For fun, I recommend that everyone read the first few pages of this thread and then the most recent comments. It’s a great contrast between high expectations and crushing failure.
ANOVOS issues (ANOVOS ONLY discussion)
- Thread starter Art Andrews
- Start date
The most perfect Internet response of the year. Well done!
To reiterate what all of us already know: as far as old SW orders are concerned, they are not coming.
I am now starting to wonder if one of the reasons that there were so many issues with armor /helmet replica delivery is because ANOVOS couldn't pay the overseas factories for the runs.
SO... if there is an ANOVOS product you really want, go pick it up from an eBay scalper who has it on hand. It's your only hope...
P.S. At least Hasbro's black series helmets have been solid products overall, and you can actually find them !
I am now starting to wonder if one of the reasons that there were so many issues with armor /helmet replica delivery is because ANOVOS couldn't pay the overseas factories for the runs.
SO... if there is an ANOVOS product you really want, go pick it up from an eBay scalper who has it on hand. It's your only hope...
P.S. At least Hasbro's black series helmets have been solid products overall, and you can actually find them !
Also: for those that check the court records directly at the PACER system you should get the RECAP addon for your browser. (RECAP Project — Turning PACER Around Since 2009)
that way the documents that you request from the PACER database end up at courtlistener.org.
And yes, i do that for the anovos case even though im from europe)
that way the documents that you request from the PACER database end up at courtlistener.org.
And yes, i do that for the anovos case even though im from europe)
....and in another Universe MY counterpart is whipping the crap out of Jose and Dana with my vintage Morgan Bullwhip!
I wish I could be in that Universe to witness it.....and in another Universe MY counterpart is whipping the crap out of Jose and Dana with my vintage Morgan Bullwhip!
darthjones
Sr Member
Oh my god I did this a few months ago. It's great - the first 10 pages and then the last 20 - something like that. WAAOOOWWW.
My god... if there is some way to get this message to Anovos. That is the best.
darthjones
Sr Member
Something else - it's hard to find but, if you look through this entire thread, some of us (and others before me) were spotting the hubris and delusion of Anovos somewhat early on - the lack of critical thinking and the sad example of someone on the sidelines believing they were qualified to be on the field.
And some came to the defense of Anovos with mention of their "learning curve" and other dynamics. They urged support and encouragement and got upset when others were pointing out the early red flags.
Do not forget that you were always wrong in their defense.
Always.
Always.
Yeah, still pissed at that.
And some came to the defense of Anovos with mention of their "learning curve" and other dynamics. They urged support and encouragement and got upset when others were pointing out the early red flags.
Do not forget that you were always wrong in their defense.
Always.
Always.
Yeah, still pissed at that.
At this point, all I'm hoping is for this community to keep track of these clowns and call them out when they start their next business(es).
Not much we can do about what happened, but we can prevent more damage for whatever happens next.
and really hope they don't manage to fool disney again. There are enough newbies to prop collecting out there that assume that the Disney mark is a sign of trustworthyness. (and not everyone knows this forum initially)
I do genuinely think a lot of their early problems were a combination of internal -- foraying into Chinese factories for the first time, utterly unprepared -- and external -- a whole new raft of potential and actual customers not knowing about their order model (stand-in image to approximately convey the final product, prior to the beginning of development, to gauge interest). My experience in the costuming universe over the decades has been that Trek and BSG costumers read the fine print and are patient, where Star Wars and video game costumers tent to be a lot more impatient, no matter how clearly the lead time is spelled out.
I have a friend who used to make N7 armor to order. He stopped after too many people ignored the whole "I start making it when it is ordered. I have no stock on-hand. Every set is made to order and will take a week to build and send out." stipulation, and filed PayPal disputes when they hadn't gotten a shipping notification in 48 hours.
Heck, just over in the Hasbro Black Series helmet threads, I've seen this sort of impatience. The official release date for the Mandalorian helmet is 1st June. Some big retailers like Target and Walmart got their stock and immediately put them up for order. I saw a lot of people -- on here and elsewhere -- canceling their preorders through Entertainment Earth, BBTS, GameStop -- even from Hasbro themselves! -- to get the jump on the places that were shipping weeks early. Earlier than the date Hasbro had set and was, themselves, following.
