a rush on, or specify a deadline date for your orders, we cannot accept this sort of request as we deal with all orders in the same numerical sequence that they are received without exception! We do not show favouritism and all our customers are dealt with equally fast and diligently.
- We do not accept orders by e-mail, and insist that even if you write us to enquire about a quote and give us your order online that you still fill out and print the above mentioned Order Form and that it accompany your payment.
- We apologise but we do not accept credit card payments or Pay-Pal for your orders, nor will we accept partial payments. We believe that if you cannot pay for your order in entirety that you should only order that portion of your order that you can afford to pay for at one time. We used to agree to partial payments on extremely large orders in the past under extenuating circumstances, but found that it was simply too much bookkeeping for us to keep track of and with our current order maximums there should not be any reason for this anymore.
- All payments should be made payable to me: Nancy L. Wood and be in the form of a certified cheque, international money order or bank draft. Personal cheques are also accepted, but there is an additional delay of 4 to 5 business days while your cheque clears our bank before we can process your order. To US and international customers, if you are paying us in other than Canadian dollars, please add an extra $3.50 US or equivalent to your order to cover our cost of converting your payment to Canadaian dollars when cashing your payments at our bank.
That's it for now, except thanks for your co-operation and continued patience and understanding and here's to another great year!"
Now a word from Natalie our oldest daughter and newest full-time painter pictured at left in her little corner of the painting area:
Hi folks! If any of you have any special Fantasy or Sci-Fi figs that you want painted, be sure and write me in person, I am the RPG and Warhammer Fantasy figurine painting expert of our team... I will give your figures the expert touch that you will be proud of as you lead your howling Orc hordes across the wargames table to victory over the low life human, elven and dwarvish scum! :o)
For details and prices for these custom paint jobs please get in touch with me "Natalie" with a description of your figures and I will be more than happy to answer your inquiries and work out a quote for you as well as work on your miniature orders. I may not be as fast a painter as my dad, but we are constantly in competition with each other to see which of us is the better painter. Personally, I think I am the best, :o) but I will let you be the judge! Hee! hee! See the sample of 15mm Orcs on wolves that I painted up and based ready for action below! For more samples of my work go to my own Miniature Painting Website at: LONE WOLF MINIATURES.
We are also happy to announce the launch of our own Yahoo Military Miniature Painting Group, and we invite each and everyone of our visitors to drop by and become members of the club. We plan to use this platform as a discussion forum and a place to exchange ideas and painting tips as well as announce new product lines and figure releases. So click on the link below to take you to the group:
Hello there, I would like to say a few words on behalf of myself, my wife and partner Nancy and my oldest daughter Natalie who now works with us as a full time member of our team. We have completed what has been a most painstaking year mostly spent on playing catch-up with the large orders from the past two previous years. Though we made what we consider to be great progress in 2002 by successfully getting a total of 38 orders done by the end of our shipping period (roughly 6,000 figures in assorted scales), we could have accomplished more if it had not been for the overwhelming heat waves that plagued us all summer long.
