OOTS Book 5 - Blood Runs in the Family (plus 2015 OOTS Heroes Calendar)

[zql]

My book arrived on Wednesday! It travelled all 8130km (or 5052 miles) from Houston to Buenos Aires . Unfortunately I don't have it in my hands yet because I was out of town and and I got to retrieve it from the mail office. I've not read the thread in a while, but I'm posting this to warn any others southamericans (I guess I could write in spanish or portuguese instead, then ): don't leave home, it is coming!

[nmsi]

I do get that OoKooDooK is small company and preordering means that you get the product when it is ready not when you place and order.
And while I also understand that random problems do happen (like swapping shipping company in the last minute), I do have a bad taste in mouth after receiving current book.

Why?
I also chose the recommended "cheaper" option - that is 45$ for a shipping a book and 2 calendars, placed the order and payed for it in 21 October.
I immediately got email with receipt. Yay! After that there was silence.. In 2 months i got no updates until Giant posted on his page that books were shipping.
It took a month more absolute silence (and obsessive mail checking and constant monitoring of this thread where have packages already arrived) to get receipt to pick the package up from local post office.

So i payed the money and waited for 3 months with no updates from OoKooDooK to get a book. I see it as leaving client waiting out in the cold.
I can understand that no tracking numbers were sent due to different shipping company and that they were themselves doing their best as quickly as possible.
But still, no updates from merchant in three months? What if my order was lost, how long should i have waited?
A simple email for all the customers that books are finally shipping, were sorry it took so long, would have been absolute minimum to do.
I'm sorry but post from Giant (who creates content for the book) in his own webpage is not equal to update from OoKooDooK (or APE who is the merchant).

While it is nice from Giant to post updates and explanations why things went the way they did, i see all this as a job for the company that got my money, not the artist.

And for those unfortunate souls who have not received their book - good luck on waiting and i hope you do get it ASAP. It is an interesting read.

[Kirous]

I received my book last Thursday here in Finland, with the preorder shipping.

This is not a complaint, but a suggestion for future.

• Make it more clear both here in news section and on Ookoodook site if there are shipping delays.
• Oookoodook should also email customers if there are delays. People stay calm longer and not everyone needs to email Ookoodook when they know there are delays. They also like it more and are more understanding when the information is provided to them, instead of they doing the work.
• The Ookoodook order information/history is poor as it only says "Current Status: Order received". That adds confusion. So they have received my order but have they mistakenly not processed it yet or what is going on. The text is the same for my 2011 order, so it is now safe to assume that the order status does not change to anything else. The status text could be improved.
• Do not offer cheaper international pre-order shipping rate if the price difference is not noticeable. It only adds confusion.
• If the pre-order shipping rate is noticeably lower, make it very clear if that causes the items to be sent in lower/slower class mail, or if the lower shipping rate is a reward for buying/paying the items in advance.

I personally selected the preorder rate with the assumption, that the book would ship with that sooner or at least not slower, as I felt that way my order was more labeled as "pre-order" that way. Maybe I did wrong reasoning. I did not select it because I felt it was cheaper. The preorder shipping rate (Intl Preorder Fulfillment 1) in October was $24.35. The non-preorder rate at that time was $24.50. Now with the difference of $0.15, I don't think any international buyer would select the pre-order rate if that causes the book to be mailed with some lesser class mail or is processed somehow slower. Did my pre-order shipping affect the delivery time negatively, I have no idea. But when I browsed this thread earlier and saw some comments on the bulk mailing, I did have this bad feeling if I had made a mistake with the shipping option.. so that added to confusion, and I would rather not have had the option to select possibly wrong shipping method/rate.

Thank you for the great book.

[Joerg]

I got a mail from ookoodook with a status update on 12/12.

Also, this was the first time that I didn't have to go to the customs office for an OotS book. I don't know if that was a side effect of the bulk shipping or because I explicitly reminded them to put something on the outside of the package, but it made me happy.

(Not so happy that one calendar was missing, but, well, it can happen and Ookoodook has already mailed a second package.)

[SarahV]

I got a mail from ookoodook with a status update on 12/12.

Me too. It told us where to look on Ookoodook's website for ongoing status updates on the pre-order, which I checked regularly after that.

I think some of the people in this thread should probably be e-mailing Ookoodook instead of posting here, if they want their comments heard by the right people...

[Noctew]

All's well that ends well...I still got one week of use out of the January calendar page (Elan!) and I do appreciate the work required to make it all happen. leans back and enjoys the books

[Spoomeister]

You would think, with all these recurring shipping complaints, that people could just wait until the book appears in their local comic shop. Or ask their local comic shop to order for them. Or wait until well after the holidays and order, if they don't have a shop near them.

I know the calendars and ornaments are spiffy, and there's often unique commentary in the collected books that one can't find online... but really, we have the main story here online already. We can still support Rich by buying these things within a few weeks of availability.

It has to be better than the seemingly regular cycle of building anticipation, mass ordering frenzy, overloading small publishing outfit, outcry over small publishing outfit not having the resources of a multinational corporation, Rich patiently and then not-so patiently explaining what he or Ookadook is or is not responsible for, and so on.

I'd also think he would prefer to spend his time and energy on his art and his personal life than on chasing down these things.

[Enas]

Just finished the book, thanks you very much for the "Quoth the Raven" strip at the end. It was superb :-)

[Peelee]

So i payed the money and waited for 3 months with no updates from OoKooDooK to get a book.

You mean 1 month. Unless you want updates consisting of, "Your preordered book is still not released."

[Gwynfrid]

I do get that OoKooDooK is small company and preordering means that you get the product when it is ready not when you place and order.

