RisingPhoenix
Resident Artisan
I received an email today, which is one of many communications I’ve had since the middle of November when holiday shopping season started over here in the US, that I wanted to share.
Hopefully folks read this and understand that there is no malice in my sharing this, and I don’t think there was any malice in the message I received, which was both friendly and a little bit of a polite jab at how long it takes to get packages out. (Many folks have written me with the same sentiment ... but have been far from being as friendly about it).
I’m sharing this not just for my edification, but I think it applies to many small businesses, including many of the fellow vendors here, which I know sometimes deal with the same problems I deal with. In my response I go over a number of things that a lot of small businesses deal with, and it’s nice to keep these things in mind, not just during the holiday season, but throughout the year - especially considering everything businesses have had to manage and survive during the last two years.
So - hopefully this message is received as the educational sharing of a communication, which is how I am intending it ☺️
The email :
12.23.2021
Morning Joseph!
Hope You have a Happy Holiday Season!🙂
I am writing not to complain, but as a friendly comment:
You know, I like You as a Person and love Your aromatic treasures! I read often the descriptions of Your new products on Etsy and very often want to buy them, but I think that every time I order it takes You at least 8-10 days to prepare the order and then few days of shipping,- which total about 2-3 weeks,- Every time!!! Not just Christmas
So I end up not buying, because when you wait so long for something that you bought,- it’s more frustration than happiness when it comes,- 2-3 weeks is really a looooong time!
You know Katlyn from Mermade Magical arts?
I buy almost everything new, because she sends it next day and even though she charges less than You for multiple items, she always sends it 2 day air, so I know I will enjoy the aroma in 4 days and it’s so happy customer experience!
I am just letting You know, that maybe You wish customers have impression that You have millions orders… customer don’t care for image, they just wish to enjoy something they found desirable! So, maybe there are others like me, or You ship to others quicker and just don’t like me😂
Have a Fantastic Holiday season!🌺🦚🌅🌈👍
——-
Nice enough message, right? And I totally get what this person is saying. I get it folks 😉 Truly, I do.
——-
My response :
Morning X!
Let me first say - I appreciate the message and the sentiment. I appreciate you taking the time to write me about a relatively common issue that I hear about from people, namely that of how long it takes to get packages out.
Katlyn, the owner of MERMADE Arts, is an old friend. Have been to her place out in Nevada several times over the years. Glad to hear you’ve been enjoying her products! She’s quite a lovely lady. 🥰
Yes she is selling incense, but the products she is selling are entirely different than what I’m selling. I have to fill each vial, and label each one per order. And I’m usually fulfilling 30-50 orders at any given point in time - which often consists of 100-300 items that all need to be labeled, bottled, packaged. Often times weighed, sorted, sliced and cut, as well - Especially if we are talking about the woods.
I have over 170-200 items in my shop, and hundreds more here in my workshop that are not up in the Etsy shop. I also generally have two or three sizes of everything available (and often more), so if they’re 170-200 items in the shop, there are nearly 1000 sku’s that I have to manage.
People often request custom sizes or a custom items, which also takes extra time. This would go a lot easier if everybody was buying full bottles, and all I had to do was pre-fill bottles and then just grab and ship. Unfortunately, that’s not how this business works. If only people were buying full bottles 😂😅
Many businesses are able to pre-fill containers and then just grab and ship when the order comes in. That’s not at all possible in this business, especially when I have to weigh or cut things like woods. Or people want custom items, or custom sizes. And people generally want to sample everything, which means sample sizes for practically everything, let alone people trying to request custom orders with even smaller sizes, which quite frankly takes even more time to sell while also making less money doing more work. But I do my best to accommodate… And I often get yelled at when I tell people I can’t. 🤷🏼♂️
Also keep in mind that people usually don’t just put in their orders. I’m often juggling dozens of conversations that often take place over several days or weeks before people ever put their order in. Hundreds, if not thousands of messages back and forth, every day. This takes a tremendous amount of my time - But it’s what’s necessary in order to get to people putting in the order. I have to build those relationships and cultivate trust, as well as steer people to the kinds of products they are actually wanting to buy. You may be buying online, but people still talk to me like I am the guy behind the counter in the shop. It’s often enjoyable - but very time consuming.
