ANOVOS issues (ANOVOS ONLY discussion)

[TK765]

I am starting to lose my patience. The trooper helmet kit is three more months or longer as is the Tie Helmet I ordered 1-1/2 years ago. I can see it now, third quarter will end and the new date will be 4th quarter. Then it will be first quarter 2017 as they will suddenly have Rogue One Helmets you can order this X-mas.

 

[Uncontested]

They just posted new pictures of the Snowtrooper. Doesn't look nearly as good as the original prototype.. Getting closer and closer to just saying screw it and getting a refund at this point. Beyond frustrated.

 

[Lichtbringer]

If you don´t like what you see, you should do that.

 

[DarkJedi]

The item I have been keeping my eye on is this one:


[/I]
It has now been over two years since ordering for an item that was suppose to be delivered in Fall of 2014. It was the second Star Wars preorder item. Additionally, the status above regarding testing and packaging has been basically the same status for about 9 months now with no progress. When it first stated such a status, it was early November 2015 with a promise of late November 2015. Basically the testing and safety issues that were originally going to be resolved in late Nov 2015 is now 7 months with no progress.

You'd think it's rocket science, putting these things into a box and getting it shipped out.

 

[Lichtbringer]

Needing approval for next to everything from Disney is the best way for Disney to control every release without geting themself in the line of fire from unhappy customers.

They just play with the dates of making approvals, and the manufacturing companies can do nothing. Disney controls which product is released and which not yet, and all the anger is not their problem.

 

[oblagon]

With all the complaints and production issues I'm surprised to see people still excited and pre-ordering new product from Anovos.

 

[cboath]

Gotta approve it for safety
Have to approve the brown shipping box
Have to approve the black item box
If there's an insert that's gotta be approved
They probably want to approve the styrofoam to make sure they feel it's adequate for shipping.

None of which they will do without a 100% finished product, which
Has to be approved as accurate/what they want it to be
Has to be approved for safety of the wearer and liability of the company.

Neither of which happens until Anovos themselves have approved a final item.

Not trying to justify it, just saying it adds up. Not to mention, like any big company, i'm sure there's bureaucracy preventing them from doing more than one of those approvals at once.

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

Gotta approve it for safety
Have to approve the brown shipping box
Have to approve the black item box
If there's an insert that's gotta be approved
They probably want to approve the styrofoam to make sure they feel it's adequate for shipping.

None of which they will do without a 100% finished product, which
Has to be approved as accurate/what they want it to be
Has to be approved for safety of the wearer and liability of the company.

Neither of which happens until Anovos themselves have approved a final item.

Not trying to justify it, just saying it adds up. Not to mention, like any big company, i'm sure there's bureaucracy preventing them from doing more than one of those approvals at once.

I personally understand that there are certain things that must happen and nothing is simple. My issue has been with Anovos' terrible ability to understand their own timeline and come up with realistic release dates. For instance: the first time that Anovos posted waiting on quality checks and packaging for the Solo rig was early November 2015 to which they estimated release at the end of the month. Really? Then they moved it to January, then end of Q1, then Q2, and now Q3. All for the same issue. How can you so poorly estimate 3 weeks for a process that now might actually be 9-12 months?

The thing that boggles the mind is that no one at Anovos seems to be learning from these mistakes. The keep offering new pre-orders with unrealistic release dates. I can only come up with 2 reasons and both are disturbing:

1. They simply don't get it.
or
2. They are intentionally deceiving the customer as they do not want to drive away pre-orders by posting realistic release dates.

 

[ggriffaw]

I personally understand that there are certain things that must happen and nothing is simple. My issue has been with Anovos' terrible ability to understand their own timeline and come up with realistic release dates. For instance: the first time that Anovos posted waiting on quality checks and packaging for the Solo rig was early November 2015 to which they estimated release at the end of the month. Really? Then they moved it to January, then end of Q1, then Q2, and now Q3. All for the same issue. How can you so poorly estimate 3 weeks for a process that now might actually be 9-12 months?

