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Dice, sigh

I'm doing a second printing of Heroes & Treasure, and the colored blank dice which were in stock when I did the first printing are no longer in stock.

Which means I have to either print 10k dice at a time (per color), or get hit with a $60 (per color) charge for the creation.

Just one of those things I didn't really budget for. I decided to do 10k of one color and 5k of each the other colors, which will give me enough dice in storage to make an additional 1500-unit run in the future, should I be successful enough to warrant that.

And if not, well, I'm paying an extra $1300 or so up front that I wasn't really expecting.

I can recoup $200 of that if my upcoming KS is successful, and almost all of the rest of it if I get to that 1500-unit run.

Just felt like posting.. All the other components are currently being printed.. guessing we'll just be waiting on dice a bit long.

At least I got to fix some typos in my printed materials :)

Comments

Are they screen printed or molds???

Sounds to me like your dice are "screen printed"... What do you mean by "were in stock"??? Are you saying they had a bunch of dice just ready to be "printed" on? If so, well then you were LUCKY the first time around. I'm must admit this post has me perplexed.

So if they are NOT "in stock" ... You just have to pay like $0.05 each to be produced. What is the $60 per dice for? Usually the $60 is a MOLD fee per dice. You pay that once and then they charge you like $0.05 a die using the mold.

And you are saying that IF you make 10,000 of a die, they will waive the $60 mold fee? It's only $60... Doesn't warrant making 5,000+ extra dice (for surplus).

Again I'm confused about "screen printing" and "molds". It would NOT be possible to have "molds" in your first print run ... IF THEY ALREADY HAD THE DICE... That to me sounds like "screen printing".

A $60 fee maybe for setup... Is not unreasonable. It's the FEE everyone pays for "custom dice". But USUALLY this is when we are talking about "molds".

Please let me know if I am understanding your topic correctly...!?

Yes, they had a lot of

Yes, they had a lot of colored blanks in stock for the original printing, except for one large die that I had to have made for me. Now I have to pay for runs of my own blank dice, and then again to print on them.

$0.042/die to fabricate. It's not precisely a mold fee, but a color change fee. $60 to have someone go and mess with the machine, I think, no matter the reason. Yes, with a 10k run they waive the fee. Running an extra 3000 dice (of one color) only costs $126, but would cost me $186 on my next run if I DON'T pre-make them. And maybe they raise the price per die by then as well.

If I wanted the dice engraved rather than printed, they would not be so cheap, and I have 15 custom dice in the box so that would add up quickly.

This IS making me think twice about adding an additional die to my KS expansion, which I was considering. I guess it's not really that much money, but like $160 on my print run, which is not nothing.. Adds about a dollar to what should be the MSRP..

I hear you... This is a difficult business

Jay103 wrote:
And maybe they raise the price per die by then as well.

That is pure BS. You mean to tell me that the price of components is going up when the price of GAMES is going DOWN??? With so much more competition, everyone is trying to lower their sales point (Retail) to attract more buyers. This is ridiculous... As a matter of fact, with all this COVID-19 business, one of my suppliers has been giving a manufacturing DISCOUNT for all purchases. I don't know how long it will last... Hopefully a while longer. I plan to make a proof sample which will be "useless" ... It's basically 200 cards to proof only ONE (1). But it's the only way I can understand how their printing will work.

Jay103 wrote:
This IS making me think twice about adding an additional die to my KS expansion, which I was considering. I guess it's not really that much money, but like $160 on my print run, which is not nothing.. Adds about a dollar to what should be the MSRP..

I computed about $0.16 per game (based on 1,000 units) and a 5x multiplier is about $0.80 to the MSRP. So a dollar is not unreasonable... But how come so high??? It's it like $0.05 + $60 ~= $110 not $160... Are you making more than 1,000 dice? Maybe that's why my numbers are different.

I didn't say they DID raise

I didn't say they DID raise the price, but a year from now? Who knows if the company that supplies their acrylic goes out of business or whatever else. Gonna be a lot of things going wrong in the next year...

I'm paying the same price for this printing (except pre-buying these dice I need) that I did two years ago.

