Wow, What a Rush!

Close, so close. The first production run will ship on October 17. The retail packages and the product labels are scheduled to be completed on October 19. I am fairly confident that we will be able to ship our first orders by October 21. This is welcome news, delightful news and much anticipated news.

It also needs to be said that I have been working on this product since April of this year in an effort to get it to the market by September, 2005. Here it is in October and I have only a few first shot samples, no retail package or product labels yet. But they're coming!

However, I have something to relate that has made me sad. Some folks on the BoardGameGeek forum were talking about The Settlers Organizer (yea!), but they didn't particularly like the idea (boo!). Well, they liked the idea (yea!), but not necessary my implementation of it (boo!). Maybe what they didn't like what the price.

OK, I know you've clicked on the link and read the post, but just in case you haven't, here are the key points.

• The Settlers Organizer is not a real product
• It is only a $1 piece of plastic with a label
• A business card organizer will do the same job for a fraction of the cost

Well, there is no such thing as bad publicity, and I posted a reply to thank the folks for talking about The Settlers Organizer and to set the record straight. Let's also summarize the truth about The Settlers Organizer, all in the interest of accuracy.

• The Settlers Organizer is a real product that is custom designed for board games that use cards, such as The Settlers of Catan. It was prototyped, designed for production, had a production prototypes producted, was user tested and market tested, had a custom mold made and is not in production.
• Well, it cost a bit more than that. We'll just leave it there. ;^)
• Here is where the real difference are. First, your off the shelf business product won't meet your needs for Cities and Knights because it doesn't have enough card slots. Realistically, though, you will be much happier with The Settlers Organizer because it is far better designed and is far more durable. Drop one of those polystyrene boxes off the table and you have a few unusable plastic pieces. Drop my Settlers Organizer from two meters onto a brick walkway and you have a small scratch in an otherwise undamaged (and fully useful) Settlers Organizer. Check out the Photo page on the web site

You won't be able to by an $8 business card holder and expect that it will really meet your needs the way The Settlers Organizer will. Hey, there's an unconditional guarantee, how good is that??

I am really pleased that folks are noticing the Organizer. I really believe that it is a great product and that you will really enjoy using it when you play Settlers of Catan. And I am really thankful for those folks for talking about the Organizer.

Thanks so much for reading.