Dragon*Con 06 Will Be AbbyShot's Biggest Year Yet!
Click above for another pic.
Dragon*Con is swiftly approaching and the spotlight is once again on AbbyShot. It looks like this year will be our biggest Dragon*Con ever. We have our booth registered and are planning on bringing a lot of garments with us. Last year was our third time attending Dragon*Con and each year we make more friends and have an even better time than before. We're looking forward to spending time with everyone again as we become more and more of a "Dragon*Con regular". One thing that we did last year was bring down several customers' orders to them, and this year will be no exception.
Eager fans are lining up to have their garments made in advance. If you want to ensure that your garment is available, then you need to place your order now for premium placement. Don't delay until our production times are too long to get your garment to you in time! Already, this is the latest that Otakon 06 attendees can wait before placing their orders, Dragon*Con is only a little bit later in the year.
Let Us Know What You Think!
We have been re-examining PayPal as a potential payment method. When we first started AbbyShot in 2002, we offered PayPal payments, however we ended up removing it after a couple of years due to dissatisfaction with their policies and their steep usage fees. Since that time, they have become an eBay company, have expanded their services and revised many of their policies. The only thing that hasn't changed significantly is their merchant fees. There have been improvements in their fees structure, just not massive ones.
Would YOU pay by PayPal?
For you as a customer, there are several advantages to us adding PayPal as a payment option. First off, you don't NEED a PayPal account to use most of PayPal's payment options. PayPal offers more credit cards than we do through our own merchant account. PayPal also offers a smooth means of paying direct from your own bank account online if you prefer. PayPal is well known online and to many people is a respected and trusted "go-between" for online payments.
However, we also realize that not everyone likes using PayPal. Since we haven't used them for a few years there may be disadvantages that you know of which we don't. Lastly, there will be a cost to us to use them which may affect pricing in the long run. We won't know for sure until we've had a chance to use them for a while first. As usual, we're throwing this out to everyone to send in their comments. The final decision on this will be ours to make of course, but at the same time we have a track record of highly valuing customer input. Let us know what you think of PayPal as an additional payment method.
More Sizes To Meet Your Demand!
Now up to 4XL!
We have been listening to your requests and one thing that you are telling us is that you want larger sizes for the Silent Bob coat. Ok, then here they are. We have created "2XL", "3XL", and "4XL" sizes. If you have been wanting a Silent Bob in sizes beyond 1XL, then now is the time to buy! Check out the sizing chart below and see which size works for you. You're welcome! :-)
| Small | Medium | Large | |
| Chest Circumference | 32.00 in 81.28 cm | 36.00 in 91.44 cm | 42.00 in 106.68 cm |
| Finished Length | 47.75 in 121.29 cm | 48.25 in 122.56 cm | 48.75 in 123.83 cm |
| Extra Large | 2XL | 3XL | 4XL | |
| Chest Circumference | 48.00 in 121.92 cm | 54.00 in 137.16 cm | 62.00 in 157.48 cm | 70.00 in 177.80 cm |
| Finished Length | 49.25 in 125.10 cm | 49.75 in 126.37 cm | 50.25 in 127.64 cm | 50.75 in 128.91 cm |
Now to collate our data... ;-)
Mike Reid is $500 USD (AbbyCash) richer!
In May, we approached our customers who had bought from us in the past and asked them to help us out in gathering some info on their likes and dislikes about our website, newsletter and forum. A big thank you to everyone who sent in their customer survey responses! We gathered a lot of very useful helpful information. Many people had excellent comments about what they did and didn't like, and the additional questions and comments people included at the end will very useful too. For those of you who included specific questions to us, rest assured that we will be contacting everyone about them. We really appreciate the time that everyone took to answer our survey and we will definitely be putting all that info to good use!