The $0.042 is to make a custom-colored blank. To make a printed die is $0.10 total.

Currently I am seeing a 33% discount from one manufacturer

Jay103 wrote:
I didn't say they DID raise the price, but a year from now? Who knows if the company that supplies their acrylic goes out of business or whatever else. Gonna be a lot of things going wrong in the next year...

From what I see, some manufacturers are offering discounts right about now. I don't know if this means that Stan (from OLG) can get a better price quote (maybe lock-down something more affordable). With all this COVID-19 pandemic, I don't know how many people are MAKING games...

Jay103 wrote:
I'm paying the same price for this printing (except pre-buying these dice I need) that I did two years ago.

That's nothing special. Like I said, one of my manufacturers is offering 33% discount. Now that is a serious rebate. I hope to finish things up with TradeWorlds this month (hopefully) and get Stan to go pick-up Mike's computer from storage (A real bad idea)... The computer is somewhere in Virginia Beach and they now live in the suburbs of New York state. I don't know WHEN that is supposed to happen.

There is one thing you can count on: "If it might happen, it's likely it WILL happen..." And sh!t happens! (LOL)

Note #1: I know that there will an "excuse": "the flights are not yet open for the public..." How long that may take??? IDK but I guess MONTHS still! That will really p!ss-off a lot of our Backers ... since it's like DEAD-TIME (wait-time same difference). But because it's unsafe to travel by plane. I don't know WHEN that poor PC will ever get recovered!

I'm not looking to change

I'm not looking to change manufacturers to look for bargains, even though they're probably out there. Minimum delay for something like that would have been a month, and who knows if the components will be the same in the end? But I agree that there probably aren't many small companies making games.. which hopefully will get me quick turnaround. I need my games asap!

I'm not telling you to change...

But maybe if you make 5,000 dice ... Maybe they can drop the FEE to $30... I don't know but a 50% discount on the "handling" fee could be reasonable. From what I have heard, the Chinese people are hard-working but they also respect people that understand the VALUE of money. And so maybe TRYING to get a discount for 5,000 dice might be seen as "reasonable". I mean if 10,000 dice is $0.00 fee, then 5,000 dice should be 50% or $30.00 fee...

Give it a TRY. I'm not saying they will AGREE. But for the sake of bargaining a bit ... a bit of haggling at this point in time is NOT unreasonable... What do you think???

Note #1: It's called "Economies of scale"! (LOL) So it's only $30.00... If it hits your bottom line, try to negotiate. Since the $60 fee is waived at 10,000 units, I don't see why they can't compromise and give you a 50% discount on 5,000 units (which is 50% order quantity). Again it's the principle and from what I hear negotiating is "recommended".

I have a couple source in China... And one I negotiated a $45 Plate Charge to being only $25. It was one-time per image, but for the bottom line unit pricing, I felt like $45 was TOO HIGH (because everyone of my customers would need to pay this fee). And guess what?! They agreed to lower it ($20 discount...) Everyone was happy.

Note #2: Again it's a matter of principle. In my case +$45.00 on a $100 to $200 order was A LOT. At $25.00 that was more reasonable. And I think they usually pad their numbers on the HIGH-SIDE so people who don't care just pay... People that are affected by the bottom-line will negotiate a little. And all I said was: "The Plate fee at $45 was a bit high, can you give me a better price...?" And yeah, he came back with $25. I was happy and the customers would have been happy.

But alas, that project has been stalled because my "business partner" suddenly is no longer interested in the venture. IDK why?! But that project is burned because it was partially reliant on OLG (Outer Limit Games, LLC). And now that Stan doesn't want to Publish more games, it seems like I need to find a new partner (which is acceptable by all parties).

Anyhow neither Here-nor-there. It was just an illustration (example).

I did try to push back on

I did try to push back on exactly what you suggest about 5000 :) Didn't work.

I'm still one of the smallest publishers they work with, I believe. Anything under 5000 sets I'm pretty sure they feel like they're doing me a favor already :)

I mean, this is a $10k+ order, so it's not like that's a huge deal anyway, but every little bit adds up.

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