Today, we released 2 posters and a shirt on the website. The time was announced (which is something we don’t like to make a habit) and we sold out of both posters in around 35 minutes. After the dust had settled on today’s release I checked Twitter and my email and found over 75 messages with people essentially saying, “Fuck you guys” or “You just lost a customer.” It’s not unheard of that people are upset when they don’t get something they really want and in our business it’s even worse because all of our pieces are limited edition, but these emails made me want to write an open letter and kind of let people look behind the curtain to see what we are doing with our release days. Several people think we are unprepared and go about these things not realizing the demand our posters have, but that is not the case. Could anyone have imagined that THE EVIL DEAD release would have more people (well over 1,000 on the site this morning) going after posters than the IRON MAN 2 release did? I love being open with our fanbase and this blog post will hopefully shed some light on the inner workings of Mondo and illustrate how we are working very hard to make release days as easy as possible for you…the fans.
QUANTITY AND THE AFTERMARKET
We have gained lots of new fans in the last several months and one thing we always get asked is if we will reprint. The answer is no. We are big supporters of limited editions staying limited. We will do variants and things like that, but the edition size will always be stated up front. We are also aware that some people out there don’t buy our posters to hang on their wall. Some of our posters are very popular on the aftermarket. It’s no secret, I assure you. I can understand the frustration it may cause fans that tried to get one as a gift or to hang in their office only to miss out on one and then they turn around and see someone else that got one immediately selling it. The truth is, we cannot control that. We do limit our sales and try to make sure everyone gets one, but that’s all we can do. Rest assured that we ARE NOT the ones putting the posters up for sale on eBay, so getting angry at us about it will do nothing. We sell the posters in our store in Austin, online and at the shows the posters were made for. Once the posters sell out, they are gone forever.
OUR SITE
Probably the most common email I get is the one where people tell us to up our bandwidth or get more cookies or whatever. Admittedly, the performance of the website has been and still is the most frustrating part of the job to us at Mondo. I am on the phone at least 3 days a week talking to technicians trying to tweak this and that all in an attempt to make sure the website doesn’t crash. The fact is, it’s almost impossible to get everything right. When there are hundreds and sometimes thousands of people all trying to buy one poster at the same time, there will be problems. Even sites like OBEY crash and they are 10 times the size of us. We have a dedicated server and are constantly tweaking the shopping cart and individual item pages to make the performance of the site better.
I’m not trying to make excuses here. Not one bit. I’m simply trying to say that we are trying. We don’t have the money to throw at having multiple servers like Amazon or other mega sites. I’ve been trying to work with Digital River that runs the Matty Collector sales and even Sideshow Toys because of their nice sale day sites. So, bottom line, if the site goes down, it sucks, but the reason it’s going down isn’t because of poor planning or lack of prep….it’s because of too much enthusiasm and excitement from fans. It is impossible to gauge excitement for a certain release. It’s all part of the thrill we get from our jobs.
SHOPPING CART
This has been an ever increasing question from fans and since we’re trying to clarify things today, I thought I’d share an actual email we got about this subject:
I don’t know how this normally works, but I was in the middle of completing my order – the last screen was loading up. My roommate asked me for assistance with something, so I went to help him and when I came back to press check-out, it said there was nothing in my cart and when I tried again, the poster was sold out. I thought having something in the cart automatically reserved the item for me, at least for a few minutes?
So, the questions is, if you put a poster in your cart, does that mean it’s yours? No. Having something in your cart doesn’t mean it’s reserved for you. The only way that item comes out of inventory and into your home is if you pay for it. This is the same way on tons of other sites and is the absolute, best way to handle inventory.
YOU’VE LOST A CUSTOMER…FOREVER
This is probably the worst thing we hear from fans upset about not getting the poster they were shooting for. If we take this morning’s release as an example, you’ll see our predicament. We had 1,000 people on the site trying to get a little over 300 posters. Because Olly Moss’ run says 250, that doesn’t mean we have 250 for sale. The studio has their comps, we sold some at the show last week, Olly gets copies, etc. So, we had around 150 or so of Olly’s to sell and 1000 people on the site. Theoretically, we could have 850 people furious at us because they didn’t get a poster. Just know that this is what happens with limited edition releases. If you don’t get one, we are VERY SORRY. We want everyone to get what they want, but it is impossible. Stick with us, though. If you missed THE EVIL DEAD posters, we have something awesome coming up next week, and the week after that and the one after that. We have a ton of really amazing projects coming up that will last the rest of the year, so please…hang in there.