To show our appreciation for everyone's time, we put their names into a draw for a $500 USD AbbyCash Gift Certificate! Mike Reid, (the proud owner of an Enigma Custom), was the lucky person who was randomly selected from all the entries that came in. Thank you to everyone who responded, and congratulations to Mike! He tells us that he is a Photographer/Videographer with Lycan Entertainment, an independent film company who will be releasing their first feature length film, Point of Fear, to select theatres in October. They will be appearing in film festivals and are currently shopping around for a DVD distributor for their works. Go Lycan! Now, don't forget us when you go big! ;-)
The latest news on this upcoming product
Shoulder armor prototypes that didn't make the grade.
Mad Max fans continue to ask us for updates, as they eagerly await the release of this newest design. We're continuing to work away on this jacket and have even done finished prototypes in a sample leather. (Not the release leather though, we're going to be using real motorcycle jacket leather for this one.)
In the past month we've had a few minor setbacks with the shoulder armor. We tried several different materials and methods with no real winning method. You can see here a few of the attempts that simply wouldn't work for one reason or another. We have found what we think is a winning method now though and once we finalize this we'll be ready to debut the Mad Max Jacket. So, when will this happen, you ask? Well, we're not completely sure, but we think that it will be within the next four weeks. Stay tuned, as we steadily make progress on this. We're down to the last few design and production details and it won't be long now.
A Courier Service For Your Preference
When time isn't on your side, or you want the added security and tracking of a courier, you now have an option. AbbyShot has been in negotiations with DHL for months now to bring you the best combination of services and price for courier delivery. We're pleased to announce that we recently concluded this and have gotten the best deal we could for you.
Courier delivery is usually more expensive than regular mail, but it does come with much better service, faster delivery times, and improved tracking & security abilities for our international destinations. Best of all, a courier solely handles your package for the entire travel time, from AbbyShot to your home, no middlemen or secondary carriers. We will be rolling out basic functionality of this shipping option on our web site this Thursday, May 8th. Over time we will be adding additional web site features relating to all of our shipping methods and information, so stay tuned to future newsletters for more details. Any existing orders can be sent by DHL if you prefer, simply contact us and we'll manually switch you over. (Just remember to let us know who you are though!) ;-)
Making All The Right Connections
AbbyShot has finally released a links page. This might not seem like much, but it represents the beginning of a much larger links strategy. We'll be highlighting all kinds of web pages about our products and their inspirations, and we also want to promote you, our customer! Over the years we've noticed that a lot of you have really intereseting jobs, businesses, or even personal hobbies. We have inventors, entrepreneurs, animators, musicians, magicians, programmers, writers, painters, sculptors, actors, cameramen, propmakers, photographers, makeup artists, dancers, singers, and more... If you have a personal or professional web site, send it in to us and we'll list it on our links page. We will review each site submission and consider it for our links page.
Check it out!
Another feature of our links page is a monthly "Featured Site". As you can see, this month we are featuring the site of Mike Reid's Lycan Entertaiment web site. (Hey, cut me some slack, I had his site description already written!) :-) Whose site will be featured next month? We don't know yet, but receiving a bunch of sites from you will certainly help! Send in your web site, it can be as involved as being a part of a movie production company, as personal as an artwork collection, or a simple as your blog. There's no rules for what qualifies as a "cool" customer web site. If you know of some other web sites for a different category, then send that to us as well and we'll contact them for a link exchange.
Speaking of link exchanges, we'd love it if you'd link to us. If you do so, then let us know! We've even created another page full of tools for you - all kinds of buttons, banners and html code for you to put a link to us on your own web site. There are only a few tools up there yet, we'll be adding to it over time. If you create a cool button or banner for AbbyShot, send it to us and we'll include it in here as well.
Advance notice of upcoming downtime
While it is still several weeks away yet, AbbyShot's Summer holidays are coming quickly.We'll be shutting down for two weeks between July and August to recharge ourselves before the Fall, pre-Christmas season begins. We'll be closed between July 21st and August 7th. We'll remind everyone again in July, but consider this your first notice! ;-)
We'd love to hear from you! Let us know what you think of this newsletter! See you next issue!
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