Solving the Shipping Problem

Yay!

It took a wee while but eventually our shipper, DHL, solved the case of the missing Nutshells.

If you follow here you will know we have a shipment posted early December that 'vanished' into the black hole of the global postal services.

Even though we now ship every product with a tracking code, over a dozen products mysteriously took time out someplace and went to ground.

Because it was the silly season (aka Christmas), the mails get over busy and trying to locate anything that does not want to be located becomes a bit like trying to find a needle in a haystack...or in a more biblical term, harder than threading a fat man through the eye of aforesaid needle.

However all has now been sorted; the errant products have made themselves known once again to the system and the blockage has been cleared. Our customers, who are so long suffering it is remarkable we have not yet been tarred and feathered and run of out of town on a rail are 'finally' getting their orders...more than a month after they were dispatched from us here in New Zealand.

If there are lessons to be learnt here it is that no one should ever voluntarily become the testing lab for a new service. It appears that the service we have chosen is a comparatively new one to New Zealand and, possibly because we have been in the business of global trading for so long, we unwittingly became the 'test platform'.

It is as yet unknown if we can get compensation from DHL; as a global shipper it is likely we are no more than a flyspeck on the lower corner of their windscreen. Apparently over the Christmas season DHL was shipping 50 tonnes of mail, every day, across the pond that is the Atlantic, from their central hub in Europe to the USPS postal service at JFK International airport in New York. And it seems that it is there the mystery mysteriously deepened.

As they (apparently) say...all's well that ends.

I surely do hope that is true.

XXX

The Perils of Shipping worldwide

For many of our customers shipping is a 'no brainer'. Something you never think about.
You order a product. It arrives. That is the end of it.

But when, like us, you are shipping from the other side of the planet, delivery can be a difficult thing.

Not only do we have to put up with the vagaries of the weather, which can delay a flight from here to there and add to the time it take to get delivered, but there is constant concern that something may go dramatically wrong with a shipment; imagine how people must have felt when their products vanished because they are on a commercial airliner that either fell out of the sky or disappeared without trace!

Luckily this is a very rare occurrence...and has never happened to us. Until now.

Recently we were excited to sign with DHL for delivery of our product worldwide. Not only do they have an outstanding reputation as a global shipper, they enable us to track every product that leaves our facilities in New Zealand - all the way (almost) through to delivery to the customer.

When added to yet another shipping service called 'aftership' this combination is one that we have been awaiting eagerly ever since we started this business almost 18 years ago - that is some time!

Still...we are mortified to report that DHL - or someone somewhere- seems to have dropped the ball.
A shipment we sent December 3 has gone missing. Obviously our affected customers are less than happy with us. Understandably we are not that impressed either.

In a world where shipping is everything...we feel our reputation is in jeopardy. While most customers are extremely forgiving and understanding, some take such disruption personally and have not been slow in venting their displeasure to us.We in turn have passed our concerns to our local DHL customer representative, who have, in turn, escalated the issue through the shipper's global delivery network.

Because every package has a tracking number on it we believe the errant items will eventually make a reappearance. Unfortunately it may not be soon enough to forestall our replacing the missing items or finalising a refund.  Such are the joys of being a global trader in a world where one small error can cause a long-lasting downstream effect.

To all those long standing Nutshell customers...thanks for being so understanding. If you are one who has been caught in this maelstrom...rest assured we are working hard to untangle knots in the shipping string.

We want to hear from YOU!

Nutshell has long served a demanding market worldwide. 

Our users come from all walks of life and share one thing in common; their nutshell.

These hardwearing and hard working leather holsters have truly made a difference to many, many, people right around the world, and we constantly get letters telling us of exploits where the Nutshell has come into its own as a product that really does do what we claim; protects the products it covers.

 Hardwearing in the Construction Industry.

Five years and four phones.

Hardwearing - still going

"I do work in construction. That's why I have and always will have a NUTSHELL for my phones! 

Most of my time is driving a desk now so the new case doesn't get nearly the abuse the previous one did

The first one just wore out after 3-4 phones. (see attached pic) the second became outdated due to a new size phone. I can't say I'm not rough on them but the first one held up for years like iron."

 If you have a similar story we want to hear it.

Please send us a image and a couple of paragraphs outlining how Nutshell really made a difference to you.

If we post your story here, along with the image you supply, we will give you a new Nutshell belt case --- FOR FREE!! 

So, what are you waiting for?

