They already did say they they proactively tried to get more than one truck to come for pick ups, but were denied and only got one truck. This year, and specifically this time of this year is crummy for shipping. I had a computer part sit at a hub for 3 days. It’s likely that even if they brought a UHaul to a local hub, bypassing the truck… their packages would still be metered out.
Just additional perspective from someone who has been in a similar situation to theirs with a few product releases… albeit around 15 years ago.
5 Likes
Griff
(Well crap, my hypometric precursor device is blown…)
11
UPS is delivering here in SoCal via driver’s personal vehicles, I’ve had 2 such.
There is a bigger picture here that includes peak Christmas rush not to mention a Pandemic.
Logistics, like so much else in the world, will not get better for a long time.
Gloves off on this one, if I offend anyone find a corner and cry in it…
If you fail, try again. If you fall down, get back up. If you make a promise, keep it. These are the core values of any small business, no matter how much the product cost. With that being said if anyone tries to tell me that if you have 100 machines to ship and UPS only picks up five a day, telling me that renting a box truck and bringing multiple packages to a hub does not speed up the process you are sadly mistaken. I was well aware that my machine will take up to a month to ship out. That is called a buffer for a company. This buffer I would assume would account for wildfires, pandemic, earthquake, astroids, the list could go on and on. One day pass this buffer equals a fail. The pandemic did not stop Carbide 3D from taking money out of my account correct? Man up, say you made a mistake and fix it!
I’m not offended. I’ve just been on both sides of the situation. You can buffer for things that have happened before, are plausible, and then add some. But when circumstances stack on top of each other…
And if you think driving it to the hub helps, you may or may not be right. Again, I have actually, literally driven a dulley and 50ft trailer to a hub full of packed exhausts and been told I could only unload half of them that day. That was not during a pandemic, nor holiday… definitely not during a holiday during a pandemic.
Again, just sharing my experience that just so happens to really correlate to this situation. We also had a room full of millions of dollars in ECU reprogrammers waiting on packaging foam. Logistics is a crazy profession!
And my skin in this game is odd. They’ve said they’d send me one, but that it would come after paying customers were taken care of. I have no clue when mine ships.
I think that shows their commitment. Us “influencers” (I don’t know if that odd term really applies to me) are at the back of the bus. But take that how you want. I empathize with those that are upset.
All right, I feel better now. Just had to get my frustrations off my chest, I work for a corporation where I take surveys all the time and can’t voice my real opinion…lol. I know carbide wants to do the right thing and it’s hard so I will just sit patiently and wait for my machine to get here so I can ruin some wood
I TOTALLY get where you’re coming from. I work at Boeing. Surveys, classes, and meetings are a significant portion of my job. But I’ve also completely lost my filter, so my manager usually gets pieces of my mind.
I can understand the frustration of the run around. This is a new product and there are going to be issues. I would rather wait a bit longer for a quality product. Then getting it on time.
On carbide’s side just own up to it the delays…have working in customer service I understand the desire to say the check is in the mail…just say we’re having issues and we’ll ship it once we get these worked out.
I am sure you are disappointed that you have not received your machine, but as others have stated - it is the first of a new machine design with unique parts. Given the 'rona situation and Christmas and (possibly causing issues, the weather on the east coast) there were bound to be delays.
But putting that aside, what I want too ask is this; Do you think that the Carbide 3D people are sitting at their desks, knowing that they have a warehouse of packed up machines ready to go out the door, and just decide “I’m going to mess with these guys for a bit, and not ship them their machine. . .” ?
OR - and this is a crazy thought - MAYBE they were basing their ship date on the many suppliers of sub-components getting their parts to the C3D shop where they assemble the larger sub-assemblies before packing them up in shipping boxes?
MAYBE their shipping dates were based on: (and I am totally making this up because I have no affiliation with C3D other than to own an XXL)
The v-wheel mfr telling them they shipped their wheels on Nov 15th
The v-wheels tracking said they will arrive on Nov 22nd
The left handed thrust bearing mfr said they would ship on Nov 17th
The let handed thrust bearing tracking said they will arrive on Nov 25th
And maybe those mfrs had issues receiving their supplies to make their parts, so they ship late, and the shippers (yes, all of them) are handling more packages than ever before since no one is shopping in person, you know - because of the 'rona!?
So, maybe instead of emailing or messaging you a 4D chess game length email about all of the plethora of possibilities, pitfalls, and potentials, they go by their best estimate and end up being wrong.
What you are all saying is correct. If there is going to be a delay, say that. Tell the truth. Do what you say and don’t say things that make you look like your lying.
Everyone needs to stop using Covid, fires, floods, the dog ate my homework excuses.