Shipping often takes longer than people think, especially for international orders or orders that require some kind of paperwork that needs to be included. (This is 30-50% of my orders) For example, shipping a DHL package often takes me about 30 minutes per package. Sometimes (often) longer. Especially with all the new HTC codes - Of which many of my products don’t fit squarely in to the standardized HTC codes. Takes a lotta time figuring that all out. And that’s after everything has been bottled and labeled and weighed.
Not to mention when there are problems with packages, especially international packages. I end up spending an awful lot of time having to take care of things that I’ve already done. Case in point, I’ve been dealing with a package I shipped off to India, and I’ve spent over an hour working on it today, and it’s work that I’ve already done and shipped off a week ago. So even though I’ve already done the work - there’s often more work to be done even after you’ve done it. 😂 Not to mention - responding to customers wondering ‘why I’m not Amazon and where is their package?’ Let alone explaining shipping stuff, which I go over extensively in my Shop Policies (which no one bothers to read) 🙄
And then there’s the customers ...
I’m often juggling hundreds of messages, and dozens of orders at any given point in time. This extension of customer service is incredibly time-consuming, but is necessary. I have to educate customers about products. I have people who are new to these kinds of products and know nothing about them. And many of these folks get chatty, which is perfectly fine and for the most part I enjoy. But this alone is a standalone job that I’m having to do along with any other number of hats that I have to wear.
Let’s also not forget that I’m still a working physician, and I juggle both patients and packages. I’m essentially working two full-time jobs - because I have to.
Much of the work for Rising Phoenix is just fulfilling orders - which can be quite mind numbing. I probably have to fill 2 - 300 sample vials every couple of days. And since October (yes - OCTOBER) - hundreds of items every week to fulfill orders.
Mind you, there’s only one of me wearing all of these hats. Many other businesses have multiple people working there. I have huge overheads between workspaces, inventory, and ongoing projects. This work ain’t cheap. I simply don’t have enough revenue to support multiple people working here and helping me out AND juggle all the fixed expenses involved in the business. Let’s also not forget that many other people I work with, especially since the pandemic, I send money to just to help them out because their livelihoods have been impacted. Rising Phoenix has only one employee - myself. But there are over 500 people involved in supporting the work I’m doing. That’s a lot of overhead, so to speak - and a lot of relationships, generally between 30 to 50, that I personally have to cultivate and spend time with. I’m talking to these people constantly.
Yes, it generally takes me a week and a half or two weeks to get packages out. Sometimes faster. Sometimes not. Sometimes it depends on if you are order number 2 in line, or if you are order number 70 with 69 other packages in front of you consisting of hundreds of items that I have to get bottled and labeled and eventually shipped out. And then writing me to jump the line (happens more than you’d think). And then screaming at me when you have to wait your turn. 🙄
This is tough work. Very time consuming work. And a lot of it is not some thing that can be passed off someone else to do. It’s questions that only I know answers to, and work that only I know how to get done. Yes, part of the solution is bringing in help, but I can only do that with my customer’s continued support and more revenue to afford all the additional overhead. Don’t even get me started on how the last two years of all this Covid bullshit and regulations have impacted my sales and revenues. I need the revenue and everyone’s support more than ever, especially if I am to grow and tackle some of these challenges like we are talking about in this message.
Hopefully that helps clarify why it takes the time it does to get the orders out.
I do appreciate your support, and I’m sorry that I can’t get things out as quickly as you’d like. Thanks for the thoughtful message - I appreciate it. Merry Christmas!
JK
PS - since Covid started - I also have to physically take packages to the Post and ship them. Once COVID started - many many packages were not getting scanned and were just disappearing. I generally take packages in 2x / week. Takes me 90 minutes each time.
