Light My Fire Spork

We're starting to see the Light My Fire line appear online. Backpacking Light has a very nice page dedicated to the spork.

Amazing November

As of Friday, November 18th, we've shipped more product this month than in any previous month, and by a big margin, too. We'll ship a lot more before the end of the month. It's going to be a record breaker!

Martha Stewart calling

Steve took a call from Martha Stewart today (well, one of her minions, anyway):

• Hi, this is Steve.
• Hi Steve, I'm calling from Martha Stewart. We saw your products and your web site and we think they're just great! We'd like to write an article about them for a new magazine Martha will be launching next year.
• Great! How can I help?
• Well, can you send us some samples?
• Sure! What color balls would you like?
• Balls? Um, we want to write about your candle lanterns.
• Oh!

Very unusual but very exciting! They're going to write about using "outdoor" items around the home. We're going to send them a bunch of stuff.

Everything is excellent!

The ball is in Time Magazine this week. We have requests in from Jay Leno and David Letterman to provide product for their shows (their people called my people). Our big customers are asking for more product than we can deliver because they're already selling out. And Martha Stewart's people called too, unusually, for candle lanterns! What a week!

Gene Simmons

We're sending some ice cream balls for use on a new TV show. The one-page writeup was fairly entertaining, so I thought I'd share it.

“Gene Simmons’ Family Jewels”

A new series for A&E. For thirty years, Gene Simmons has been known as the fire-breathing, blood spitting, makeup wearing demon of mega-rock band KISS. With Gene as the face of the band, KISS has broken box office records set by the Beatles & Elvis, and is America’s number one gold record award winning group. He has managed to turn KISS into an empire, merchandising everything from KISS condoms to KISS kaskets. Although Gene may be the rock God of his own empire outside of his house, inside his house it’s quite the opposite.
Gene, the self-proclaimed “village idiot” of his household has been “happily unmarried” to Shannon Tweed, a former Playboy Playmate of the Year for 22 years. Although they have never tied the knot, they share two kids, 13 year-old Sophie, and 16 year-old Nick. Gene claims never to have wanted kids, but it’s his perfect kids who have taught him more about life than his 30 years of rock stardom ever could. This 13 episode series reveals the side of Gene that he has kept hidden until now, and shows how the most non-traditional, traditional family in America manages to make it work under the oddest of circumstances.

More press

Consumer Reports magazine has listed the Play and Freeze Ice Cream Maker as one of the best gifts for this year. Time Magazine will be on newstands November 14th with their holiday gift guide, including the ball. And About.com just published a flattering article. The beat goes on!

The Passion of the Customer

This customer wanted our candles but received knock-offs instead. He's very unhappy (which makes me very happy). We're monitoring the situation and will help out if possible. I've eliminated names to protect, well, myself.

TO: UCO COPORATION/Industrial Revolution

The substitute candles sent to us by M are a complete horror. They were sent in place of UCO candles and without our consent. The generics are sold by L. Yesterday, L's person told me their candles are not as good as UCO's.

We tested 5 of the generic candles sent by M during the last 12 hours, in two UCO single-candle lanterns, and in a glass candle cup.

1. No candle stayed lit because the wicks burned high and quickly and bent over into the melted wax. Then the candles put themselves out. This happend in the UCO lanterns and inside the candle cup.

2. The replacement candles made a mess of the candles and deposited immense quantities of black (soot) within them.

3. We are left with huge candle messes in both UCO lanterns.

4. Even when the wicks were trimmed, they repeatedly burned very high and extinguished themselves within the melted wax.

5. Because of the performances of the generic candles, the UCO lanterns are filled with hardened wax and require boiling water to clean out.

We did not authorise M to switch to a generic candle, nor would we have done that. This unauthorised switch is bad business. Even the shipping receipt states UCO CANDLES, as does the website as of today. This is totally false. We were baited by the low price $1.99 for 3 UCO candles, then the UCO product was switched to the other.

M says he is not charging for the switched product and he is refunding what we paid. This is no gift because we are now having to shop for another 30 UCO candles, at another cost, and another delay.

We paid for sterling products and were sent paste.

B

Honolulu, Hawaii

November 6, 2005

Hot Trails

Hot Trails uses a custom-made (by us) version of our Mini Lantern to make a product for hunters. I thought the photo gallery would have more shots of the lantern in use. I was wrong.

Product love

Yesterday was my anniversary so I took the day off from work. However, I heard that a woman drove up from Portland to get her lantern repaired. Can you imagine? Someone who loves their product so much that they'll drive 200 miles one-way to get it fixed! We offered her a new lantern. I'm not sure what happened.