Needing your feedback...

Thursday morning, still groggy and barely awake I received an email from a fellow shop owner who loves and carries the Jeanne d'Arc Living magazine and products. I opened her email very curious to find out what she had to say. I was a bit confused because she was asking me what I felt about the email from JdL and how were my customers going to take this, etc. I inquired as to what email she was referring to as I had not received anything. She forwarded the original JdL email to me (with my name clearly in the address line, apparently my server bounced the email to me). So I began reading the news with my mouth hanging open saying "oh no, oh no, oh no".
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December 3rd 2009

Dear customer

We regret to inform you that we unfortunately no longer will be able to sell our products to customers in United States of America.

Thank you for understanding and showing interest in Jeanne d´Arc Living.

Kindest but regretful regards.
The JdL staff
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There were more details in their email regarding their decision and how it relates to dealing with customs and the cost prohibitive freight fees for shipping to the U.S. While I have not yet ordered and offered their goods it has always been something I had hoped I could bring you in the near future. I know it was a very hard decision for them to make as they enjoyed bringing their beautiful publication to us as much as we enjoyed devouring each and every beautiful page. Their decision takes effect immediately on all products (for now) with the possible exception of the magazine. However, shipping the magazine won't be without it's own changes as well. Mainly, the price. My costs as a supplier will go up quite a bit which of course means the end price will go up too.

So now the decision as to what to do going into 2010. After trading a few emails with my fellow JdL lover (and "stockist" of JdL products, Ruth Harsham of The Beautiful Life) she suggested asking our customers what they thought and if they want us to continue bringing to them.

So here it is...if we continue to bring the magazine to the states current estimates on the price of each issue will be approximately $35. There will be 8 issues in 2010 (there were 6 in 2009) and all issues will be in English. So what do YOU think? Would you still want this gorgeous publication available to you? Please leave me your honest comments. Your feedback is VERY important to me and will help me determine my plans going forward.

Also...the current issue, for the first time ever, reflects a
U.S. price of $17.00. That is an error! Shopkeepers across the country who stock the magazine were all fairly shocked to see that price, since we can assure you,
it doesn't cost much less than that for US to get it here, so PLEASE know that the $17.00 price is not an accurate rate of conversion for the magazine and is not an accurate "MSRP" for it. We all have been in contact with our dear friends at JdL about that and future issues should have that corrected.

The January issue is being printed now and it's time for me to reserve copies for us. The release date is January 15th. So please leave me your comments, I anxiously await them!

(For those of you who don't have one yet I have about 14 copies of the Christmas issue left, you can order one (and other goods) by clicking here.)