HOW WE ANNOUNCE SALES
We announce the on sale of our posters and shirts by many ways. We send out a bulk email, announce it on this blog, announce it on Facebook, Twitter and we also get covered by many major news sites. Many people ask us to announce times for our releases which we really don’t like doing. It’s a situation that can be described by the old cliche, “Damned if you do. Damned if you don’t.” By releasing our posters at random times, it greatly eases traffic on the site. When we announce times, like we did today, the site bogs down and everything slows. The site didn’t officially crash today, but it got way too slow for my liking.
I’ll leave it at that. To sum up, we try to produce the best products for the best movies and want you to be able to have them in your home. We have grown by leaps and bounds the last year or so and are still trying to get everything perfect, so stick with us. If you have any questions, please ask them in the comments. I’m looking forward to answering them.
-Justin
Thanks for clearing things up. Keep up the good work!
Great open letter. It’s a shame so many people get angry, but NOT getting a poster makes the getting it so much better. I’ve missed opportunities before, but have five on my walls, (only one that needed a mark-up purchase from eBay). The quality of work is fantastic and the limited edition status is, to me, the biggest appeal. The chase is part of the fun and makes a success that much sweeter. Keep up the great work Mondo, your products truly are a joy for a film geek and graphic designer such as myself.
A couple of things-
1) It might be nice to put something up on the site similar to Shepherd Fairey’s sentiment regarding Ebay flippers – http://obeygiant.com/store/help.php?section=policy
I don’t know exactly how he enforces it but it might be worth looking into. That is my absolute number 1 complaint about the process. You can see numerous Moss Evil Dead prints on ebay now for ~$200. It is seriously infuriating and I’m one of the people who got lucky today.
2) Who sets the quantities? If you really want to make your customers happy, increase the quantities. If there were 1000 people on the site today, ready to buy, why turn down their money? Why not give people a set time to order (something reasonable like a 1-2 hour window) and print your run based on the preorders and never reprint after that point.
I understand the culture of S/N screenprints and the monetary appreciation due to rarity but I hate it. Instituting a policy like the one mentioned above would seem to provide more $$$ for everyone involved except the Ebay flippers.
I love your posters and you will not lose me as a client regardless but there has got to be a better way.
Hi Justin. Question: Are people allowed to purchase multiple copies of a given poster? I ask because I often wonder that when someone posts on Ebay and their auction states that they have 3 available, etc. it seems weird. I tried to get 2 Moss today (one was a potential gift for a friend) and was unsuccessful. Thought maybe this had something to do with it. (Got the Bertmer, though. YAY!) Perhaps limiting people to 1 copy a piece would help allow more people to get one.
Thanks, Max
Thanks for all of the comments, everyone.
JB-
1. I admire Fairey’s disdain for flippers, but what would that really do to ward them off. If they want to buy a print to flip, I don’t think harsh words or their conscience is going to get in the way of money. That being said, we were well aware of people putting them up within minutes of ordering and I tried to find their orders and cancel them. I couldn’t figure out who they were, so there they stay. This is definitely a sore subject to a lot of people and I totally understand why. The only thing I’m saying is, please, don’t be angry with us about it. We limit the posters and do everything we can to get people what they want, but there is only so much we can do.
2. We set the quantities. There is no way we can predict the demand a poster will have. If we would’ve printed 500 Olly Moss posters, there very well could’ve been only 100 people wanting them. Does that make sense? This business is not an exact science and the thrill of the hunt is a big part of the excitement of limited edition posters.
Thanks, JB.
-Justin
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Devin Faraci, Justin Ishmael and Inside Rock Poster , Rizzo. Rizzo said: RT @mondonews: If you're curious about how we handle our sales, please read this. Behind The Curtain: How Mondo Handles On Sales http://bit.ly/dDrwux [...]
