General News / Queues / Supply chain issues

2023 Summary (not so hot) & April 2024 update:

When a certain folder is out-of-stock, "pre-order" reservations are now ranging from weeks to 1-2 months to fulfill, depending on our production sequence of different folder models. 
2023 appears to have been an unprofitable year, and some prices will likely need to rise in the Spring (but not on your pre-orders), when full data is in. 

March nearly hit our production minimum with over 7000 folders produced, but a high rate of non-conformances reduced order-filling, with folders diverted as  "Grade A" near-perfect folders. We expect to be able to fill all orders that were waiting for Deluxe Black Folders by ~ 2nd week April.

Thank you for your patience and brand loyalty, and we will keep your trust with the quality craftsmanship we put into your long-lasting folders.

My strong recommendation for those who don't want to wait, is to grab any "Grade A factory second" folders you can see, described in our 'Discounted Factory Seconds'  section, even for an entire choir order, because we're pretty ruthless with quality control, and their 'non-conforming' issues range from negligible...to undetectable by many, in addition to the significant 25% minimum discount. There is a total of *thousands* available; they're the best deal going, and can ship immediately. One thing that people may not realize is that one reason we have so many Grade A folders, is because our production target for 2024 is 100,000 folders.

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General news and current plans:
The past couple years have been incredible in terms of our primary component suppliers going bankrupt or closing business for various reasons.

We have responded to this supply chain chaos by taking on all manufacturing functions of former key suppliers and are expanding our staff by more than double. We have set up significant credit lines and invested hundreds of thousands of dollars into equipment and supplies purchases as we have set up a new bindery division. 

And bought other folder manufacturers. NEWS: In 2023 we purchased remaining assets of Deer River Folio Co., and their machinery and an array of incomplete folios has arrived to a warehouse across the street. Much of their machinery, sadly, is worn out and in need of vastly more extensive repair than expected. *When* we have finally sorted trailer-loads of folder parts and fixed machinery, and have sorted the data, we will retain their customer's order priority and re-confirm order priority for their 15,000 back-ordered folders, but focus on their highest volume back orders (#73). This purchase will give us better continuity with increased redundancy from machine breakdowns, and higher production capacity when fully running. 

All this isn't done overnight, and demand is higher than what we can supply, until we are fully staffed, trained, and smoothly operating. Some popular folders have significant waiting lists that will expand to months and miss concerts, instead of our former order-in-the-morning-ship-this-afternoon fulfillment. 

Know that we wouldn't invest this much, nor put in insane weekly hours to roll out these projects, unless we believed that it would all work out in the end, with benefits of vertical integration and eventual better control of quality, in-house, here. We kindly ask for your understanding and patience.

Our wait-lists at start of month, depending on the folder, range from 0 to near 1700 for our out of stock folders, totaling a couple thousand already reserved (so, if out of stock, pre-order to get in the queue ASAP!).

April 2024 planning will see completion of batches of :

• Standard/Deluxe/Deluxe Classroom Choral folders (caught up by 2nd week April after filling orders for ~ 7000) 
• More RingBinders of various types (~2500 Choir RingBInders with Two Expanding pockets) ~500 Choralex Compact folders
• Approximately 5000 Band & Orchestra Folders toward the end of month, including DRF#73 to hack away at DRF's huge back order list.
• Note that we have significant numbers of red folders (new) available and will finish some other incomplete builds from Deer River Folio, making them ready to purchase.

-Ian Bullen