Good Wear-abouts

[EmergencyIan]

That’s the thing, John is such a nice and upstanding guy that I cannot understand the communication breakdown. Again, from a distance, it’s perplexing.

- Ian

 

[Grayland]

I'm surprised to hear that GW was messing around with Shinki leather. They're just a couple of hours drive from me. Their biggest customer for years has been RMC, who get first dibs on their hides.

He's used Shinki for years. Most of his hh jackets are made with Shinki although he really doesn't mention it much on his website - except for the ads for his sale jackets. I'm lucky in that I got in the queue years ago for a Ventura (about 24 months to get it) and then bought one of his Imperials second-hand. I do really like his Arcadia, but the current situation looks pretty bleak.

 

[Superfluous]

This thread makes me want to hold onto my Imperial regardless of the less than ideal fit.

 

[steve u]

I'm not very experienced in "fit" , but I think the Imperial looks GREAT on you. steve

 

[ProteinNerd]

This thread makes me want to hold onto my Imperial regardless of the less than ideal fit.

I always say you can’t un-sell it, don’t do anything until you are 110% sure you don’t want it anymore!

 

[BlueWallpaper]

This thread makes me want to hold onto my Imperial regardless of the less than ideal fit.

I think PN’s advice of not selling it until you have another (then choosing which one you prefer) is the way to go.

On the situation in general. I decided to order a GW a while back and wrote to ask a few questions but never got a reply so didn’t bother. Seemed like a bad sign. He should post on his website guidance about communication. I bet people would feel better if on the site it said you won’t hear from him until one month prior to construction and also something like ‘Spring 2014’ to indicate how far along he was (roughly). Probably also save him a lot of time in the emails he does reply to.

 

[Brettafett]

I sent John and email a month ago, also no response. He always replied in the past, sometimes took a few days to a week... Must be really busy...

 

[jacketjunkie]

I'm certain John is a good man and has no intention to do anyone wrong. However I do think John has difficulties to cope with the dimensions into which his reproducing leather jackets hobby exploded with the rising popularity of his jackets. Just imagine being some dude who's stitching up a jacket every few weeks in his garage whenever he's got the spare time and all of a sudden you have hundreds of e-mails coming in from people who want a jacket from you, plus thousands of e-mails with follow up questions to come after. Your once hobby no longer is a hobby now, you have obligations to all these people, you're undder a lot of pressure and the only way to fulfill all these obligations is to sit in your garage every day, nine to five. And then a loved one dies, you grief and this grief, mixed with the constant pressure of having obligations to fulfill, hundreds of e-mails coming in, you're overchallenged with everything and from that point, it is not very far to a real bad depression and depressions don't exactly make you the most efficent worker.

Imho, John should have charged 300 USD more for every jacket since day one and used that to hire one or two additional helpers to deal with e-mails and also should have stopped taking deposits the second he realized he had more than a year of backorder.

 

[Otter]

Just a thought, has anyone contacted Diamond Dave on VLJ, he works very closely with John.

 

[Sloan1874]

Okay, John's been in touch (proves the adage about the squeaky wheel has a lot of truth in it!). He sent a very detailed explanation as to his circumstances and was very apologetic about the lack of communication -- as we've all said here, it's not deliberate, he's just starved for time and juggling priorities. It's good to know that he's trying to get on top of the backlog.

 

[Dickie Teenie]

Any word on whether he has gotten his leather supply problems sorted?

 

[Monitor]

Is John still taking orders?

I've been there. I illustrate for a living and couple of times I made a mistake of taking on too many projects, more than I could handle and eventually, due to the lack of time, I was forced to scrap some and refund people. It wasn't deliberate, it wasn't something I had planned, it just happened. So I get it - but no way in hell would I have gotten out of it if I didn't stop taking on jobs at the time. It's amazing how quickly things get to the point where it becomes literally impossible to get on top of the backlog.

 

[navetsea]

been there too, same like Monitor, after my grandma's death I was stuck with pages of parallel projects I had to draw for multiple clients, it feels so sad/ bad to answer each mail with excuses, I rather just be quiet and force myself to finish those pages even when it takes much longer to complete, I rather apologize together with the finished work attached/ linked in the mail. I didn't have hundreds of clients and 4yrs backlog though... I couldn't imagine such scale.

 

[SpeedRcrX]

This, remind me my CS Adventurebilt order.

I ordered the hat in 2009 and got it at the end of 2015... and I have it because I add money to match the new price... some people are still waiting.

So I feel for you guys and wish you good luck and patience.

 

[tropicalbob]

This, remind me my CS Adventurebilt order.

I ordered the hat in 2009 and got it at the end of 2015... and I have it because I add money to match the new price... some people are still waiting.

So I feel for you guys and wish you good luck and patience.

You had to pay for price increases incurred during your waiting? I've never heard of that.

 

[Sloan1874]

You had to pay for price increases incurred during your waiting? I've never heard of that.

Yeah, the last time someone did that to me, it was a mechanic who said that the job repairing my car was a bit more than he anticipated half-way through the work and jacked up the price. Daft thing to do as I never used him again.

 

[SpeedRcrX]

You had to pay for price increases incurred during your waiting? I've never heard of that.

Yes, if people do that they would be put on the priority list. I tried getting a refund but never got an answer and it was to late to do a dispute on PayPal. I was fed up waiting so I cracked and paid the increase. The hat is beautiful but it let a sour taste in my mouth...

Some people ordered in 2008 and still don’t have their hat.
I understand Steve situation but it is still unacceptable...

 

[marmalademan]

Some people ordered in 2008 and still don’t have their hat.
I understand Steve situation but it is still unacceptable...

Let's see some photos of this hat!

 

[SpeedRcrX]

This is not a recent photo but at least I have my TN jacket on so it’s not completely OT.

 

[marmalademan]

Thx. i don't know anything about hats. To my amateur eye that one looks okay! Lol