The thing that boggles the mind is that no one at Anovos seems to be learning from these mistakes. The keep offering new pre-orders with unrealistic release dates. I can only come up with 2 reasons and both are disturbing:

1. They simply don't get it.
or
2. They are intentionally deceiving the customer as they do not want to drive away pre-orders by posting realistic release dates.

Which new products have unrealistic release dates? The newest just say "coming soon". Some of the other more recent products are for TFA which Disney appears to move through the process more quickly.

It's mostly the OT products that have the long delays.

 

[cboath]

I personally understand that there are certain things that must happen and nothing is simple. My issue has been with Anovos' terrible ability to understand their own timeline and come up with realistic release dates. For instance: the first time that Anovos posted waiting on quality checks and packaging for the Solo rig was early November 2015 to which they estimated release at the end of the month. Really? Then they moved it to January, then end of Q1, then Q2, and now Q3. All for the same issue. How can you so poorly estimate 3 weeks for a process that now might actually be 9-12 months?

The thing that boggles the mind is that no one at Anovos seems to be learning from these mistakes. The keep offering new pre-orders with unrealistic release dates. I can only come up with 2 reasons and both are disturbing:

1. They simply don't get it.
or
2. They are intentionally deceiving the customer as they do not want to drive away pre-orders by posting realistic release dates.

Think of it like congress. If Disney for example, wants to hold back something. They don't have to say 'we decided we want to delay this' they can simply hold up approval. Anovos would be clueless and frustrated as are the rest of us.

The stuff that's been two years, mind you, that's pretty tough to explain at all. Short of 'we were screwed out of $xxxxx by our first factory and had to repeat the process with a second. That type of delay deserves a full and flat out admission of what took so long with a big bonus to those who wait it out or money back with interest.

The trooper is the one that kills me here, people state it was exceedingly late. No, it wasn't. They said they were hoping for pre-TFA but could not guarantee it. They started shipping end of february.

Couple that with them saying FO troopers to start shipping in August/September IIRC. They hit that date and it screams behind the scenes politics of what goes out when.

 

[ronwlim]

Honestly, I don't mind waiting. I mind lying. I bought my Han holster at Comic Con last year, when I was told it'd ship the following month (August). Then Q1, then Q2, now Q3. Give me a realistic timetable and I have no trouble waiting. But stop kidding yourselves and lying to consumers about when your product is ready to ship.

 

[ggriffaw]

Honestly, I don't mind waiting. I mind lying. I bought my Han holster at Comic Con last year, when I was told it'd ship the following month (August). Then Q1, then Q2, now Q3. Give me a realistic timetable and I have no trouble waiting. But stop kidding yourselves and lying to consumers about when your product is ready to ship.

Why do so many assume Anovos is in total control of every step needed to produce these products?

Maybe they should be more pessimistic in their estimates, but if they are given dates by the factories or Disney that turn out to be incorrect, how is that Anovos's fault?

 

[ronwlim]

Don't announce an official ship date until you have approval from the licensor. Simple. Estimates are fine, but base those estimates on realistic dates. Once they had issues with the first item, use that as a metric as the kind of hoops you'll have to jump through to get approvals. Then for all future items, allow a longer lead time with an estimate that doesn't slip by more than 6 months (which I feel is more than generous).

-Ron

Why do so many assume Anovos is in total control of every step needed to produce these products?

Maybe they should be more pessimistic in their estimates, but if they are given dates by the factories or Disney that turn out to be incorrect, how is that Anovos's fault?

 

[ggriffaw]

Don't announce an official ship date until you have approval from the licensor. Simple. Estimates are fine, but base those estimates on realistic dates. Once they had issues with the first item, use that as a metric as the kind of hoops you'll have to jump through to get approvals. Then for all future items, allow a longer lead time with an estimate that doesn't slip by more than 6 months (which I feel is more than generous).

-Ron

The current Updates page lists estimated shipping dates, not official ship dates.

Unfortunately the delays may vary from product to product.

