Thu, Mar 31 2011
One night. 7500 Wrapsters. 35 staffers (and friends). Open bar. Go.
For more pics, check out our Facebook page.
One night. 7500 Wrapsters. 35 staffers (and friends). Open bar. Go.
For more pics, check out our Facebook page.
A ginormous THANK YOU to everyone who stopped by our lil’ shindig last night. We stayed past 2am wrapping thousands upon thousands of Wrapsters, and as a result, we’ll be able to fulfill our March orders without the additional packaging expense. A fun video (and better photos) of the festivities is on the way, but we didn’t want to delay telling you that you seriously, seriously rock. Like, big-time.
Love, The Quirky Team
Next Tuesday night, we’re having a RAGING KEGGER!!!
Just kidding… though there will be adult beverages present… and maybe Hello Kitty party hats.
Next Tuesday, the whole Quirky team will be throwing down to package, wrap, and ship off thousands of Wrapsters. If you’re in the New York area, we’d love your help!
Shoot us an RSVP at partay@quirky.com. We’ll let you know Monday if you’re in, and what time to stop by.
Love, The Quirky Team
Wrapster influencers: Check your accounts. Your rewards approximately tripled! That’s right, we collected payment of $100,000 for Wrapsters we shipped in December. That means $10,000 in cash to share with you.
A large national bookstore purchased Wrapsters with their logo printed on them. It was a one-time promotional sale, and Chad will be looking for similar opportunities for Wrapster and other products.
Those of us on the Money Team (as the rest of the staff calls us) will be looking forward to getting your payout requests. Writing checks and wiring funds to you is our favorite part of our jobs.
Great news, everyone: we’re ready to push Travelstacks, Broom Groomer, and Wrapster out of our warehouse and into your hands!
In the words of Inventory Wizard Nancy “Pei-Pei” Chen: “soon people around the country will be sweeping dust bunnies via Handicrafter-stickered sexy ass Broom Groomers.”
A huge congrats to ideators Nancy Casimir, Bill Ward, and Matt Fleming. We did it!
During the last 3 weeks:
Brian’s last update on Wrapster finished up with us hoping to test samples in our final production material (TPE plus 2% PP alloy) and review the final colorways.
The last thing that stood in the way of this ‘final production’ sample was to make a simple change: we needed a little more material added, 0.03 inches, in order to fully secure the iPhone 3G and 4G. Simple right? No. We had a long, drawn-out back and forth with the factory, a discourse which made Gone With The Wind look like a children’s short story. The first issue was that the factory kept asking us to print iterations of design changes, despite us repeatedly telling them that the shrinkage and material difference found in off-tool samples rendered our Bertha prints bad reference samples.
The second issue was that the factory’s first stab at adding material was adding fairly ugly ribs along the inside surfaces of Wrapster:
Well this was not a good start. Luckily, Brian stepped in and gave them 4 solid options to pick from:
Using their knowledge of the material, shrink rates and tool modifications they came back to us with the answer:
“We would like to suggest working towards a happy medium between option 2 and 3… we can call it 2.5″
No. We told them to do option 4. Despite their feedback that it was the ‘most difficult to achieve’ due to reworking both ‘core and cavity’ of the tool, we knew that the outcome would be the best for everyone: Quirky, retailers and community. Despite any doubts our manufacturer had, this change was in many ways the simplest answer: to subtly increase the wall thickness along Wrapster’s central gap by removing steel from the tool. This small change would hopefully ensure that Wrapster held the iPhone 3G and 4G in landscape position for watching movies, youtube etc.
The timeline from the factory came through:
Reengineering of part for mold adjustment: 9-8 thru 9-24
Electrode Design: 9/27 (Mon) to 9/28
Electrode Programming/Cutting: 9/28 to 9/29
EDM/Burn: 9/30 to 10/2
Polish, Assemble, Sample: 10/2 to 10/5
Parts to arrive at Natech for review 10/6, deliver to Quirky 10/7
So after more delay while we printed their revised file, we moved forward with their timeline. We will be honest here, we were getting… frustrated, to put it mildly. In our minds we couldn’t help but wonder how this was all taking so long. Wrapster is, after all, a lump of plastic. A very cool and functional piece of plastic, but polymer nonetheless. With fingers crossed, we awaited Rev 18 of the Wrapster…
On October 5th, an e-mail came through from the factory:
“Great news! We just evaluated your parts and the mold change is a success… the part seems to behave much like a new pair of leather boots”.