_________________________

One Rate for All

I would rather it were 'One Ring for All" but somehow I think Sir Peter (or a Hobbit) may take offense...if  they ever read this.

Over the years we have been trialed just about every delivery service to the rest of the world from New Zealand, with varying levels of satisfaction and success.

All have had inherent difficulties. Some were very expensive. Some took no care at all. Others garnered an international sticker on their way through the system that led some customers to believe we were actually making our products in Asia...and not in New Zealand.

Some took no responsibility for their actions; if they dropped the ball and, God forbid, lost a product, they became very defensive and almost accused US of mismanaging the process. Others were less accusatory...but extremely slow to settle their debt..

Meanwhile we, as the merchant, had to maintain our customers' faith in us, and delivery another product...at our own expense.

Hopefully..those days are now behind us.

DHL promise much..and we have every expectation they will deliver on their promises.

Finally - a service that allows us offer a traceable delivery at a realistic rate.

A Merchant's Work is Never Done

Ho boy....what a weekend...

After sending out an email to our much valued customer base...promoting our newly revamped website...we have been inundated with orders..

OK, maybe a bit of an exaggeration. Suffice to say - a lot of orders. More than most times recently.

However, during the course of this resurgence in Nutshell and hopefully our fortunes, I got a note from a potential customer saying he was unable to locate the Buy Button for a certain product.

I looked. He was right.
The button was nowhere to be seen.

Good grief and ALAS!
What to do?

Unfortunately our web merchant shopping cart supplier, Network Solutions, has recently been acquired by a company called Web.com. They claim to be on top of customer service.

Like heck they are!
They do not work on the weekends! 

Anyhow...it took me several painstaking hours to work out what had gone wrong with the product that had been brought to my attention. Unfortunately, the problem applied to lots and lots of other products as well.

For some unknown and unexplained reason many prices had gotten out of whack. The regular price had become MORE than the MSRP. No wonder the Buy Button had gone AWOL.

Luckily - as with most things in life - there was a relatively quick work-around. Well, one that actually took two days and about 12 hours to fix. Typical for any computer problem in my experience...lots longer than you anticipate. Especially when there are over 800 hundred line items to check.

Hopefully now ALL products will have pricing showing and the Buy Button will be prominent at the bottom of each product page.

There is always a silver lining to any grey cloud; while I was fixing things...I lowered many of the product prices to bring them into line AND lowered the shipping rates...because we charge a rate for handling that gets added on to the actual shipping cost...so I have made some adjustments.

There is more to come in the near future....but in the meantime I hope our customers  (whom I know are very forgiving) will return to us in droves,....telling their friends, neighbors, colleagues and even passing policemen; spreading the word and generating more than enough work to keep people downstream (who have to make, pack and ship the products) good and busy in the lead up to the silly season.

More about that later my friends....

PS: If you spot an error please let me know.
No promises...but...
I may even gift you a Nutshell.

All the best
:-)

Time for a Refresh

Nutshell has been running a commercial website for almost 18 years.

In that time we have had several hosts and several remodels to accommodate the changes. Initially we ran our website on a platform provided by T3West...then the Microsoft bCentral eCommerce platform....but then Microsoft determined it was not in the eCommerce game and pulled the pin in 2001. Subsequently we moved to our current host, Network Solutions.

Although there are those who claim this platform is not as good as some of its more recent rivals, at the time it was the best we could find, bearing in mind our wish to serve the US market. As such we decided the host needed to be local in the States, and not several thousand miles away down under.

As it was we experienced some interesting problems in the early days with failed routers and links that refused to work no matter what we did.

Right now we are in the process of revitalizing our website design with the aid of a talented young woman with sophisticated IT skills.

Over the coming months users will see improvements as she works her digital magic.

Our intention is that this will result in a more pleasing experience for online shoppers and make our products even more desirable than they already are.

We thank you for your patience and invite your comments on our progress.

Thank you for being a Nutshell customer.

Farewell Maureen - the Voice of Nutshell

It is with a heavy heart that I report the passing of my dear friend and co-worker Maureen Watson on the evening of September 12.  She died peacefully in her sleep after a lengthy illness

She will be known to many Nutshell customers as the woman who answered the calls to our US Freephone (1866-427-3688)

Maureen was 69 years young and had been a linchpin in the Nutshell company for over 15 years.

