Kickstarter Woes: Antonia Saint NY
Update: Since writing this article, I have received Antonia Saint NY Version 2.0 heels, which I love!
Kickstarter is a double edge sword. More than one creator was caught out trying to collect as much as possible without thinking about how they are going to meet the promises they made. A good example of creators getting caught out is Antonia Saint NY’s campaign for High-Tech Heels & Flats that Feel Like Sneakers Inside. I backed the campaign and asked for a heel in “Nemi Nude” colour. Obviously, the “feels like sneakers inside” bit was attractive to me. But what interested me the most was the app-enabled custom fitting. I have great difficulty finding shoes that fit perfectly and so I was looking forward to getting perfectly fitted shoes. Unfortunately, it didn’t work out like that, but there are lessons to be learnt from this failure.
A Bit of Background
Antonia Saint NY (ASNY) ran a very successful Kickstarter campaign, with 6,989 backers pledged $1,845,714 to the project. As is often the case these days, as soon as the Kickstarter campaign finished, ASNY opened an Indiegogo campaign. At the end of the Indiegogo campaign, a total of $2,132,408 was raised. But that amount included the original $1,845,714 raised through Kickstarter.
While it seems that ASNY raised a lot of money, it is actually not a lot when you consider that these shoes were supposed to be custom made. Not to mention, the shoes were going to be made in the USA. So the manufacturing cost of each individual pair was going to be very high. It is one of the reasons you cannot get a 100% refund on the shoes, instead, if you change your mind, you can only get a 50% refund.
Needless to say that I took a huge risk ordering these shoes. Also, from a pure price point, these shoes are not cheap. But I figured that if the shoes were well fitted and comfortable, they would be worth the price. But unfortunately, I suspect ASNY overstretched themselves with the two campaigns because so far, it has not gone well.
The App
Photo telemetry is hard, and apps with telemetry are harder to get right. So the fact that the app ASNY development to measure my foot for fitting was difficult to use, wasn’t immediately a red flag. Especially since, along with the photo telemetry, I did have to manually measure my foot and answer questions about my foot shape. The combined assessment resulted in the app telling me that my shoe size was 8.5. That sounded about right to me because size 8 shoes are usually a bit tight for me but size 9 shoes usually too big. So as far as I could tell, the app had done its job. All I had to do now, was just wait for the shoes to arrive.
The Shoes Arrive
My “custom-made” shoes finally arrived in mid-May! The packaging the shoes arrived in were interesting in their own right. The left and right shoes were packed separately, implying that they took care to incorporate the differences between my left and right foot when creating the heels. The triangle heel boxes also had magnets in them. That meant they should hold their shape as a rectangle making it a very clever design feature.
Another thing to note about the box was that it had an empowering slogan on it. I bring this up because ASNY’s twitter, which hasn’t been active since April, was all about the empowering slogans. Now I am sure this seems like a strange segway, but please keep this in mind because there is a lesson to be learnt here that I will get to in a minute. But first to the shoes!
I am writing this while wearing the ASNY heels and I am in considerable agony, and I am only sitting down! My toe box is too tight and I think the shoes are a bit too long. I can’t tell because of the built-in padding. The shoes do cling to my foot but I still feel as if my feet are sliding forward. But more importantly, the width is wrong and there is a clear gap between the side of my foot and the shoes. If the shoes are truly custom made, that gap shouldn’t be there. But also, did I mention that I am in considerable pain just from wearing the shoes while sitting down? It’s not looking good for Antonia Saint NY High-Tech Heels & Flats that Feel Like Sneakers Inside!
The Aftermath
I would like to say that I am a minority of Kickstarter backers and the majority of ASNY’s backers were happy bunnies. Unfortunately, all indications say only a small minority are happy with their heels. The vast majority received ill-fitted heels, and many have raised questions about the “custom-fit” aspect of the heels as they never used the app to create a profile for their foot. But they received a pair of heels anyway! Indeed, I seem to be on the better end of the fail spectrum because I can actually wear my heels. Many of the comments on ASNY’s Kickstarter campaign page were from people who got shoes that were either too big or too small. Now if they used the app, you would hope that the shoes they got fit, even if the fit wasn’t perfect. But I get the sense that the quality control was lacking in the manufacturing process.
To their credit, ASNY seems to be doing their best to contain the damage. First, they waived their “you must return your shoes within 30 days for refund or exchange” policy. Because at this point, most of us can’t return the shoes because of administrative breakdown on ASNY’s end. But they also have some glaring blind spots. Namely, their Twitter, which is still dead and any visitors still see empowerment messages from April. A lot of frustrated backers have noted the disconnect on Twitter because it wasn’t immediately obvious to them that the latest tweet was from many months ago. I understand that many of their current issues are because they are short staffed. But when a problem like this happens, I think it pays to make sure every public-facing facet of the business sends a coherent message. In the case of ASNY, the message is that “we are doing our best and we won’t leave you high and dry”.
Not that I am entirely sure if the message is getting through to the Kickstarter backers. I genuinely believe that most people don’t think about the inherent risk associated with backing anything on Kickstarter. Don’t get me wrong, I am not excusing ASNY, because the amount of bad shoes indicates a flaw in the manufacturing process. Either their app wasn’t good enough, or the design they chose for their shoe had too many failure points, whatever it is, this disaster of a campaign is their fault. But reading through the comments, I get the sense that very few even entertained the possibility that the delivered goods would be anything but perfect. Despite the fact that as early-stage adopters, we are the guinea-pigs that company is using as test subjects.
Lesson for Entrepreneurs
The big take away from other entrepreneurs is that quality control matters. An obvious lesson, I know, but all too many people think their quality control is good enough when they really aren’t. Also, in this particular case, I can’t help but think that staggered delivery would have flagged issues with ASNY’s process early. Instead, they find themselves in a situation where the majority of their 6,989 need a replacement with many demanding refunds because they have lost faith.
The other lesson I think is that startups need to consider their delivery capacity carefully. Whether its the max number of users their service can support or their manufacturing capacity, all too often, startups seem to bite off more then they can chew when crowdfunding. I mean, did ASNY honestly believe they could make 6,989 custom shoes? Or did they get caught-up in startup fever and just wanted to maximise their intake? But here is something to consider, I said earlier that from a pure price point, the heels were expansive but that is if you compare them to mass manufactured shoes out of China.
For high-end shoes, produced in a limited capacity, the price probably didn’t leave too high a profit margin. I am guessing, but if I am right, far from Kickstarter establishing ASNY as a viable business, the fallout might actually take them under. So it is essential to estimate your capacity accurately. Sometimes, it is better to leave money on the table in the short run.
Finally, personally, I have not given up on ASNY. I received an email from them telling me that I can keep my heels for the time being, but I am on their list of customers for their manufacturing process 2.0 run. I am quietly optimistic. So watch my blog to see how this adventure ends!
Update: As mentioned at the start, since writing this article, I have received Antonia Saint NY Version 2.0 heels, which I love!