When I start my first business I was told by a long time sales rep, “There are 3 things that make a small company raise to the top and stay there. 1. Good Quality 2. Great Customer service 3. Consistency”
I asked him what about “Price”? He said “price doesn’t matter if even one of the 3 are missing”.
I said “what about things out of my control”? He said, “Its your business, and your responsibility to plan for that”. What did he mean by that? Simple, sell what you have.
Example: The Bit Runner and Bit Zero where both out of stock. Where they pre selling those? NO. They would Email you when they were back in stock. Expectation set.
But the second you take someone’s money and give them an estimated ship date your now at the mercy of raw material suppliers and everything in between. That is what we are seeing here.
Pre orders are a different type of beast. Similar to a kick starter. When signing up for a pre-order I feel that it is implied that it will ship when it is ready…carbide has never let me down, they have great quality,…customer service on the day to day is spot on. This new product is just that a new product with many moving parts that they don’t have control over. They tried to give their best guess.
I personally believe on your 3 points made above but being in the wood working business. Consistency in materials is impossible to guess. Many of times I have to push dates out. But I make sure the quality makes up for that. I truly believe carbides quality will make up for the delay in shipping.
Have faith…its the only thing you have left. Carbide all ready has your money.
I think that everyone loves Carbide for their Transparency
They admit when there are issues and try and resolve it. There is frustration because we (the people awaiting orders) do not feel like Carbide is being Transparent which is out of character.
Additionally, as you await your new toy, you build up an excitement and anticipation of all of the stuff you are going to build. Understood that the goal post might be moving, but if you provide us with an updated shipping window, you will allow us to reset our expectation, which is important because based on the learnings from this forum, you need a good dedicated week to get it working flawlessly (CNC version of flawless ) and we the recipients of this new toy are planning our schedules around them
First off its not a point of view, ever hear of a “business plan”? I have built and sold 4 very successful business and am retired at age 40. That didn’t happen by chance. It took planning.
In the recession of 2008 when business like mine where folding up iIgrew by over $1 million. Again not by chance or by making excuses. Life gives you lemons you don’t squeeze them in your customers eye.
I didn’t buy this as a “preorder”, it was a lead time. Just like if you buy custom made cabinetry. They tell you 4-6 weeks, not “whenever we get it done Mr Smith, after all these are custom”. This isn’t a “kickstarter” either. Any fan boys here??
"Sell what you have "= sell what you have completed. We’er not talking about parts, we are talking about a product. This isn’t rocket science.
Look, did Covid screw a lot of business, yes. But this Shapoko Pro was released for sale well after Covid. That means there should have been a discussion about how it would affect lead times and “plan accordingly”.
I’m not saying Carbide3d is a horrible company, but they haven’t planned well for this product launch and haven’t responded to the issue.
I left a voice-mail 3 days ago and still never got a call back. What explanation do you have for that? If they had called and apologized then this thread probably wouldn’t even exist. As a business owner you take the slap and make the needed changes. Don’t ignore and hide from your customers, or glaze over.
FWIW every new product I ordered since March (from 4 different vendors) has taken ~3-6 months to arrive. Most were up front about the expected timeframe, but every single one was at least a month late. I have seen from other vendors the issues with UPS truck limitations as well for several months, so it’s not a made up thing. You can even find articles online about UPS putting limitations per vendor.
FYI I have been waiting on my new sectional to be delivered for 18 weeks…
Speaking of custom cabinets that is what I currently do and I have had to tell many customers that they have a choice of me making with less than ideal materials, they need to wait, or pay out the rear for me to get materials shipped from Timbuktu…
The rollout of the Shapeoko pro is obviously not one we’re happy with, and clearly customers who’ve been waiting for the machine past 30 days are not happy either.
We provided our best timeline at the time, and we were wrong, and honestly our optimism got the better of us. We were honest about the delays and we’d hoped we’d be able to cut in the lead time, but we didn’t. It’s a good lesson for us for any new product launches, which will be very different given the unexpected delays we experienced with the pro, and the frustration experienced by our customers. I won’t enumerate the sequence of events that propagated the delays here because I don’t think it’ll be productive.
As of today your order is one day past the 30 day timeline and our sales team gave you a new eta of 12/28 based on our latest shipping schedule, which is two weeks past our original estimate. We’re doing everything we can to ship orders as soon as possible.
It’s been our experience that if customers are this unhappy with the company (us) even before they’ve received their machine, no matter how good the machine turns out to be, the relationship is soured. If you’re past the point of frustration and prefer to cancel the order, I completely understand, even though we want to be able to turn the relationship around and have you working with your Shapeoko pro, making chips, as soon as possible. I’ve tagged your latest email in our ticketing system so that I can be your point person and we can chat about it further.
I’m locking this thread because it seems we’re past the point of constructive discourse.
) and we the recipients of this new toy are planning our schedules around them