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Reply To: Large Kickstarters should be more open about shipping costs

April 27, 2021 at 2:09 pm #1640125

limburger

21709xp

Accurate numbers for shipping costs would be nice … but it would also reinforce the idea that Kickstarter is a pre-order webshop.

I’d rather have the full spreadsheet with a breakdown in personell cost (what salaries? what 3rd parties? how much ?), materials, etc. …
It’s what they’d have to do for actual investors if they weren’t doing crowdfunding.

Why ?
Because it might show the world that a kickstarter with 10,000 $ goal and at least a year of work by a team of 3 is not realistic.
It would force companies to admit that they really need hit all of the stretch goals before they can have a chance of delivering with minimal cost overruns and delays.

The only problem with that approach is that the average backer isn’t an investor … they are pre ordering (and no amount of ‘not a pre-order/webshop’ is going to stop that).
And they might get scared if they even bothered to read.
Not that scaring of those types wouldn’t be a bad idea …

And while I’m on the subject. The 1$ investment level needs to go.
At that level you don’t have money to burn and you shouldn’t be backing a kickstarter as you might not have the funds to deal with unexpected costs that get passed to you (like custom duty and handling fees).