Initially responsible for our dispatch processes from our factory in Patrick Street Onehunga, Maureen fell in love and married Graeme Watson, one of New Zealand's last great saddle makers. Graeme had been a member of my business partner Steve Munro's manufacturing team for many years and was the man behind many of the products that you buy from Nutshell today.

A funeral service will be held in Auckland at the Manukau Memorial Gardens on Monday August 17 at 2 pm (NZT)

RIP

FINALLY - The Large Sideways Belt Case has Arrived!

It is said that all good things take time.  If this is true then the arrival of our latest product should be better than good - it should be fantastic!

The #254 is the largest horizontal (or sideways) case we have created, and represents a milestone in the history of Nutshell.

In addition to being the largest sideways case, it is also the first off the knives using a new manufacturing technique, which means we can offer it at a very attractive and affordable price.

Built to meet our customary high standards, the #254 is also a departure from our traditional model; we have dispensed with the D-ring and in place of the bright steel clip with the leather backing, the #254 sports a high quality black anodized spring steel clip. In addition, we are currently only offering this product is one color; a high grade premium BLACK Leather. Other colours will follow, but for now...

The belt fastening is sourced from a highly reputable US clip manufacturer and carries a lifetime warranty.

The #254 is an extremely versatile belt pouch and and is capable of comfortably containing a wide range of smartphones from an array of manufacturers.

In addition to being the perfect carry case for a 'naked' iPhone 6 Plus, the #254 will accept a Samsung Note 3/4 with a slimline accessory cover.

It is also well sized to accept a wide range of  'mid-sized' smartphones like the iPhone 6 and the Samsung S6 smartphones in a variety of different accessory covers, like those from Otterbox.

Nutshell customers should use the coupon code "tuff01" to get a discount.

One for All?

And All for One??

 It has long been a major problem for many smartphone accessory manufacturers; Smartphone makers keep changing the sizes on their phones.

That makes it hard for folk like Nutshell to keep up; we have to continue to create new products to meet the latest sized smartphones.

However Samsung seems to be breaking that mold.

The giant of the the Android world has now announced the imminent release of its new Galaxy S6 and curved screen S6 Edge, and for once existing Nutshell Galaxy users should be able to simple swap out their smartphone for the latest model without having to replace their belt case.

Our #296 holster and #224 horizontal belt pouch will both accept the latest Samsung devices.

Nice to see at least one smartphone manufacturer recognizing that finally they have created a hand-held product with a form factor that simply works.

How to Stop Cyber Pickpockets

The Problem

In this day of increased electronic interactivity at the personal level, it's not hard to see why some people want to steal secrets from your pocket.

The Solution

At Nutshell we recognise that electronic pickpocketing is a very real threat to your personal information, and your rights, in the pursuit of happiness.

That's why our new smartphone wallet with RFID shielded double card pockets with natural antistatic short-shorn possum phone separator is the perfect platform to incorporate the technical protection demanded by  market savvy people.

,

Smarter Smartphone Protection

CLICK HERE

New Amazon Affiliate Site Offers Wireless Charging Products - and MORE

A phone call from an insistent Albuquerque based American sales person has resulted in our trialling an Amazon Affiliate website portal....which offers us a unique opportunity.

For those who follow Nutshell, you know we believe in the continual development of the mobile movement, including the constant release of new and interesting products geared to make it easier to be mobile - without the attendant wires and cables necessary to recharge your power-hungry devices.

Smart Wireless Accessories  is the site and, although it seems like it may become a continual work in progress, it does promise to offer us the ability to showcase leading-edge products for the savvy mobile user we believe will appeal to Nutshell customers worldwide.

In addition, it will generate us an alternate source of revenue. This is not bad, especially when you consider that we have loaded a selection of the Nutshell products currently on offer from Amazon, at prices that will astound you!

Please take a look.

International Currency Exchange Rates means Lower Pricing

Thanks to Global currency fluctuations, Nutshell has lowered its pricing by an average 6%.

Recently higher currency exchange rates meant that to maintain our margins we had to raise our pricing. However, now that the margin between the US and NZ dollar has widened, we are able to once again offer product at rates that our customers should be more comfortable with.

As one of the first Internet B2C traders (we started in 1997) we have experienced some wild fluctuations in the differing values between currencies. Rather than attempt to match every country's individual cash rates, we determined early on that the most equitable currency to price our product in was the USD.

Of course our local customers get charged in local currency because local sales attract local sales taxes.

Should the dollar rate between the USD and the NZD continue to widen (or narow) we may adjust our rates even more in the coming months.

