Hello Tindarians!
Being the first Blog post since the acquisition we wanted to get our ducks in a row before we went public with too much, but I promise this is the first in what we’re hoping is a series of communications that discuss some of what we have planned for the buyer / seller community on Tindie. Firstly though, let me preface everything with a bit on what we’re NOT going to do:
As you know by now, Hackaday / Supplyframe acquired Tindie and you’d be forgiven for wondering if we/they intend to jump in there and a) change a bunch of stuff, thus changing what Tindie is all about and b) if the new company has ‘dollar signs in their eyes’ and is intent on somehow extracting every ounce of cash from buyers and sellers, again thereby corrupting the spirit of Tindie. So for the record, the answer to both is a resounding “no”. 1) We are not planning to come in like a maelstrom and change a bunch of stuff (only try and improve things…keep reading) and 2) nor do we intend raise rates or somehow make it unfavorable to anyone buying and selling on Tindie. If anything, the pressure to deliver to investors has subsided since the acquisition and we have some much needed breathing room. What’s more, we have a really amazing development team to work with in improving things and fixing bugs more quickly.
So, that out of the way…Here’s what we’re thinking in the short-medium term as a sort of who’s-who of things we intend to add / modify / improve. This list is not in any particular order and there’s no fixed timeframes, but rest assured, it’s all on the roadmap…
First up is the much needed “Vacation Mode” for sellers. This requires a few things like allowing you to set when you’ll be gone, when you’ll be back, and providing some user-side feedback indicating as much. All good things and we intend to do this.
Next up is a system for Backorders. We really want to add this however it does require that we think thru a few details like “how long is too long…” and then with that, how do we refund the buyer in the event the seller fails to keep up their end of the bargain. This is really a mix of technical and business mish-mash that we need to work thru but we’re working thru this now and it’s something we’d really hope to implement.
We have also discussed taking preorders though this carried a somewhat higher risk for the buyer than backorders (we know you can build a backorder product, but preorders create a risk that can’t compromise the user experience for all Tindie customers). Still putting it out there so you know we’re thinking about this but in terms of sequencing, this is a bridge we’ll cross once we’ve worked out backorders.
Next up is better inventory synchronization. A number of issues arise when a product is returned or refunded for some reason and we are going to get the inventory synchronization sorted and working properly asap. This is really a bug fix but an important one.
Hopefully this preview of what we’ve got in store sounds good but we’re not so arrogant as to think we got it all perfect! If you have questions, want to make suggestions, etc. please let me know! I’m open to any feedback (good and bad) that you might have and the suggestion box is open.
Best regards,
Matt
Tindie.
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