Order Board Lore

I figure it’s time for a Kickstarter campaign status update. The past couple months have been the busiest times in recent memory. In fact, I don’t think I’ve crammed that much since studying for final exams in university. I again thank all the people who joined in to help me complete the Christmas orders and who therefore ensured the backers would have their promised Boardcrafting rewards to give to their loved ones.

One of the things I was working on in November and December was figuring out what the Fancywood Edition should be. I have a design and a manufacturing process for that item now, and I’ll try to get some nice photos up soon.

In December, I shipped 95 rewards. My original self-imposed deadline was Dec 10. My actual last day of shipping was Dec 17. (Well, I actually was shipping a few special orders out until the morning of Dec 22…) Since then, I’ve taken a little holiday time for myself, and have been looking back at the last couple months to decide what worked and what didn’t.

New Years Resolutions

I really need some automatic (or manual, but really cheap) way of peeling all the tape off the pieces. Maybe there’s some tool like one would use to plane wood.

I think I would have less stress if I kept all the boards together as they go through the steps, rather than eg, have 5 waiting to be lasered, 5 ready to be peeled and 9 waiting to be assembled.

I need to find an economical way to make frame kits. They were the 2nd most popular reward, but I was losing money on them at $60.

I need to figure out how to make a frame that will fit the Settlers of Catan expansions. In my survey, it was highly requested.

That’s been the ride so far. The thing that I am so amazed by is the feedback I’ve been getting from pleased backers. Knowing the impact my boards have made is so positive and appreciated is definitely not something I got from software development.