In the meantime, please enjoy the cost-relief (however slight)  that international trading makes possible.

Stretching for a Perfect Fit

At nutshell we do our very best to make sure you get a product that meets your needs as best we are able. That includes creating holsters that comfortably hold your device.

One major hassle with customers is that, because each holster is hand made, and not made like spaghetti, every case is hand sewn, which can result in some very small discrepancies when it comes to that perfect fit.

Luckily, because we use high quality top of the-line New Zealand sourced leathers, we know that they will not only take a pounding and deliver very long life, they will also stretch to accommodate those difficult sizes.

Here is a brief outline of the steps we recommend anyone who finds that their Nutshell is too tight undertakes before sending us an email voicing their concerns that we may have sent them a product that is too small to be usable.

1)   Dampen the case with water (not soak!) and then find something larger than your device assembly – like a hipflask, timber shape or even stiff cardboard – and FORCE it into the holster. 

 

2)   Let the holster dry S-L-O-W-L-Y overnight.

 

3)   Remove the filler packing and insert your phone.

Recently a customer was concerned that we had shipped him the wrong holster because his Nutshell was too tight to protect his iPhone 6 Plus in the Apple leather cover. But after following the instructions above, he sent us this response;

"By jamming in some objects and filling the spaces around the edges and ends with cardboard so it was so tight I could hardly pull it out and wetting the pouch and filling under a faucet and leaving to dry over night the phone and bumper fit loosely and can be removed easily.  Thank you so much for your patience and persistence in helping me achieve the pouch I wanted."

This process worked for him, and it can work for you too.

Thank you for choosing nutshell.

Your Nutshell Can Now be Hand Delivered

Confirmed Delivery; Challenging from Down Under

At Nutshell we pride ourselves on giving the best possible service; it is one of the primary reasons our customers maintain their loyalty. What we say we deliver we do our best to deliver.

And if it doesn't work out nobody is more disappointed than us.

Because of our 'distance to market' our options when it comes to choosing delivery systems are limited - and primarily based on cost effectiveness. For over 15 years we have watched as market options have appeared, vanished into the ebb and flow of the tidal global commerce systems, and risen once again. Often that revival is accompanied by a more cost effective approach too.

Sometimes the reason to reject a shipping option is based on our customer feedback.

Like the time we used a shipping service that took our export deliveries in a bundle up into Singapore and then distributed them to all parts of the globe.

Nothing too unusual in that you would think. Except for the complaints we started getting from our more elderly customers in the United States and elsewhere . They claimed we were not making our products in New Zealand. And they remembered the Pacific war! All because the intermediary Singapore step resulted in our packages getting an added Asian stamp!

Transportation is one of those factors that can weigh heavy on any exporter, along with the changeable currency rates, and the service we use  needs to be the best possible to make our customers feel as comfortable as possible.

Within the blink of an eye that Singapore service was terminated; there really is nothing worse for a marketer than waking up to dozens of angry notes from customer threatening to never again darken our doorway, all because they have the wrong end of the stick..

Recently, however, that proved to not be the case. Over a year ago we were approached by a reputable shipping company and offered the ability to provide added security for our shipment, with the option of a signature required service. Unfortunately for us, we were told, and assumed, that this service would be accompanied by a tracking scheme that would let customers go hunt for their individual tracking information by trawling the world's shipping and tracking services. Usually these are maintained by individual postal services and the scanning process is pretty much a necessary formality in this day and age of advanced wariness about trans-border freight and security.

That's what you would think. But often reality is stranger than fiction.

The reality is that the service we elected to engage to make sure that our deliveries were  by hand delivered and required a signature to finalize, were not always scanned as they passed from the local 'down-under;' postal delivery system. We have pressed for answers; most times delivery can be tracked, but only if the product is crossing the border into the United States, where it often gets scanned at the gate. But that's not always the case. While our local Postal service cannot offer us this signature-required registered-mail service we get from that third party supplier, they do not scan the item as it leaves the country. Why? Darned if I know, and I have asked.

That's why we now offer a new Hand Delivery Option; we know and you know you are going to get your nutshell and that it will be delivered by a person who will ask that a signature is provided before the shipment is handed over. What we cannot, at this time, assure you is that you will be able to track it door to door.

It's not an enviable position to find ourselves in, and we are very disappointed that it seems some organisations do not play well together.

Rest assured we are working to find a solution that combines the best of all worlds to make it affordable to offer our customers' a fail-safe and affordable shipping service that delivered on time, every time and let each deliver be tracked, door to door.