Some people prefer to not hear anything until the shipping time frame is set and others want to hear updates along the way. There are plenty of complaints about lack of communication for efx and Anovos in the past.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

Think of it like congress. If Disney for example, wants to hold back something. They don't have to say 'we decided we want to delay this' they can simply hold up approval. Anovos would be clueless and frustrated as are the rest of us.

The stuff that's been two years, mind you, that's pretty tough to explain at all. Short of 'we were screwed out of $xxxxx by our first factory and had to repeat the process with a second. That type of delay deserves a full and flat out admission of what took so long with a big bonus to those who wait it out or money back with interest.

The trooper is the one that kills me here, people state it was exceedingly late. No, it wasn't. They said they were hoping for pre-TFA but could not guarantee it. They started shipping end of february.

Couple that with them saying FO troopers to start shipping in August/September IIRC. They hit that date and it screams behind the scenes politics of what goes out when.

I'm not going to jump on the "It's Disney's Fault" bus. People say that crud all the time to make them the bad guy. If that were the case, other Star Wars items would be late from other companies. It has no benefit to Disney or LFL to hold up product release just to be difficult.

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

Which new products have unrealistic release dates? The newest just say "coming soon". Some of the other more recent products are for TFA which Disney appears to move through the process more quickly.

It's mostly the OT products that have the long delays.

When I say new pre-orders, I refer to all pre-orders that came out after the first Star Wars products were offered. It's been two years for items like the Bespin Fatigues and Solo Rig, getting close to that for items like Snow Trooper and Vader. You would think that the first year of product delays would give them a clue to production timelines. But they went into the second year making the claims of items being delivered later in the year.

If you go back to my other posts, it is the poor time estimates that frustrate me. I understand that it takes time to go from basically a concept/prototype to a packaged final product and that their can be production delays during that process. So does Anovos understand that? I would have to believe they do. So why offer a Solo Rig in summer of 2014 and say it is going to be delivered in Fall of 2014? And why keep doing this with many products to follow? At this point, I can only believe that they are simply afraid that indicating realistic product release dates would hamper sales and/or lead to refund requests.

 

[Ukyank]

I'm not going to jump on the "It's Disney's Fault" bus. People say that crud all the time to make them the bad guy. If that were the case, other Star Wars items would be late from other companies. It has no benefit to Disney or LFL to hold up product release just to be difficult.

Completely agree with this - Disney licenses out so many products; think every cartoon; Pixar movie; everything they do basically into so many different product categories I find it very hard to believe that Disney plays much of a part in product development or approval; not to mention its in Disneys best interest for these products to make into consumer's hands asap.

 

[Lichtbringer]

I'm not going to jump on the "It's Disney's Fault" bus. People say that crud all the time to make them the bad guy. If that were the case, other Star Wars items would be late from other companies. It has no benefit to Disney or LFL to hold up product release just to be difficult.

In fact it does.

It makes a lot of sense to bring stuff while it´s new. Most people have limited funds, and that can only spent once - TFA is more or less a momentary hype, but the ot stuff will always be bought. So it´s only logical to "steer" release dates from the back to get the money for the new stuff while it´s hot, and bring the everytime sellers later.

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

In fact it does.

It makes a lot of sense to bring stuff while it´s new. Most people have limited funds, and that can only spent once - TFA is more or less a momentary hype, but the ot stuff will always be bought. So it´s only logical to "steer" release dates from the back to get the money for the new stuff while it´s hot, and bring the everytime sellers later.

But it;s not Disney/LFL setting release dates of products (unless you are talking about when items for upcoming movies can be sold or revealed). Those are set by Anovos. And it goes back to the point I made prior. They either are awful at developing reliable ETAs or they are intentionally misleading (which you seem to be hinting at). Whichever the case, it is quite disturbing.

My point by the pervious comment was it is not Disney sitting on a throne of product telling poor Anovos, "NO PACKAGING APPROVAL FOR YOU... WAIT NINE MONTHS!"

 

[joshvanrad]

These Disney conspiracy theorists making excuses for a company- that just flat out sucks at estimating shipping dates- is classic.

Usually the simplest answer is the correct answer. And that answer is that Anovos just bit off more than they can chew... and they continue to do it.