Here’s what 60 orders look like :
Hopefully folks read this and understand that there is no malice in my sharing this, and I don’t think there was any malice in the message I received, which was both friendly and a little bit of a polite jab at how long it takes to get packages out. (Many folks have written me with the same sentiment ... but have been far from being as friendly about it).
I’m sharing this not just for my edification, but I think it applies to many small businesses, including many of the fellow vendors here, which I know sometimes deal with the same problems I deal with. In my response I go over a number of things that a lot of small businesses deal with, and it’s nice to keep these things in mind, not just during the holiday season, but throughout the year - especially considering everything businesses have had to manage and survive during the last two years.
So - hopefully this message is received as the educational sharing of a communication, which is how I am intending it ☺️
The email :
12.23.2021
Morning Joseph!
Hope You have a Happy Holiday Season!🙂
I am writing not to complain, but as a friendly comment:
You know, I like You as a Person and love Your aromatic treasures! I read often the descriptions of Your new products on Etsy and very often want to buy them, but I think that every time I order it takes You at least 8-10 days to prepare the order and then few days of shipping,- which total about 2-3 weeks,- Every time!!! Not just Christmas
So I end up not buying, because when you wait so long for something that you bought,- it’s more frustration than happiness when it comes,- 2-3 weeks is really a looooong time!
You know Katlyn from Mermade Magical arts?
I buy almost everything new, because she sends it next day and even though she charges less than You for multiple items, she always sends it 2 day air, so I know I will enjoy the aroma in 4 days and it’s so happy customer experience!
I am just letting You know, that maybe You wish customers have impression that You have millions orders… customer don’t care for image, they just wish to enjoy something they found desirable! So, maybe there are others like me, or You ship to others quicker and just don’t like me😂
Have a Fantastic Holiday season!🌺🦚🌅🌈👍
——-
Nice enough message, right? And I totally get what this person is saying. I get it folks 😉 Truly, I do.
——-
My response :
Morning X!
Let me first say - I appreciate the message and the sentiment. I appreciate you taking the time to write me about a relatively common issue that I hear about from people, namely that of how long it takes to get packages out.
Katlyn, the owner of MERMADE Arts, is an old friend. Have been to her place out in Nevada several times over the years. Glad to hear you’ve been enjoying her products! She’s quite a lovely lady. 🥰
Yes she is selling incense, but the products she is selling are entirely different than what I’m selling. I have to fill each vial, and label each one per order. And I’m usually fulfilling 30-50 orders at any given point in time - which often consists of 100-300 items that all need to be labeled, bottled, packaged. Often times weighed, sorted, sliced and cut, as well - Especially if we are talking about the woods.
I have over 170-200 items in my shop, and hundreds more here in my workshop that are not up in the Etsy shop. I also generally have two or three sizes of everything available (and often more), so if they’re 170-200 items in the shop, there are nearly 1000 sku’s that I have to manage.
People often request custom sizes or a custom items, which also takes extra time. This would go a lot easier if everybody was buying full bottles, and all I had to do was pre-fill bottles and then just grab and ship. Unfortunately, that’s not how this business works. If only people were buying full bottles 😂😅
Many businesses are able to pre-fill containers and then just grab and ship when the order comes in. That’s not at all possible in this business, especially when I have to weigh or cut things like woods. Or people want custom items, or custom sizes. And people generally want to sample everything, which means sample sizes for practically everything, let alone people trying to request custom orders with even smaller sizes, which quite frankly takes even more time to sell while also making less money doing more work. But I do my best to accommodate… And I often get yelled at when I tell people I can’t. 🤷🏼♂️
Also keep in mind that people usually don’t just put in their orders. I’m often juggling dozens of conversations that often take place over several days or weeks before people ever put their order in. Hundreds, if not thousands of messages back and forth, every day. This takes a tremendous amount of my time - But it’s what’s necessary in order to get to people putting in the order. I have to build those relationships and cultivate trust, as well as steer people to the kinds of products they are actually wanting to buy. You may be buying online, but people still talk to me like I am the guy behind the counter in the shop. It’s often enjoyable - but very time consuming.
