A 10-video orientation series started today over on my YouTube channel. Every Saturday, Sunday, and Wednesday for the next few weeks, a video will be released in the morning. Haha, that’s right. Weekends and hump days.
This morning a white truck pulled up next to our house. Our decks have arrived!
The order was for “curb side delivery,” meaning the truckers were only obligated to drop those boxes on those wooden pallets (which apparently we had to pay for) off literally “curb side.” But they were so sweet and moved each pallet into our garage for us!
And now we begin the laborious process of unpacking from those pallets and moving those boxes inside. We don’t want to leave them in the garage, so today and tomorrow, we are literally doing heavy lifting to get what you see there into the house, one box at a time. Eeps. I better have toned arms after this!
Also, time to prep the assembly line!
Back in 2018 I shared a video of the first time I unboxed my First Edition Spirit Keeper’s Tarot. I thought it’d be fun to share me looking through the Revelation Edition for the first time.
Michael is the broker dude. I was at the office when James texted me the above. 4:21 pm today, Oct. 4, 2021. So there you have it. We will receive delivery of the shipment some time between Wednesday and Friday. At the rate of my luck right now, let’s just say it’s gonna be Friday. =)
Continue reading “Australia & New Zealand Pre-Orders + Delivery Status Update”
First, the important but dry status update report. There are none. Sigh. The container that my decks are in finally made it to the warehouse on Friday, October 1. Delivery of the shipment to my front doorstep will happen next week.
When exactly next week, I asked? The reply I got was “some time next week.” Can we narrow that projection? Some time next week. Like are we talking Monday to Wednesday or are we talking about Wednesday to Friday? :: radio silence :: Sigh. Welp. :: hands up and a shrug :: There ya go. Some time next week is when I will get the decks and next-next week is when we will start shipping them out. Assuming everything I’ve said above is accurate. Another sigh.
Continue reading “A “No Updates” SKT Update + Personal Ramblings”
I gave you wrong information in my previous status update here. That’s because the third-party importer/broker that my manufacturer hired to oversee delivery gave me wrong information. (And that’s also what I really want to go nuts telling all of you all about! What an… ARGH! You’ve got to hear this whole story. Like. Ugh.)
Only after I turned into an all-out full-on Karen did I finally get the name of the warehouse. And still, no contact info was provided to me for that warehouse, so I had to go search for it myself.
I called the warehouse directly this morning (the info wasn’t given to me until last Friday; my status update to you was on Saturday; today is Monday) and spoke with a very kind, pleasant fellow at the warehouse.
It turns out my packages are not at the warehouse yet, as I was told by the broker/importer guy. Thank goodness I took the initiative to look up the warehouse contact and called on my own.
So here’s the real deal. There are 15 containers ahead of mine in line for unloading at the warehouse. Until those 15 containers of goods are unloaded into the warehouse and one by one shipped out by truck to where they need to go, no one is even going to get to me.
While he doesn’t know exactly how long it’s going to take, by his best estimate, it is going to be another 2 weeks before they unload the container that my packages are in and my boxes are delivered to me.
One more ARGH! moment: The guy at the warehouse and I took a long time figuring out what reference number info I had to give him for him to track my package BECAUSE… get this… because the importer/broker guy filled out my forms wrong. ARGHHHH!!
Oh– and (!!!)– I was given the wrong # of boxes in my total shipment. I was told 36 boxes, and kinda thinking in my head, oh wow, each box is gonna be huge (because, math, which means there would be about 100 decks in each box, which means each box is going to require at least 2 people to lift). When I finally talked to that warehouse guy this morning, he said, “Uh, no, ma’am… it’s 63 boxes. You’ve got 63 boxes incoming.” The exact # of boxes matters because that’s how you do your initial headcount, to make sure you’ve got everything before you start opening the boxes up.
Breathe…breathe… okay. I’m calm. Promise. I’m very calm. Everything is fine. Nothing to see here. Happy Monday.