Similarly, I saw, on here and elsewhere, people thinking the stand-in image was the final product, and that it would be ready to go out in a few weeks, rather than an interest-generator for a product that hadn't even been begun yet, and would take a couple years to actually develop and get out. And then, as with my friend, above, after what they considered a "reasonable" amount of time had passed with no shipping notice, they'd cancel their pre-orders. By the score. I can only imagine how many thousands of invested dollars suddenly hemorrhaged back out. And they had no backup in place, because they'd never needed one.
That's when we get into the later problems. The owners had no contingency plans, no backup options. They tried to keep a business-as-usual face on things for way, way too long, all while they were robbing one project to try to pay for another, that had costs spiraling because Chinese factories on top of cancelled pre-orders, cutting staff to try to reduce overhead -- which ate into their ability to do final prep and packing States-side, and so on. I know part of their agreement with Disney precludes disclosures of most of their business matters, and that bugs me, too. They did a few things -- stopping their old tiered pre-order model, for instance -- but not enough, and not far enough.
Since Disney wouldn't let them put a public pause on things, issue an authentic and detailed mea culpa, maybe even start a Kickstarter or Gofundme to try and regain lost capital to finish the outstanding projects already begun, I feel Disney should have shouldered the onus they were forcing onto ANOVOS' customers, who were hanging on (or not, in the case of those futilely pursuing refunds) in an increasing information vacuum. Since they were denying ANOVOS' customers the transparency they needed to make an informed choice, Disney needed to front the money to complete those runs that people were hanging on for in good faith. I hate that the judge excluded Disney and Lucasfilm from the lawsuit, given their gag order on ANOVOS is partially responsible for the present situation being as bad as it is.
This whole mess is a perfect storm of a surge of a completely different kind of customer from what they'd dealt with before, a company utterly unprepared for the literal and existential costs of that lack of experience, a licensor who placed (IMO) unreasonable restrictions on the licensee -- while also still demanding their huge license fee regardless of sales, and owners who found themselves utterly out of their depth and decided the only way out was charging desperately forward.
I have a friend who used to make N7 armor to order. He stopped after too many people ignored the whole "I start making it when it is ordered. I have no stock on-hand. Every set is made to order and will take a week to build and send out." stipulation, and filed PayPal disputes when they hadn't gotten a shipping notification in 48 hours.
Heck, just over in the Hasbro Black Series helmet threads, I've seen this sort of impatience. The official release date for the Mandalorian helmet is 1st June. Some big retailers like Target and Walmart got their stock and immediately put them up for order. I saw a lot of people -- on here and elsewhere -- canceling their preorders through Entertainment Earth, BBTS, GameStop -- even from Hasbro themselves! -- to get the jump on the places that were shipping weeks early. Earlier than the date Hasbro had set and was, themselves, following.
Similarly, I saw, on here and elsewhere, people thinking the stand-in image was the final product, and that it would be ready to go out in a few weeks, rather than an interest-generator for a product that hadn't even been begun yet, and would take a couple years to actually develop and get out. And then, as with my friend, above, after what they considered a "reasonable" amount of time had passed with no shipping notice, they'd cancel their pre-orders. By the score. I can only imagine how many thousands of invested dollars suddenly hemorrhaged back out. And they had no backup in place, because they'd never needed one.
That's when we get into the later problems. The owners had no contingency plans, no backup options. They tried to keep a business-as-usual face on things for way, way too long, all while they were robbing one project to try to pay for another, that had costs spiraling because Chinese factories on top of cancelled pre-orders, cutting staff to try to reduce overhead -- which ate into their ability to do final prep and packing States-side, and so on. I know part of their agreement with Disney precludes disclosures of most of their business matters, and that bugs me, too. They did a few things -- stopping their old tiered pre-order model, for instance -- but not enough, and not far enough.
Since Disney wouldn't let them put a public pause on things, issue an authentic and detailed mea culpa, maybe even start a Kickstarter or Gofundme to try and regain lost capital to finish the outstanding projects already begun, I feel Disney should have shouldered the onus they were forcing onto ANOVOS' customers, who were hanging on (or not, in the case of those futilely pursuing refunds) in an increasing information vacuum. Since they were denying ANOVOS' customers the transparency they needed to make an informed choice, Disney needed to front the money to complete those runs that people were hanging on for in good faith. I hate that the judge excluded Disney and Lucasfilm from the lawsuit, given their gag order on ANOVOS is partially responsible for the present situation being as bad as it is.
