Extended Christmas Deadline!!

Over the last week we have made good progress on the time it takes to despatch orders, and I am pleased to tell you today that our warehouse team are picking orders placed today for same day despatch. What this means for you is:

- Orders placed today (Friday) have a good chance of being shipped for delivery on Monday
- Orders placed on Saturday have a good chance of being shipped for delivery on Tuesday
- Orders place on Monday – dependent on volumes over Friday & Saturday have a reasonable chance of being shipped for Tuesday delivery.

We do still have some bedding in issues that cause delays on some orders or split consignments. We are working hard to resolve the problems, but please recognise that a proportion of orders placed over the next 3 days will not arrive before Christmas.

Winter Gift Trade Shows 2009

We will be holding another series of Gift Trade Shows in January 2009. In addition to our current range of gifts we will be adding a number of exciting new companies to our catalogue, including Ling Cards, Woodmansterne Cards and Not of This World clothing. We would love to see you there.

Dates and Venues:
Tuesday 13th January – Bristol: Arnos Manor Hotel, 470 Bath Road, Arnos Vale, Bristol, BS4 3HQ
Thursday 15th January – London: ChristChurch, Town Square, Woking, GU21 6YG
Wednesday 21st January – Birmingham: Apollo Hotel, 243-247 Hagley Road, Birmingham, B16 9RA
Tuesday 27th January – Edinburgh: Faith Mission Conference Centre, Gilmerton, Edinburgh, EH17 7JD
Thursday 29th January – Belfast: Park Avenue Hotel, 158 Holywood Road, Belfast, BT4 1PA

Companies Exhibiting include:
Ling Cards (Christmas boxes, packs & singles), Woodmansterne Cards (Christmas Packs), NOTW (Not Of This World) Clothing,Jim Shore, Creation Greetings, Robert Schalling, Toy
WorkshopalsoForever Shines, Whimsical Grace, Alphabet Alley, Winged Heart

For further details please contact your local Area Sales Manager.

Last Order date for Christmas

Wednesday the 17th December is intended to be our last day to receive orders and despatch them before Christmas. This is dependant on the volume of orders that we receive between now and then, but I will keep you updated. Please can I ask that you place your orders as early as possible to help us with the flow through our system. We are doing all we can to get as many orders picked and shipped over the Christmas period. Today and all of next week we shall be bringing office staff in to help push orders through the system.

System Update

Just to give you a quick update - today we are picking orders that were placed on Wednesday 10th December although a small minority of orders may have been delayed due to a variety of reasons.

Errors in orders:

I have received feedback from a number of customers highlighting the issues of picking mistakes with orders and shops receiving incomplete orders or wrong items. Please allow me to apologies for these errors. To help recover the backlog we have brought in a significant number of temporary staff. As a consequence of this there has been a decrease in the accuracy rate of picking, but we’re in the process of re-training to improve this area.

Progress on Availability:

We have been looking at ways of increasing the speed of product through the warehouse from receiving to live racking. From Monday we shall be implementing a number of changes that we anticipate will improver this flow and subsequently improving our availability.

Again I just want to thank you all for your understanding and prayers at this time, which is appreciated by the whole team.

System Update

I would like to give you a quick update as to where we are with processing and fulfilling orders. Today we are picking orders that were placed on Thursday 4th and Friday 5th December. I just want to reassure you that our team is doing all we can to get back to our normal service levels - this week we have more than doubled our night-shift team. Our goal is to get back to a 24 hour despatch as soon as we can. We are also making good progress on ordering and receiving stock which will improve the fill rate, and we appreciate your patience as we work through outstanding orders and queries.

I would also like to quickly respond to a recent comment in the media – “It now seems it’s too late to order for Christmas from STL.” I want to make you all aware that this is absolutely not the case. We are currently running at 48-72 hour despatch and with the additional night shift team, this will go a long way to helping us achieve our goal of a same day despatch. I would like to thank you for your continued patience during this time and also to apologise once again for the inconvenience this has caused you.

If you are having issues, please don’t hesitate to contact our customer services team on 0845 705 6568 or speak to your Areas Sales Manager.