Hey there!
I appreciate the open letter you put up! It does clarify how you guys operate and the lengths you go thru to put out such quality work.
I am one of the many unfortunate people who could not get one of the Moss Evil Dead prints (which looks bad-ass btw!!) And I was upset because I got so close (Curse you cookies!), but I understand that I’m quite honestly competing with hundreds of other people for this piece and knew the chances of getting one was 50/50! It would look good on my wall, but oh well. No use sending an angry email out. Honestly what’s the point? People need to understand the basics of limited edition. That what makes it so special when you get one of these pieces of work, that you’ve got something that only a select few have!
I am the proud owner of two pieces on my wall (Imaginarium and Wolfman…AWESOME btw!) and eagerly look forward to adding more to my collection. I guess the thing I’m trying to say is that I didn’t get this one, heck I’ll just try again next time you guys release another kick-ass piece!
Keep up the awesome work!
Thanks!
We have ways of limiting the posters, yes. Do we do it for every sale? No. If you ordered more than 1 poster today, you’re getting refunds for the extras. If someone has three on ebay, they may have had friends buy others. Who knows. There are several different avenues they could have taken to get more than one.
Thanks for being up front with everyone. I was mad at missing out on IM2, probably only by a matter of seconds. However, I understand that limited means limited, and it wouldn’t help matters by complaining. I was fortunate enough to score an Evil Dead, so you win some and you lose some. Thanks for making awesome posters!
The only thing I have to say is, when I read the blog I went “oh hell no” at the mention of Mondo trying to work with Digital River. Yes, they do handle Mattel’s Matty Collector stuff, but they are godawful at what they do. If you poke around the web, you’ll find various forums where countless fans of the Matty stuff have been pulling their hair out at how Digital River has bumbled orders, handled customer service issues, etc, etc. Every on sale date for Matty Collector product has pretty much been a nightmare for most customers and they’ve been doing it for well over a year and a half now. Not much else helpful to add I’m afraid, as I haven’t bought anything from the Mondo site and haven’t experienced the fast sell-outs of the posters, shirts, etc. But I’ve seen a lot of online frustration with how DR handles Mattel’s stuff, and thought I’d throw that out there.
Something to keep in mind if you live in Austin, we often times sell the posters at the shows they are made for, so that is an easy way to beat the rush of the site. We often times put people on a waiting list if we have any extras lying around or cancellations.
Craig-
I feel your pain with Digital River. I’m a subscriber to the MOTUC line and I buy the other figures every month. Tytus will be brutal to get, I’m sure. What can I say, I’m a nerd.
Anyways, the thing that intrigued me was their “virtual line.” I’m poking around anywhere I can to get ideas and advice as we are always trying to make sale days smoother for fans. But, don’t worry. We won’t be switching over to Digital River anytime soon.
-Justin
I’m sorry, but I really have no sympathy for people who buy movie posters for investment purposes. I’m interested in movie posters in general, and Mondo posters in particular, because I am a movie fan. I frame my posters and hang them on my wall. I also [GASP!] open my action figures and [SHOCK!] read my comics. As an artist, I would be much happier if my art was on display, not in a box waiting to be scalped online.
You want to invest? Try the stock market.
I have precisely one Mondo poster. I’ve tried to get others numerous times, including today, but have been unlucky every time. The one I have? Given to me as a gift by a friend from Austin.
I don’t want to just bash, because I love the stuff Mondo produces — we spend quite a bit on shirts every time we’re in Austin (once a year) — so I should offer a solution:
Make two printruns — a limited edition and an unlimited edition. You can keep the limited edition numbers low for the investors, and then print enough unlimited to satisfy the Mondo fans who don’t care what number they get, but just want these awesome posters to hang on their walls.
Could you ever work a preordering system? That way you can get an idea of how many posters will sell so there are not too many or too litle posters produced. I understand to the limited edition part of of it, and thats why its tricky. I was lucky to get an iron man 2 last week, but was unable to checkout with one of the evil dead prints (damn 3g iphone!) Yeah its just really frustrating to see the posters appear on ebay for ridiculous prices. I really appreciate the answers and keep up the good work!