This whole mess is a perfect storm of a surge of a completely different kind of customer from what they'd dealt with before, a company utterly unprepared for the literal and existential costs of that lack of experience, a licensor who placed (IMO) unreasonable restrictions on the licensee -- while also still demanding their huge license fee regardless of sales, and owners who found themselves utterly out of their depth and decided the only way out was charging desperately forward.
Imagine having the gall to not only pocket all your customers money for orders which will never be filled. But also not paying the legal team you needed because of your horrendous handling of even the most rudimentary customer service. Anovos never ceases to amaze.
MODS, please sticky this great summary of the ANOVOS debacle. We will NEVER know for sure, but this is probably the closest to the target we will ever get.
I do not believe ANOVOS ever had any malice or ill intent, but found themselves quickly in a money hole, with large IP owners showing up and demanding their fees. At that point, you can't explain how Billy Smith is owed a refund for his Kylo ensemble ordered 4 years ago but never delivered, so you can't pay Mr. Disney today. Instead, you hand Mr. Disney whatever $$$ you have and whatever FO armor sets are sitting in your warehouse, so he leaves your front porch, gets back in his Maybach and leaves you alone for a while longer.
YEP: For the Disney/SW IP, it's probably best for a company to either have "toys" like Hasbro, where cheap plastic can be knocked out quickly in overseas factories for action figures and vehicles, or ultra high end, very limited and $$$$ collector pieces, like large character statues and full sized Vader/Trooper/droid statues.
Trying to cater to the mid tier collector market is a tough spot to be in.... you're not big enough to have economies of scale and long-lived arrangements with you suppliers, and your are also not exclusive enough to demand $$$$ for unique collectibles.
cboath
Master Member
In regards to this, I don't disagree. I'd just add Disney COULD step in and make things right with those who will get screwed and it wouldn't even register on their corporate earnings reports. It's money in the couch cushions to them. I'm not saying they should, but they could. Though I kinda lean towards should because they've been aware of the situation for what? 3 years now? and haven't done jack. The Disney logo does get stamped on all this, so their name gets dragged down in a morass like this as well. But for all their responses, or rather lack thereof, it is starting to show they don't care about their customer either.
That. SO much that. They knew, when they assigned the license, that the "high-end costume and prop" corner of the Star Wars merch 'verse is fraught with failures, from Icons to The Prop Store. The only company I have seen not fail outright was Museum Replicas, because Star Wars was only a tiny slice of what they did.
IT WAS KNOWN that to get people to buy such things they had to keep profit margins as narrow as possible with a product price point that was as low as possible above breaking even. IT WAS KNOWN that these weren't mega-manufacturers on the scale of Hasbro or Mattel, and that they would thus not have much clout with any factories they contracted with. IT WAS KNOWN that they didn't have the production capacity in-house to expand into the whole new direction of hard armor and helmets, and would have to look to Chinese factories.
I'm not an MBA, but it seems obvious to me that getting a company going in that niche is going to take investment capital to help them get some inventory to attract (and please) customers. Banking on people not cancelling pre-orders is not sound business sense for companies that want such notoriously usurious licensing fees. In this case, I'm leveling the finger of blame at Lucasfilm, that contracted for such licensed fare from: Icons, Master Replicas, Museum Replicas, ANOVOS, The Prop Store... and keeps, apparently, wondering why it isn't working. Meanwhile, the only company that is doing somewhat well in this niche is RS Propmasters. Who don't have to pay licensing fees due to the UK's copyright decision. Hmmm...
darthjones
Sr Member
Beautiful stuff, guys. I must say though that an ocean of their Star Wars customers were very patient within the confines of the estimated Quarterly time frames. Anovos asked their intended customers to take them seriously and we responded with respect and trust. And money. Lots of it When that got violated we responded with worry, not impatience.
Customers requesting refunds played no part in the failure of this company - these refunds were demanded by people who saw the writing on the wall and turned out to be right and justified at every turn.
There is no way anyone can say that everything would be fine without Anovos refund requests without being laughed away.
