Pendraken are moving! After 20 years of carefully growing the business, we have finally managed to get to the point where we have outgrown the garage/extension/utility room/spare bedroom (!), and we need a proper space of our own. We've been looking at industrial units since the start of the year, and have had a few viewings, but last week we found one which looked promising. So, after a bit of haggling and a bit of paperwork, we will officially be making the big jump on April 2nd!
It's been a long road to get here, and we're all pretty excited at Pendraken HQ. The past few years have seen a huge amount of growth for us, and for 10mm in general, and we'd like to thank everyone who has supported us thus far. Hopefully the move to our own premises will allow us to improve things in several areas, so even more shiny goodies and quicker order despatch for our customers, and more space and a more efficient workplace for us.
The new unit will also mean that we can welcome visitors a lot easier than we can at Pendraken HQ, so we'd also like to extend an invitation to everyone to come and visit if you're ever in the area. Just give us a ring to let us know when you're thinking of popping in, and we'll get the kettle on! We could even cast up something for you while you wait!
I grabbed some pics of the unit when we were viewing it, and it's a big old space!
There's also room for a mezzanine floor if we need more space in the future.
And my new office!
As a consequence of the move though, there may be some delay to things while we get everything sorted in our new space. The unit is only a couple of miles down the road, so it's not too far away fortunately, and we should be able to get everything done in around a week. The plan at the moment is that we're getting the keys on Mon 2nd April, so the Monday and Tuesday will be spent fitting the workbenches and partitions, and then Wed/Thurs will be moving all the machines/moulds/etc down there. Friday is my runover day in case anything gets delayed, or something comes up which we haven't anticipated. I'd also expect it to take us a couple of weeks to get used to our new workspace, but we'll be working 7 days a week to make sure everything is done as smoothly as possible.
The website will remain open for business as usual, but if you are planning on placing an order in the next couple of weeks, please be aware that there may be a delay.
Price Increase 
The downside to the unit of course, is that our overheads are going to increase quite substantially. On top of the other increases we've seen over the past 18 months, from metal, petrol, utilities, show stands, etc. it unfortunately means that we are going to have to put our prices up. We don't enjoy doing this (not least because it requires a lot of work), but it's something which has to be done to allow us to continue growing as a business. We're really proud of our fantastic customer base, so I hope that people still see us as great value for money.
The planned price increase will take the pack prices from:
£3.50 --> £4.00 (Regular packs)
£2.05 --> £2.35 (Vehicles)
£1.20 --> £1.35 (WWII foot packs)
£1.60 --> £1.80 (Fantasy packs)
The good news is that the price increase won't come into effect until August 1st, so there is a long time for folk to get orders in before the prices go up. We're hoping this means there won't be a last minute rush in the last week of July, but I have a feeling there will be! A coincidental benefit of the Aug 1st increase, is that the Pendraken Birthday will be the last show where people can purchase anything off the show stand at the old pricing. After the Birthday, we'll be pulling everything off the racks and re-pricing it.
Again, I hope everyone sees this as a positive, as the majority of the price increase will be going straight back into making the business even bigger and better.
PostageFinally, completely unrelated to the move, we are going to be changing the postage pricing very slightly. The % rates are staying exactly the same, but we need to increase the minimum postage amounts a little, as we're losing out on a lot of the smaller orders. With Royal Mail increasing their prices as well on April 1st, that loss will be even more. So, the changes to the minimums will be:
UK - increased to £1.00 minimum.
Europe - increased to £1.50 minimum.
RoW - increased to £2.00 minimum.
These changes will go live on Sat 7th April. As a counter-balance, we may look at putting a maximum postage charge in place as well, but I'll need to chat with Matt about that first.
Let us know your thoughts on all of the above, your feedback is very important to us and always appreciated.
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