It’s amazing to see the explosion of Mondotees store over the past few years.
No site is perfect, so many artists have issues selling their prints. It’s nice to see you continuously trying to improve and making yourself open like this.
Congrats to all involved, even if it’s coming with a few growing pains I hope your success continues and you guys can enjoy it.
Justin,
Trying to stop resellers is like stopping illegal immigrants coming to the US. My point is why bother spend so much time stopping resellers when it’s clearly inevitable. I don’t think any company or artist wants to spend a good chuck on their time catching resellers when they can use their valuable time on something else (i.e. customer service).
I noticed most of the complaints are coming from buyers that are having a hard time checking out when trying to purchase a “hot” poster. My question is, why not use eBay to sell these posters instead of using your own shopping cart? Yes eBay has a small fee BUT at least they won’t crash on people when they’re trying to checkout. Furthermore, no inventory will be oversold AND buyers can pay for their order any time instead of losing out because of a laggy server. Also, I think the small fee outweighs all the bad/mean comments left by buyers to Mondo since it might deter others from purchasing from you guys down the road.
Thanks, Jon. It’s a crazy fun job and we’re really trying to step our game up with licenses and the site.
James-
This type of open forum really gets the wheels turning. Seems like lots of people are using Iphones and other things like that to buy our stuff on sale days. Maybe I’ll try to develop a Mondo app where it’s super streamlined for easier purchases on days like today.
Hammertime-
We’ve looked into it, but it doesn’t have detailed enough accounting software for us. Thanks for the recommendation, though.
-Justin
Justin,
Can’t you guys just import your sales to Excel and transfer them over to Quickbooks? You’re selling posters here and not mutual funds so I highly doubt you’re going to need the best accounting software to tally up your sales.
Small eBay fee? Not really. For every poster sold at $40 eBay would take roughly $5. 12.5% seems like a pretty hefty fee to me.
Hammertime-
Like I said, we looked into it, but it didn’t feel like a good fit for us.
-J
Reading back over my comment, I realized that I might not have been clear.
So you have two runs — the limited edition run, the number of which is set by you and the artist/studio and pre-printed. Then you have the “unlimited” (really, a bad name for it), the run of which is set by the number of sales over a set period of time — 24 hours, a week, etc — you print the number you sold (plus enough to cover misprints and other spoilage), so you don’t have to worry about having a huge amount left over.
What is the point of doing a limited run at all then? People that buy because of the limited runs will lose any interest if there is a second ‘unlimited’ run available.
Hey Justin,
You mentioned Matty Collector/MOTUC, which got me to thinking about their system.
When Matty (Sideshow as well) does a big drop, they convert the shop page so that all the new releases are on one page, and you are able to select the quantity for each new release figure, and then check out with all of the items grouped simultaneously. Have you guys looked into anything like that?
I think it would help, as many of us do purchase more than one new product on release, and it seems like we miss out on one print or everything trying to add something else to our cart. Anyway I was fortunate to get both an Olly shirt/poster, I appreciate all the hard work you guys put in! Keep ‘em coming!
P.S.
That Tytus is going to be a bitch.
When I worked for a small book publisher, we often made limited numbered editions of the titles we printed, generally between 25 and 100. The fact that you could buy a non-numbered version for a lower price didn’t stop the numbered editions from flying off the shelves.
You can have a color plate difference, or simply have a “Limited Edition” stamp next to the number.
And I think that the small amount of people who buy “because of the limited runs” are far outnumbered by the amount of people that would purchase the posters because they look cool. Look at how many people tried to get the Evil Dead posters today — how many wanted them because they were “collectible”, and how many because they were awesome posters?
A lot of people that want them because they are ‘collectible’ also want them because they look cool. Poorly done prints in limited numbers don’t demand much. You would be surprised how many people wanted this because it is collectible. The collectors are the ones who pay the big bucks on ebay. I think you are underestimating the collector market. They could have sold their 150 copies today to people who would put em in a flatfile/portfolio to never see the light of day if they had wanted.
I know full well that there are people that want them because they’re collectible, I just believe that the number of those who don’t care how many were made as long as they get to purchase one far outweigh the former.