Happy Christmas 2014

Working from the Outside In

First it was Samsung with their oversized NOTE, then it was Apple with the larger than usual iPhone 6 Plus and now it seems every Smartphone vendor is lurching rapidly toward the  Phablet - those larger than large Smartphones that are neither a tablet, nor a phone - but instead a mixture of both.

Doubtless these devices fill a growing need in a market that is hungry for continual change - but sometimes one just has to wonder if, and where, the sizes will stop expanding upward and outward, while at the same time becoming increasingly thinner and thinner.

In my book the answer will be - soon. Or just as soon as the super-thin, super-tough and super-flexible OLED folding screens we have long been promised become reality. Then and only then will the relentless push toward bigger means better be tempered with a healthy dose of physical reality.

In the meantime our reality is that the cases we have long manufactured to contain the Smartphones of yesteryear and their accessory covers are no longer deep enough, or long enough to provide sufficient protection for today's latest crop of super-thin, super-sized Phablets.

Ah well - back to the drawing board. Our customers await.

Pre Purchase your Holster for the Apple iPhone 6

Click Below for:

20% discount on the pre-purchase of our holster for the iPhone 6

But wait! That's right. The iPhone 6 has not yet been released.
That means we do not know its final size?
Correct.

But it also means that when the product is available we shall know the answers. is it one product or is it two? What are its 'standard' dimensions? Once we know these facts, and more, we shall be able to either match it with an existing Nutshell (or two) - or create totally new product to accept the phone.

Either way, in the time it takes Apple between releasing the new phone and making it available we should be able to make and ship a perfectly fitting holster - so that our customers who elect to update their comms can do so - and have it protected in a Nutshell from the get-go.

Clever? Not really. We offered the same deal for the iPhone 5 to great success.

PS; This offer only applies to the belt case for the Apple iPhone 6 and will not last beyond the end of September

It's an Ethical Game

Followers of this blog will be aware that I am a committed brue-greenie, which means I support the ethical culling of pests for the making of a dollar. Nothing wrong with that, although there does appear to be a school of sorts that would have all pests poisoned and left to rot, attaching no value whatsoever on the critters being poisoned and left to rot. That is a pity.

In my book we should be supporting whatever efforts are being made to rid the world of pests and undesirable critters that cause havoc and upset the apple cart by being something that is so out of place it has no right to be there.


For example, while Nutshell is fast perfecting its latest possum based products for smartphones, others have already done the hard yards and developed products like these.

These soft and supple golf gloves are available in both men's and ladies sizes and will add lustre to any golfer's game.

We hope to bring you lots of other New Zealand made product featuring our national pest in the near future. Please support our efforts - and stay tuned!

Be Careful What You Wish For

In addition to Amazon, Nutshell is now a verified Gold Supplier to Alibaba - the gigantically enormous (35+ Million members) Chinese trading portal. 

It is now a question of understanding how to operate in a totally new way to maximise the opportunity; first we have to get a handle on the various subtleties of the environment. 

Unlike Amazon, which has us locked into a single category of 'wireless accessories' Alibaba seems happy for us to trade in - just about anything.

Nutshell Listing: Belt Pouch for Galaxy s4/s5 on Alibaba

Amazon Ahoy!

We've been an authorised vendor to Amazon for some time now, but until recently we were pretty much 'inactive' for a number of reasons. Basically it all had to do with margins. Let's leave it at that.

Recently Amazon has dramatically increased the visibility of its Amazon Marketing Services, and launched a Vendor Page service, which lets vendors (like us) promote their company, products and services throughout Amazon's massive customer base.

Nutshell's Amazon Home Page

In addition AMS now enables us to create Cost per Click - CPC - adverts for the aforementioned page and for products that we have shipped into the Amazon distribution channel - all in the name of driving sales, improving our visibility and increasing turnover. During the creation process we can define our target audience - those who will see the adverts - based on their known interests and even their professions.

Nutshell Galaxy s4 holster on Amazon

Nutshell iPhone 5/5s/5c holster on Amazon

Of course, with Amazon there is no such thing as a free lunch. It is very much suck-it-and-see right now, but this combination of the AMS Vendor Page and CPC should really make to make a difference to our bottom line. That's the plan.

Amazon Fire - Set my world alight

We've matched the upcoming Amazon Fire with our #296.
The button above throws to a micro-buy-page but makes the image look strange.