Wait. What? Leather boots? This didn’t sound good…
They went on to say:
“We feel we have Wrapster exactly where it needs to be dimensionally for the secret agent material we formulated. I am confident your team will agree.”
Secret agent material? Ok, everyone calm down, let’s wait for the samples to come in…
On October 7th, as promised the final samples came in and were indeed perfect! Brian immediately had 20 people test the product for the next few days and put the product through its paces. Finally we had a product that fulfilled the design spec: hold and manage headphone cables, hold iPhone 3G and 4G in landscape mode. Phew!
In the next 3 weeks:
We should be seeing the final 4 colors of Wrapster no later than October 19th. Pending color approval we will be moving swiftly into final production. We will also be receiving a full production timeline asap. Hopefully the next production update will be live from an injection molding production line!
The Wrapster is available for $6.50 in the Quirky store.
Wrapster is moving forward with some new developments. Here’s the latest.
Wrapster progress since our last post:
- We selected the production material (a type of TPE).
- Finalized/reengineered Wrapster design based off of the samples we received earlier this month.
- Currently modifying the tooling to reflect the most recent engineered design.
- Finalizing packaging design.
Wrapster next week:
- Testing samples in final production material.
- Reviewing the final color ways (black, blue, Quirky purple, and pink).
About the product:
With Quirky’s Wrapster, you can say good-bye to tangled earbud headphones — we’ve created the ultimate cord management solution! The Wrapster’s unique design allows you to wrap your cords vertically, which means more convenience and less bulk.
Features:
- Slim, modern, compact design – fits in your pocket!
- Constructed from durable plastic.
- Ear bud cords run through two separated side tubes and wrap around a central bar.
- When cords are not wrapped up, Wrapster can serve as a stand to hold your 3G or 4G Apple iPhone in landscape mode.
With the Wrapster, you’ll finally be able to wrangle the tangle out of your earbud headphones.
Available in the Quirky store for just $6.50.
Here’s a quick update on the Wrapster, Quirks.
We are currently testing Wrapster prototypes coming directly out of the tooling. Over the last month or so, our factory has sent us four samples. These samples are each a different type of plastic and have varying levels of hardness. Wrapster’s form is simple but every part of its design is functional. And choosing the right material for this product is imperative to its success from a design standpoint (actually from every standpoint).
Above is a shot of the four samples we’ve tested so far. From left to right, the tooled prototypes range from a hard plastic to a much softer TPE. We might actually receive another batch of samples today, if Hurricane Earl doesn’t blow our messenger off the map.
These new samples we hopefully get in today will be made out of TPE. However, this time they will be stiffer than before. This material choice allows for flex but also holds its form. In the beginning of the production process (post tooling) our factory engineers were a bit concerned with this material choice not behaving nicely with internal design of the tool. But so far things have been looking good and we feel confident that we are moving in the right direction.
We will slide in another update after the holiday when we receive/test the new samples.
Brain* out!
Community Ambassador note: Brain is Brian’s new nickname. Spread it like wildfire!
During last week’s Town Meeting, we announced some changes to the way production updates would be communicated. In short:
- We will provide a date estimate only when full production has begun.
- We will send confirmation e-mails and have SKU (color/version) selection only when the product is on hand.
- We will provide a full production report on each post-threshold product every three weeks.
Stay tuned for the following post-production reports coming your way…
Wrapster: later today!
Space Bar: 9/10
MugStir: 9/14
Sling Back: 9/23
Switch: 9/30
Click n Cook: 10/4
Pivot Power: 10/5
How Cool Is This? Wrapster is coming along great, and is on track to ship in late August/early September We had to share this badass tool design, which kicks out 2 Wrapsters at a time (2 cavities).
Wrapsters are made in the USA!
Pictured Above: Hardened Steel Tool Design For The Wrapster
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