I would much rather have the ability to purchase all the posters I find cool than only have the one I do own due to the fact that they are artificially limited.
TONY!
The Four Horsemen rule. I love what they’re doing with the MOTUC series and can’t wait for their new Outer Space Men project. Gonna be nuts.
The way Matty and Sideshow (especially Sideshow) handle their on sales is the reason I started bugging them. If I could do something similar to what they do, I would execute it in a second. Unfortunately, we haven’t found anyone that can do that for us, yet.
We have offers all of the time to wholesale our posters to larger companies to gain more exposure or to make a ton more cash, but we turn all of it down. It’s not what we’re in it for. If we start doing that, we’re not Mondo anymore.
The reason we have a reputation for turning out good products is because there is a small collective of people making the decisions on how things get done Sure, we look at the bottom line…you have to to stay in business, but could we make a lot more money by limiting the color palette of the artist or not printing something with metallic or glow inks? Definitely, but we don’t want to go that route.
First and foremost, we’re fans, so we want to put stuff out that we would actually buy. If any of you are into vinyl figures, I’ll describe it like this. We want to be more like BXH or Secret Base and less like Kid Robot. You will never see our stuff in a Walmart…not because we think our products are below what’s in there or anything like that, it’s just that we have no interest. We truly love the boutique nature of our business and have no intentions of changing it up with second editions or open ended runs.
-J
I hear what you’re saying, and for the most part, I agree. Sour grapes at missing out makes me wonder two things though:
1. Does geographical distance from servers count? I was on Mondo all day waiting for the drop, found out the time, was ready, got it in the cart within five seconds, but the check out took 15 minutes. I’m in England, and wondering if there’s lag over time. Nothing you can do about it if there is, but just know it blows, as I miss out on a lot of big releases (same thing happened with Dan Dangers Wolfman print)
2. Saying “you have no idea for demand” with an Olly Moss print is a bit of a cop-out. I totally agree with a bigish run of 250, but saying you didn’t know it would be popular, given a) how hot he is right now, and b) the insanely good feedback on all the pics over the last week or so is a bit lame.
Anyway, you haven’t lost a customer here, I’m just pissed off and frustrated at the situation, which it seems you guys try to have a good handle on.
oh, aaaaaand 3. Why not let us log in to our accounts before checkout, as with other sites like Posters & Toys? I don’t have auto-fill for my details, which might well be my fault, but if that’s what cost me getting the print, because the pro-flippers all use it, then that seems unfair to me. Just a thought.
Ben-
I never meant to imply that we didn’t think this release wouldn’t be popular, especially Olly’s. But, we never would’ve guessed it would have been bigger than IRON MAN 2. I don’t have an answer for you about the servers and your location geographically, but I’ll look into it.
-J
Justin, really great of you to be willing to discuss this with the rest of us, and give us an open forum.
There’s a difference between an item selling out before demand is met vs. people having trouble completing a checkout process. It may all blur together for someone who misses out, but they are two different questions. I don’t think there’s any need to change what you sell, just how you sell it, right?
Chris and the rest of the tech folks at Sideshow have certainly set up a really good in-house, custom system – but it took them a while and a lot of trial and error. Others here may not know what they do:
On-sale times are pre-announced typically, since they’re not concerened about overload.
They have two entirely separate computer systems – one to handle the purchasing/cart process on the internet which is what the consumer interacts with directly, another to manage the inventory database on the back end. This way, a lot of people trying to purchase doesn’t slow down and hose the actual inventory database, which is typically what causes oversells.
If I remember correctly, they don’t use paypal, so everything is under their control. No bouncing back and forth for the purchaser – that just leads to more room for errors, and more rings to jump through.
30 min prior to on-sale, they shut down their normal site and put a streamlined site that just allows you to purchase the new items, with as few clicks as possible.
Justin, one of the simplest things Sideshow does, which you folks could also do easily but would require a slight shift in your marketing techniques – purchasers *have to* subscribe to their newsletter ahead of time (24 hours?) to be able to purchase (they also have to have a Sideshow account). This is great because it gives an absolute upper limit on the number of people who could possibly attempt to purchase at the same time. It’s more than likely that only some percentage will try for any particular release, but if you know the absolute max, you can design and test your system to be able to handle that.
