Today I have 3 quick topics inspired by the recent movie Air about Nike signing Michael Jordan to an endorsement contract, an inspiring quote from a season 3 episode of Ted Lasso, and a completely random pair of tips about sending invoices. Nike and Endorsements Air is a fascinating movie about the start of Nike’s transformation from running […]
At the peak of the pandemic freight shipping woes, we paid over $33,000 for a 40′ container from Shenzhen to St. Louis. Prior to the pandemic, a container that size was around $5000 door-to-door. 5292 units of Wingspan fit into container of that size, so the freight shipping cost of 1 copy of Wingspan pre-pandemic […]
Over the last 4 days, a few thousand people gathered in a convention center in St. Louis to play games. Geekway to the West 2023 is one of the true highlights of my year so far, and I’m incredibly grateful to the Geekway team for creating such a festive, welcoming, and exciting event. When you […]
Trust is hard to earn, easy to lose, and quite difficult to regain after it’s lost. I know this from experience on both sides. Last week I wrote about a crowdfunding project whose creator lost the trust of many backers after requiring significant additional payments well after the campaign ended. A few people asked a […]
When was the last time a company, crowdfunder, or service made you feel awesome? I recently watched an older video about a book called Badass: Making Users Awesome. The book isn’t just about making customers feel great, but also about using techniques like benchmarks and examples to make users really good at using the product/service. Over the last month, […]
One of my favorite genres of games are tableau/engine builders with hundreds of unique cards. As I recently discussed in a video chat with Wingspan designer Elizabeth Hargrave, it helps immensely in this type of game to have a master spreadsheet to balance the cards and make adjustments. It helps even more if the spreadsheet […]
Yesterday I spoke at length with a backer of the 6: Siege Kickstarter project, after which I looked at the project itself and at perspectives from various sources (Dicebreaker and BoardGameCo). I empathize with the tough situation these backers are in, and I’m hoping to add something constructive to the conversation. Here’s a brief overview […]
May the 4th be with you! A few years ago, Disney announced that they were building a full-immersion experience where guests could feel like they were on an interstellar cruise ship for a few days, caught in the middle of a Star Wars conflict. It’s like Westworld, but with Jedi instead of cowboys. I was […]
Over the last 10 years, I’ve written over 1000 articles on this blog to share my thoughts, observations, mistakes, and insights with my fellow creators. That’s a lot of content to go back and read for someone who is navigating the crowdfunding process for the first time, so in this series I continue to revisit […]
In my younger years of secondary school, I struggled with procrastination, often waiting until the last day or so to write a paper or study for a test. My responsibilities at Stonemaier Games no longer give me the luxury of procrastination, but sometimes I’ve found myself dreading tasks that require hours upon hours of time. […]