Then you also understand that you haven't been left in the cold for 3 months. Pre-ordering is basically the definition of not expecting any definite delivery date.

Like others, I got an email update from Ookoodook on Dec 12, by the way.

[Lissou]

The latest Ookoodook email I got was on the 26th of October, a week after I pre-ordered, and was to inform me that the book I had pre-ordered on the 20th was now available for pre-order.

Quite honestly, that freaked me out because I thought it meant my preorder didn't go through. It only took me a couple of minutes to check on the website that it did, though. I guess the email was sent automatically to everyone who had placed orders before or something, regardless of whether they had already preordered.

Didn't get any 12/12 email. What was that email about? Was it for international customers only?

[SarahV]

Didn't get any 12/12 email. What was that email about? Was it for international customers only?

I got it and I'm in New York. Maybe a spam filter ate it?

[Lissou]

I got it and I'm in New York. Maybe a spam filter ate it?

Didn't find any in the spam folder either, and it seems weird that it would block some messages from that address but not others (since I've been receiving confirmation messages from ookoodook fine). Not a big deal though, I was just curious.

[Jaxzan Proditor]

I got the email too.

[The Giant]

Yeah, an email definitely went out on 12/12/14, directing people to check the website for future updates. If it didn't get to some people, that's unfortunate, but it's a very different level of problem than "three months with no communication," which didn't happen.

Here's what it said:

I wanted to send you an update on the shipping status of the new Order of the Stick book, Blood Runs in the Family, and the 2015 calendar.

Both items are still at the printer, and they are expected to finish next week. They will then be shipped to our warehouse and we'll work frantically to get them out to you as quickly as we can. We already have all of the orders pre-packed with non-pre-order items and labeled - waiting only to drop in the pre-order items when they arrive.

Realistically though, many of the orders won't arrive before the 25th, especially international orders.

For the latest status, you can check in on the ookoodook.com homepage where it says "Order of the Stick Pre-Order Shipping Status". Currently the status shows "At Printer".

Email questions to us at [email protected]. At this point we can handle address changes, if necessary. We cannot ship partial orders, or change order contents, but we can delete orders.


Kevin Brusky

President, APE Games
Ookoodook.com

As it transpired, the books arrived on Thursday, December 17th—in a truck without a liftgate, which we specifically requested and the printer screwed up by not providing. The books had to go back and switch to another truck, so they didn't arrive until late on Friday, December 18th. Packing began at that point.

[Porthos]

Didn't find any in the spam folder either, and it seems weird that it would block some messages from that address but not others (since I've been receiving confirmation messages from ookoodook fine). Not a big deal though, I was just curious.

Some/many ISPs will block emails at their end before you ever see them based on their arcane, automated, scoring rules. A mass email blast is one of those scores. As a "for instance" this can mean that you'll get an individual email from a company, but not their newsletter. Or, say, their mass "Whoops. Product's late folks" email.

I've had to set up whitelists with my actual ISP to make sure I don't miss important email.

[Nevitan]

What should the expected reply time for emails sent to [email protected] be? I accidentally entered the incorrect shipping address when I purchased the preorder of the new book. I didn't realize my mistake until after the book was expected to be delivered. As far as I can tell, the mistaken address isn't valid and the book was likely returned to sender. I emailed ookoodook about the mix up on January 12th and haven't heard back.

[Lissou]

I'll make sure to whitelist ookoodook to avoid missing emails in the future, then, since it's unlikely the issue with me not getting the email was on their end. While not getting that specific one wasn't a big deal (thanks for quoting it here though, Giant), I might care more about missing out on future ones.

[HeeJay]

Awww, know at least 3 others here who have them. Toivotaan parasta.

I finally got mine! Today! With five days in January still left, so that picture will not go to waste. Joy!

[nogall]

Is there any way to contact ookoodook service? I sent them an email ([email protected]) 10 days ago and didn't receive any response.

I still have no clue if the pre-order I placed in late October (book + calendar + Rarr game) will be shipped anytime soon...

[NerdyKris]

You should be using the Contact Us link here. That is likely the only regularly monitored customer service address. I don't know where you got those other two addresses from. The response time for that is about an hour or so.

[nogall]

You should be using the Contact Us link here. That is likely the only regularly monitored customer service address. I don't know where you got those other two addresses from. The response time for that is about an hour or so.

thanks, I just did that. As for the other address, I had replied one of their emails ([email protected]).

[Menarker]

Finally got my book, after close to 2 hours of waiting.

Glad to have it in my collection.

Spoiler: Spoiler

Show

Although I was hoping to see the adventures of Vaarsuvius in Ranch-Dimension. Guess not in THIS book or something.

[Parlik]

Just a small sidenote: Getting it through customs can cause a significant delay at times, which can hardly be faulted at the sender.

[Echon]

Hi. I just finished reading Blood Runs in the Family, which was amazing. I had not re-read any of these strips online so there was actually a lot that I had forgotten, which only made the book that much more exciting. I look forward to reading the next one, too, regardless of when it will be completed. Good job.

[Vinsfeld]

Did anyone from Brazil get the book?

[Rogar Demonblud]

Not that I recall seeing, although someone from...Buenos Aires?...has received it.

[Kokomo]

Melbourne, Australia, here. I noticed that one person from Melbourne reported theirs arriving, but has there been anybody else? If a pre-order hasn't arrived by now, should I get in touch with Ookoodook, or is that a bit premature?

[zql]

Did anyone from Brazil get the book?

I'm in Buenos Aires and it came a week ago.

[Vinsfeld]

Ooooooooh, got my book today. Brazil's mail service is pretty slow. I'm actually surprised to see it so soon.