I think a lot of us could have told you that a striking Olly Moss design with such vivid tones made for a much-loved classic film for only $35 would sell better than another big Tyler Stout traced faces collage with kinda drab colors for an at-the-time-yet-to-be-released sequel.
Cosmically Yours
Justin,
Why don’t you guys ever respond to emails? I had a cart full of items ready to place an order, but I never did get a response about my shipping question and a previous order, so you lost a sizeable order right there. That was like a month ago. I understand that you guys are busy, but taking over a month to respond to an email which would take all of one to two minutes is pretty disappointing. The fact of the matter is that I don’t expect I’ll ever hear back. Even though I’ve bought quite a few shirts, I don’t feel that I am valued or appreciated as a customer in the least. Maybe you guys are getting too big for your own good.
Nathan
How about making EVERY sale a limit of 1 per person for the first 24 hours?
The Iron Man is still there so why not open it up for multiple purchases now?
I missed the Evil Dead poster too, but I’m finding the thrill of the chase is half the fun!
Keep them limited editions, that’s the extra appeal otherwise you may as well get them Litho/Digially printed cheaper.
Nathan-
If you ever have any questions, please email me directly at Justin@MondoTees.com. I’ve searched for your name and email in my inbox and I’m not seeing anything. We try our best to get back to everyone in a timely fashion and to answer any questions people have….which is why I’m doing this blog post.
Again, so sorry that you feel like you’re not valued. I assure you, that is not the case.
-Justin
It’s really cool to see you posting in response to the fans Justin. As a prime supporter of mondo I just want to let you know that your hard work does not go unappreciated. The projects that you have put together over the years now decorate our walls and have become conversation pieces to many of our guests as well as a great deal of pride for myself. As a rabid movie fan it’s always fun to see different artists interpretations of the movie concepts and what they take away from it. The only thing I ask is to keep it up and stay creative…and maybe make a poster for they live the next time Alamo shows it
Yeah, it is all appreciated. There will be another Olly print along soon, I hope it’s on a subject that’s as cool. But Mondo have put out some great work, for which I’m grateful!
Runs of 1000 for high demand artists/films seems like a no-brainer. As Mondo & the Alamo have increased in popularity over the years, its only reasonable that the run numbers increase as well. They would still be quite limited and if the immediate resale values on the aftermarket suffer a little, that can only be a good thing. While I can appreciate you not wanting to print too many and be left with unsold stock, having quanity available for a couple days before it sells out can only be a good thing for those who actually want these prints. A poster by Stout or another hot artist or a poster for a popular cult film can always expect enough interest to merit 1000 prints, imo. You can always have a color varient counterpart in smaller quanities for those that enjoy the thrill of pusuit or put more value on the “rareness” of a thing.
In anycase, I really appreciate the open dialog, Justin. I dig the way you do business.
Yeah I scored Evil Dead poster but I missed out on Iron Man 2 which had me so pissed off at my email clients (Mail) because it only updates RSS every 30 minutes. Now some schmucks are reselling them on eBay for over $200. I do think you need a higher supply and your previous customers should have SOME sort of perk when new posters go online.
I remember the whole fiasco when your shared server went offline and DNS screwed up people pretty bad, I was on here telling people how to work around it to get to your dedicated server. If you have enough demand to deem a dedicated server due to the traffic, you should really have slightly more of the supply IMHO. You can keep the limited prints @ the minimal, but I don’t see a reason you don’t sell more of the typical print, hows about an Iron Man 2 reprint / second shot? =]
In any case, keep doing what you’re doin!
F the haters
Mondo ROCKS!
Keep up the awesome work!
Nobody is asking Mondo to limit your color palette, lower standards, to sell posters at Wal-Mart, or anything like that.
Pre-printing a limited edition that has a ” /150″ on it, then another run based on how many orders you get in a set amount of time (still less than 1000, most likely) is completely different then going hands-off with an offshore printer or whatever else you think we’re talking about. Keep the retail price high enough to make sure that standards don’t slip, and go to town.
You’ve got to understand that when you make high-quality items for a good price, as Mondo does, people are going to want it.