::adds whiskey to my next cup of coffee…it’s not even 9 am…::
As I’ve been told, the decks are now in a warehouse near the Port of Oakland (here in California) and we’re waiting for our turn for delivery to our front doorstep.
Between my last SKT communiqué and this one, there’s a lot simmering in me that I want to vent and chit-chat about, but I’m going to hold off on that for now, focus on what’s the priority (getting the decks to you), and at some future time, we’ll talk. =) Oh boy, will we!
I still don’t have the decks (inferred by the first sentence of this update, I hope, but I suppose it bears spelling out) but a projection has been given for last week of September. That’s when the decks will physically, literally be in my home.
In the meantime, we’ve done our best to transform parts of our home into a warehouse and assembly line, so the plan is once the decks arrive, we’ll do a final quality check, tally of what’s arrived, make sure everything is in order and we have enough decks that pass superficial quality check to send out to all pre-orders. What I mean by “superficial quality check” is we give the outside box a quick look. For making sure the cards, cardstock, illustrations, gilding, booklet, all the interior stuff, we will open at random a deck here and a deck there a box there and a box here for arbitrary quality checks, and assume if all these random decks we open are fine, then the rest should be fine, too.
Continue reading “SKT Deliveries Begin First Week of October”
I’m continuing to keep you up to date on all the granular details of your SKT pre-order and deck delivery, because it turns out many of you– lots– are full-blown nerds like me and find this stuff interesting. Who knew.
Continue reading “Importing the SKT Decks: CBP Form 7501 Entry Summary”
In my last SKT update sharing the Bill of Lading, I shared the version with the ship my decks were supposed to be on. But something happened with the manufacturer, they didn’t get the boxes on board in time, so it was delayed. It had to wait for another vessel, and the manufacturer simply didn’t think to update me until I proactively reached out and asked.
Here’s the actual Bill of Lading:
I was tracking the vessel named “EVER FEAT” thinking that was the boat my decks were on.
But no.
My decks never made it on to EVER FEAT due to delays.
Instead, it’s on CMA CGM LOIRE (click on the hyperlink to track the ship).
Continue reading “SKT Delivery Update and New Lessons Learned Re: Import-Export”
Just a super quick update that really doesn’t contain any substantive content with regards to your pre-order, but some of you might find a look-see at the Bill of Lading to be interesting. So here you go. With personal info redacted. =)
A Bill of Lading, or B/L (you can also see it in shorthand as BoL) is used in import-export, to acknowledge and document cargo on board. I’m sharing what ours looks like in case that’s something you were curious about. Haha. I dunno. I think this is something I’d find interesting if I pre-ordered a deck. So here you go. In case you’re like me.
Continue reading “SKT Revelation Pre-Orders Update: Bill of Lading”
Printing and production completed on July 21, 2021. You might recall from an earlier update, the projected completion date I had gotten from the factory was July 19 at the latest. So we are running behind schedule.
The decks then had to go through one final quality assurance check at the factory before it’s packaged and prepared for overseas shipping. The shipping time is between 45 and 50 days.
We’ve been assured by our factory that the decks are shipping out this week, but as of this precise moment that I’m typing, it has not been shipped out yet. Just to keep the numbers and projection on the conservative side, let’s assume the factory isn’t ready to ship until Friday, which means it actually ships next Monday, August 3. Sigh. Okay.
We’ve been told shipping by sea takes 45 to 50 days. If it arrives in port on the 45th day, it’ll be on US soil on September 16. If it’s the 50 day mark, then that’s September 21.
It then has to go through US customs. The last time we went through US customs for a large shipment was pre-pandemic, and it took about 7 to 10 days. I heard from other business owners who import goods that right now it’s closer to 14 days.
So let’s just assume my shipment arrives on September 21 and takes 14 days to go through US customs. We’re now looking at actual receipt of the decks around October 5.
Continue reading “SKT Pre-Orders Update and Some More Good-to-Know Tidbits”
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