I'm tied to this cursed circuit, so here's my involvement...
I ran Secret Seasons for its short existence, from the prototyping, to building, to shipping...and literally all the investment. (Obviously,
Laura gets the credit for her awesome artwork! I assembled and wired about 50% of them, my ex wiring the other half). Ah, NewarkWilder posted the Facebook statuses.
NewarkWilder basically screwed me. He was polite while doing it, though.
For those interested in the long backstory:It started when he contacted me, saying he got the rights to the Fingerprint name, and that Matt (Penny Pedals) was going to send him build info, but never did and was no longer responding to any emails. So he came to me to trace the Fingerprint, do a layout, etc. He said he'd pay me for my work, I agreed. I took a look at a Fingerprint, figured it out (the way I saw it, it's basically a slightly modded Tim Escobedo design, which I'd actually used before), and did a layout. He then decided not to even use the Fingerprint name.
Then, after I did the layout and design, ordered PCBs and sent everything to him (with the assurance of being paid back...my fault--I'd had several phone conversations with NW and considered him a trusted friend)...he admitted a couple months later that he wasn't capable of building them. And that Laura had quit. I'd invested hundreds of dollars in what seemed like a sure thing, so I asked if I could build them. He agreed, and we agreed he'd get a cut for coming up with the names...I expected around $10 per. Later, when I'm ready to go to market, he starts talking about having me sign a contact, and says he wants $35 per pedal. Higher than what Laura was getting (he'd previously talked her down like 50% from what she got before and should have gotten!). Too late, cause it's ready to sell. So I agree. I was making less per Snowdrift than I was per Algal Bloom (for a build 3 times as complex, with logistics 3 times as complex, what with shipping enclosures to Laura). I was making about the same per pedal as Mike!
He did nothing but Facebook statuses...he'd disappear for a couple months at a time, pop up with all these requests, then disappear. He also asked for--and got--4 free Snowdrifts out of the deal. When Laura quit because there was no room in the profit margin for her to get paid what she deserved, Mike told me I had to take it out of production so he could hire someone to make a new graphic (I didn't own the names, so I couldn't keep building it if he told me not to)...six months later, he was still telling me "almost there!" only to find out he hadn't even paid the graphic designer. I asked him for permission to get the pedal back on the market, because at this point, I'd lost money on it, and he responded by taking back the rights to the names and saying he was going to build them himself.
In the end, I was left with hundreds of dollars in parts, many hundreds of dollars of Laura Bennett painted enclosures...when Mike halted production, Laura had a large batch of drilled Snowdrift enclosures she'd been working on, so I of course paid her for those, and ended up with
even more painted Snowdrift enclosures that I couldn't use... I
STILL have Snowdrift enclosures here. I still have hundreds of Secret Seasons stickers I bought. I didn't make money off the Secret Seasons deal--I lost money, and I was left holding the bag. So the parts I was sitting on went to Mr. Wire, and the Bennett boxes and stickers are still sitting here. Unless I start a salad dressing company, the stickers aren't going to be used.
As for Mr. Wire...
My longtime pedal-building buddies Mark and Dave started Mr. Wire with some help from me. I tack their parts orders onto mine and we share bulk discounts. I don't have much time for non-FuzzHugger things, but I've got some involvement there.
After 11-12 months of the Snowdrift being out of production, and no word from Mike/Secret Seasons (or Penny Pedals, for that matter!), I sold all the Snowdrift parts to Mr. Wire and they built the Fuzzprint they'd been talking about for a few months. I told them I wasn't sure if I was comfortable stocking it, given the history with NewarkWilder, so they sold it through Etsy and eBay.
Matt--when I saw that you popped up on Harmony Central, I reached out to you, asked if you had any concerns or issues with the Fuzzprint--even said I'd like to get you a free one--and you never responded. I'd have given you a free one, heck, I know Mark would've arranged for you to get per-sale cuts had you voiced any concern at all. After hearing nothing back from you, and hearing nothing from NewarkWilder, I told the guys I'd be willing to start stocking it at FuzzHugger.com.