I also tried to get a poster yesterday. Made it to step 3 and poof, error message. Once I got back on, it was sold out. Before I read the blog, I checked ebay….HOLY CRAP!! I guess that’s the price we pay for living in a capitalist society. I just wanted one to get Bruce Campbell to sign at Wizard World in Philly……oh well.
“I feel your pain with Digital River. I’m a subscriber to the MOTUC line and I buy the other figures every month. Tytus will be brutal to get, I’m sure. What can I say, I’m a nerd.”
Ha ha, then you know exactly what I was referring to then as far as that kind of experience can go… good luck to us both with Tytus
I second the most recent comments in this thread by Chris & John Maddening.
Hey Justin, big fan of Mondo. With the big drops you’re gonna win some and lose some. Quick note though. If a site like AICN leaks an on sale time. Can you tweet the onsale time earlier than just as it’s released so we are not 5-10 minutes behind everyone that had a heads up?
I totally understand the appeal of an unlimited run of posters mixed with a limited run, but to me, that isn’t limited edition anymore. We have people emailing us everyday to do a second edition or to reprint something and that’s just not something we are into doing. A limited edition is, to me, finite. Like I said in the blog post, not everyone is going to get what they want, but that is the breaks with limited edition products.
We are definitely aware of the popularity of our items and if you look at the runs we’ve been doing the last year or so compared to the runs we did when Mondo first started doing posters, we have upped them considerably. Take IRON MAN posters for instance. The Jesse Philips run on the first IRON MAN poster was only 100 vs. the runs on IRON MAN 2 being 515 and 265. The variant run alone on Stout’s was higher than the regular of the poster for the first film. We are very conscience of the increased fanbase and desirability of our posters.
So I’ll fess up. I bought 2 Moss Evil Dead prints. My brother and a few of my close friends are into the poster scene. They’re way more selective than I am with what they keep, but they’re also big fans of the Evil Dead series and Bruce Campbell in general. Plus I have a better opportunity to actually take a stab at drops during the work day. So yesterday, since there was no “one per person” disclaimer on the page and the shopping cart did not automatically reduce my quantity, I purchased 2. One is for me (definitely keeping), and the other is potentially for my brother (who would have attempted to order one if I hadn’t succeeded in ordering 2). But when I got my confirmation for 2, I told him not to waste 30 minutes of his work day trying to purchase one.
I completely understand the rationale for limiting purchases to one per person. Ebayers are going to get around it anyway by having other people order extras, but it at least makes things a little more complicated. They have to pay shipping costs for each individual tube from Mondo and then potentially pay shipping again for the extras if their buddies aren’t local. That said, the “one per person” limit should be clearly stated up front or the shopping cart should automatically reduce quantity to one. I empathize completely with the folks who got shut out and say “Be grateful you got one.” I’m still looking for a Tyler Stout Inglourious Basterds poster after getting shut out at mondo and tstout.com. At the same time, it’s unfair to give people the option of purchasing 2 while the item is still in stock and then tell them after it’s sold out that you’re only shipping one. I even double checked the product page for any mention of a quantity limit before I placed my order. Dan McCarthy’s Lost World poster also sold out quickly, and mondo had no problem shipping me 2 of those, neither of which has been resold.
I really do appreciate the work mondo’s putting out now. Heck, I’d love to visit Austin and attend some of the screenings. But I do think any policy regarding quantity restrictions needs to be clearly stated somewhere during the checkout process. Especially with something like a quantity of two, there are plenty of legitimate reasons for somebody to make a purchase: reduced shipping costs, buying for a friend who’s occupied with work, multiple members of the same household, etc…
Thanks for giving us a forum to offer feedback, and keep ‘em coming!
Here’s an idea: set a window of time an art print is available then print on demand.
for example: Evil Dead goes in sale from 10-11am. then the sales over. everyone who wanted one just paid for one and now you can have that exact amount printed. everyone gets one. no leftovers. amen.
I enjoy limited editions as much as anyone but wouldnt be upset if i had an edition of 5000 or 10000 on my wall. the typical run is very very low in my opinion.
I hang all my prints. Very proud of them. Keep up the good work guys.