Shipping update, August 1

Hey everyone,

Many of you are eagerly awaiting for our next round of units to ship out - and this summer really has gone by very quickly. Back in April/May, we really thought that we could have the new units ready within just a matter of weeks. But then a few problems came up that forced us to halt production and subsequently put shipping on hold until we could resolve them. I personally feel very bad that it has taken this long (today is August 1 already, can you believe that?) - but I have always kept our promises on delivering the StayblCam to EVERY customer who orders one, no matter what. We are a 100% honest and dedicated company.

To understand the reasons behind why we got delayed so much this summer, it is first important to understand what happened in our first production run back in January through March this year. During that time, we manufactured over 2000 units that were shipped out to more than 60 countries. But we soon learned about a few problems that we knew we definitely needed to correct in future manufacturing rounds.

The three main issues we had to change since then were:

• Gimbal assemblies. Some of the initially made units had a flaw that would sometimes cause the gimbal to fall apart. This HAD to be fixed! That meant re-adjusting the countersinks in the aluminum rings. We also had them ordered pre-assembled from the supplier instead of assembling them as part of our own production process.
• The main StayblCam plastic "body" part. We were unhappy about our original supplier for this part, and some customers also noticed how the long black body of the StayblCam would sometimes arrive scratched or scuffed, almost looking like it had been already used. But they were never used. Just poorly delivered to us as parts.
• The packaging box design. The packaging box had weak cardboard inserts that would collapse under transport, causing the StayblCam to become loose or rattle inside the box. On top of that, assembling these boxes in production proved to be time-consuming for workers, so we felt a better box design was really needed.

So what was the holdup?

We were now receiving the new and improved gimbals as pre-made units however... this was the first time our aluminum supplier had assembled something like this, and when they arrived - they had all been tightened waay too hard! So here we were, with customers getting impatient thinking we are shipping any day now - with a huge batch (thousands) of gimbal handles that were unusable! This is one of those times in business where you have to make really tough decisions. Should we ditch the whole batch of overly tight gimbals and wait for a new batch to made entirely? Or should we try somehow to see if we could take them apart and reassemble them (not an easy task, as they are built very strong to last a lifetime!)

The decision was made to try a little bit of both. We would order a certain number of UN-assembled ring sets that we could assemble the old fashioned way...and...we would also see if we could rework at least some of the 'bad' gimbals we already had on hand.

In the meantime, our other new supplier that would make the 'body' plastic part for the StayblCam got going with making the tools to create this part from the ground up for us (instead of us buying them pre-made and scratched up from our old supplier). They spent a few weeks getting this right, as their first run did not fit together so well with our existing parts.

Also - since we are now offering the StayblCam in white color, they had to find the exact matching color chips to use that would match the white color we would use for molding white parts. All of these things quickly add up, and before you know it, a few weeks have gone by on things like this.

Finally, the packaging box underwent a big change, and samples were sent back and forth for adjustments and approval. But I am glad to say we now have a brand new box design, with a foam insert - that will now both be easier for workers to package - and just better for customers to have and open up. Heck, it can now even serve better to store your StayblCam inside of.

Production time and workers are now being scheduled for production to resume next week. This should mean that we can have new units ready to ship from our warehouse by August 10th.

I apologize to all of those of you who have been waiting for so long this summer, and also for me not giving you more frequent updates as to what is going on.

But I can assure you once again that if you have ordered a StayblCam from us - you WILL definitely be receiving it! :-)

Thanks to everyone for the continued support and love for the StayblCam!

Eskil Nordhaug
CEO / Creator, StayblCam