But Disney is totally culpable as outlined above!! I can tell you now that there are judges who should not be judges. But this judge may have deferred to legal protections (Disney is wrapped with those) as I would be surprised if there was some recognition of an innocence/ ignorance or other on their part.
Customers requesting refunds played no part in the failure of this company - these refunds were demanded by people who saw the writing on the wall and turned out to be right and justified at every turn.
There is no way anyone can say that everything would be fine without Anovos refund requests without being laughed away.
But Disney is totally culpable as outlined above!! I can tell you now that there are judges who should not be judges. But this judge may have deferred to legal protections (Disney is wrapped with those) as I would be surprised if there was some recognition of an innocence/ ignorance or other on their part.
I am leaning away from 'petty'...
But am I the only one that feels like there are only 2 or 3 faces that caused (and supported) this Bull$&(T? Legit knew what was happening, and, no matter the extraneous stuff, kept going with it.
I get the idea of being under water, not wanting to panic your base, and then shoveling as hard as you can. But this ( nevermind what was put up in the last couple pages) stinks amazingly. Capricious approach is one thing, fraud after the fact is quite a bit another. Fool me once, Steve Dymszo.... Fool me twice?
I'm not talking about what I think you're talking about. I mean early on, when things were still good-ish. I saw on various social media and heard from people associated with the company that there were a lot of people who preordered without, apparently, reading any of the not-so-fine print and thought they were getting in on something that was going to be shipping imminently, and then angrily said "this is ********!" and cancelled a month or two in. The same sorts of people, probably, as I've seen for ages over on the 501st's Detachment boards asking where they can buy an off-the-rack-approvable, ready-to-wear Storm/Clone/Scout/Snow Trooper costume -- and it has to be film-quality and not too expensive.
Certainly "not all fans", but enough, in this case, to knock the company off-stride and render them less able to cope with problems with Chinese factories and a licensor who still demanded their (huge) cut.
darthjones
Sr Member
But Inquisitor - don’t you at all have a problem with the idea that your assessment opens up an avenue of sympathy for these two jokers?
People have come to think that removing redundancies is some slick way to avoid expenditure and these two seem to be no exception.
There are overwhelming examples of delusion and deceit. Myself, I have it on good authority that their Kylo costumes were never even started. That whole write up about them being finished but then all being trashed is also suspiciously missing from their site.
And when Kylo costumes WERE supposedly going into production again (lie) Anovos had no problem selling the spots that had opened up from cancellations.
These guys dont have what it takes and, in fooling Disney, fooled themselves into thinking they did.
I’ll grant you this: Star Wars fans are some of the most selfish and unrealistically demanding folk out there. You know this. I know this. And only an idiot would tell them that their product was coming within a certain time frame and then not deliver.
And any cancellations a week or so after purchase were not numerous enough nor frequent enough to affect a company with any real sense of structure. They had more than enough customers to wait through their Q1-Q4 system if they adhered to it.
These people were selling flying cars without inventing them first.
And Inquisitor, I am not pushing back on you, dude - I’m sparring with your assessment, sure. And I have loved and do love your contributions to this monster thread. Please know that.
In short…
Sympathy for Anovos? No way.
Star Wars fans are whiners? Big time.
People have come to think that removing redundancies is some slick way to avoid expenditure and these two seem to be no exception.
There are overwhelming examples of delusion and deceit. Myself, I have it on good authority that their Kylo costumes were never even started. That whole write up about them being finished but then all being trashed is also suspiciously missing from their site.
And when Kylo costumes WERE supposedly going into production again (lie) Anovos had no problem selling the spots that had opened up from cancellations.
These guys dont have what it takes and, in fooling Disney, fooled themselves into thinking they did.
I’ll grant you this: Star Wars fans are some of the most selfish and unrealistically demanding folk out there. You know this. I know this. And only an idiot would tell them that their product was coming within a certain time frame and then not deliver.
And any cancellations a week or so after purchase were not numerous enough nor frequent enough to affect a company with any real sense of structure. They had more than enough customers to wait through their Q1-Q4 system if they adhered to it.
These people were selling flying cars without inventing them first.
And Inquisitor, I am not pushing back on you, dude - I’m sparring with your assessment, sure. And I have loved and do love your contributions to this monster thread. Please know that.
In short…
Sympathy for Anovos? No way.
Star Wars fans are whiners? Big time.
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