Bufflehead

Around March, 2016 I heard good things about bufflehead soap. Couldn't find it anywhere but read the artisan was having a child, wait until the summer. OK. That works.

I checked semi-regularly on the website only to find nothing not the website. It turns out announcements are made on "social media". So I missed out in July for the first scent. OK, fine. My bad. I don't do social media but since July I checked Every day.

On 9/20 I do my daily checking and see some will be released 9/21 at 8PM CST. Finally.

I patiently wait until 8 PM CST but only had my phone with me. Exactly at 8 PM I see soap is available. And i started typing in my info. Made one typo (hard to use a phone for anything) and hit submit.

Sold out. What? I look at the clock at its 8:09 PM and sold out.

The next day I check my email and lo and behold, I have an email from Bufflehead telling me my cart is waiting to check out - go finish. Now I know companies routinely do this. If you leave something in your cart, they want you to buy so they "remind" you to go back and and finish your order. So I go back and, of course, it says ... sold out.

Here's a suggestion

1. Do not just announce stuff only on "social media", put it on your website.

2. Tell the consumers how much product you will be selling. If its like a batch of 60, I will know not to waste my time checking everyday nor trying to order when it sells out in 8 minutes.

Yes, Im not happy but such is life. It would just be nice to know if it was worth the effort to try and without an inventory count, its not.

Totally agree with you here. Many vendors have mailing lists that go out when they have more stock. I don't participate in Twitter/Facebook And other popular social media apps so typically I do not buy from vendors that use it as their only means of communicating restocks. I think you're correct too that it would be somewhat helpful if a vendor showed how many items were in stock like Maggard razors for instance.

+2
I don't want to join Facebook. I check the Bufflehead site everyday and I missed it too.

This has long been the story with Bufflehead, even before the child thing came up. I managed to snag a couple of samples last winter from somewhere. The soap is very good and quite slick (made with duck fat). But no soap is worth that much trouble to obtain, especially with the explosion of good quality new soaps hitting the market since this past Spring. I'm not wasting my time waiting on it or looking for it.

It seems to me that since it's such a sought after soap, he would do himself well by making bigger batches

grim , I understand exactly how you feel and think you make very valid points. I've had the exact same thing happen to me with my other hobby.

The good thing is that artisans have driven higher quality soap. The other part is that many of them do this on the side and after a hard day at work, the thought of dealing with lye and being over a hot stove isn't that attractive.

I wish they would have a wait list or something. In my other hobby, I've missed highly sought after items many times because I wasn't sitting at my computer when the email went out.

I have done enough research to know that it usually get sold out within 5 minutes, and the soap maker make very small batch each time. I managed to get one that day after camping 5 minutes before release, after I purchase(which is around 3 minutes+), I check the website and everything is sold out.

Maggards is about the ultimate in customer service. They not only tell you exactly how many items are in stock but constantly send emails with updates. I consider them to be the Gold Standard within this industry. Now I don't expect that from a one or two person operation, but I do expect to know, within reason, that a run of product will be enough to cover a "reasonable" time span and 9 minutes or less is NOT reasonable.

If a store wants to depends solely upon "social media", then that is their option. As others have indicated here, they lose my business. And as others have indicated, there is a LOT of good stuff out there so I don't really care. Others are glad to take my money. I suspect that any small vendor can only handle so much and if its a hobby - so be it. I wish them well.

Around March, 2016 I heard good things about bufflehead soap. Couldn't find it anywhere but read the artisan was having a child, wait until the summer. OK. That works.

I checked semi-regularly on the website only to find nothing not the website. It turns out announcements are made on "social media". So I missed out in July for the first scent. OK, fine. My bad. I don't do social media but since July I checked Every day.

On 9/20 I do my daily checking and see some will be released 9/21 at 8PM CST. Finally.

I patiently wait until 8 PM CST but only had my phone with me. Exactly at 8 PM I see soap is available. And i started typing in my info. Made one typo (hard to use a phone for anything) and hit submit.

Sold out. What? I look at the clock at its 8:09 PM and sold out.

The next day I check my email and lo and behold, I have an email from Bufflehead telling me my cart is waiting to check out - go finish. Now I know companies routinely do this. If you leave something in  your cart, they want you to buy so they "remind" you to go back and and finish your order. So I go back and, of course, it says ... sold out.

Here's a suggestion

1. Do not just announce stuff only on "social media", put it on your website.

2. Tell the consumers how much product you will be selling. If its like a batch of 60, I will know not to waste my time checking everyday nor trying to order when it sells out in 8 minutes.

Yes, Im not happy but such is life. It would just be nice to know if it was worth the effort to try and without an inventory count, its not.

I gave up some time ago even checking or even thinking about it - this vendor doesn't exist in my mind.

That is unfortunate.

I am extremely fortunate that my favourite soap artisan never seems to run out of products in the past five years that I have been ordering from her.