Shipping often takes longer than people think, especially for international orders or orders that require some kind of paperwork that needs to be included. (This is 30-50% of my orders) For example, shipping a DHL package often takes me about 30 minutes per package. Sometimes (often) longer. Especially with all the new HTC codes - Of which many of my products don’t fit squarely in to the standardized HTC codes. Takes a lotta time figuring that all out. And that’s after everything has been bottled and labeled and weighed.
Not to mention when there are problems with packages, especially international packages. I end up spending an awful lot of time having to take care of things that I’ve already done. Case in point, I’ve been dealing with a package I shipped off to India, and I’ve spent over an hour working on it today, and it’s work that I’ve already done and shipped off a week ago. So even though I’ve already done the work - there’s often more work to be done even after you’ve done it. 😂 Not to mention - responding to customers wondering ‘why I’m not Amazon and where is their package?’ Let alone explaining shipping stuff, which I go over extensively in my Shop Policies (which no one bothers to read) 🙄
And then there’s the customers ...
I’m often juggling hundreds of messages, and dozens of orders at any given point in time. This extension of customer service is incredibly time-consuming, but is necessary. I have to educate customers about products. I have people who are new to these kinds of products and know nothing about them. And many of these folks get chatty, which is perfectly fine and for the most part I enjoy. But this alone is a standalone job that I’m having to do along with any other number of hats that I have to wear.
Let’s also not forget that I’m still a working physician, and I juggle both patients and packages. I’m essentially working two full-time jobs - because I have to.
Much of the work for Rising Phoenix is just fulfilling orders - which can be quite mind numbing. I probably have to fill 2 - 300 sample vials every couple of days. And since October (yes - OCTOBER) - hundreds of items every week to fulfill orders.
Mind you, there’s only one of me wearing all of these hats. Many other businesses have multiple people working there. I have huge overheads between workspaces, inventory, and ongoing projects. This work ain’t cheap. I simply don’t have enough revenue to support multiple people working here and helping me out AND juggle all the fixed expenses involved in the business. Let’s also not forget that many other people I work with, especially since the pandemic, I send money to just to help them out because their livelihoods have been impacted. Rising Phoenix has only one employee - myself. But there are over 500 people involved in supporting the work I’m doing. That’s a lot of overhead, so to speak - and a lot of relationships, generally between 30 to 50, that I personally have to cultivate and spend time with. I’m talking to these people constantly.
Yes, it generally takes me a week and a half or two weeks to get packages out. Sometimes faster. Sometimes not. Sometimes it depends on if you are order number 2 in line, or if you are order number 70 with 69 other packages in front of you consisting of hundreds of items that I have to get bottled and labeled and eventually shipped out. And then writing me to jump the line (happens more than you’d think). And then screaming at me when you have to wait your turn. 🙄
This is tough work. Very time consuming work. And a lot of it is not some thing that can be passed off someone else to do. It’s questions that only I know answers to, and work that only I know how to get done. Yes, part of the solution is bringing in help, but I can only do that with my customer’s continued support and more revenue to afford all the additional overhead. Don’t even get me started on how the last two years of all this Covid bullshit and regulations have impacted my sales and revenues. I need the revenue and everyone’s support more than ever, especially if I am to grow and tackle some of these challenges like we are talking about in this message.
Hopefully that helps clarify why it takes the time it does to get the orders out.
I do appreciate your support, and I’m sorry that I can’t get things out as quickly as you’d like. Thanks for the thoughtful message - I appreciate it. Merry Christmas!
JK
PS - since Covid started - I also have to physically take packages to the Post and ship them. Once COVID started - many many packages were not getting scanned and were just disappearing. I generally take packages in 2x / week. Takes me 90 minutes each time.
Here’s what 60 orders look like :