This isn’t a criticism of any specific project on Kickstarter, recent or current. Rather, I have some general observations about a trend of I’ve noticed that may really be hurting Kickstarter creators. In short, over the last few months I’ve received notifications about a number Kickstarter projects that I was eager to back…until I saw […]
Two months ago (has it only been two months?!), I wrote an article about how the coronavirus might impact tabletop game publishers, crowdfunding, and entrepreneurs. Today, with the news that Essen Spiel 2020 is cancelled, I’m going to write about how the pandemic has impacted Stonemaier Games. I’ll start out with a few ways that […]
A few days ago, an artist messaged me on Instagram to express interest in illustrating a future project for Stonemaier Games. I thanked them for their interest, complimented their style, and asked them to fill out the job application form on our website so I could have their contact information and portfolio all in one […]
On Friday I had a great chat with a friend in the book publishing industry. At one point in the conversation we delved into the topic of social media, and he asked why I chose to use “jameystegmaier” as my Instagram name instead of “stonemaiergames”. My answer, in short, was, “If I knew then what […]
Sometimes I make really dumb mistakes. If you’ve followed Stonemaier Games for years, you know what I’m talking about. There was the time I accidentally spoiled our own product by posting a thumbnail of the box that I thought people wouldn’t be able to read. I once put a bar code on a product that […]
On Friday I had an experience that made me look at customer service in a different way. It was a rather bad experience–but not entirely terrible–which made it stand out. I received a letter from my company’s dental provider, Anthem, informing us of an upcoming renewal. That was great–I like when any type of subscription service […]
I continue to revisit the Kickstarter Lesson posts I’ve written over the last 8 years in chronological order, highlighting the core elements of each. Paid Advertising and How Backers Find Your Project (#26): Of all the paid advertising for my original Viticulture campaign, banner ads on Board Game Geek appeared to attract the most […]
This is a bit of a weird topic for me to write about, as I haven’t ever rebranded a company, nor do I have any plans to rebrand Stonemaier Games. But I find the idea of rebranding interesting, and it was recently brought to my attention by Cody at Gold Nugget Games, as it’s something […]
In a world where local stores and cafes aren’t open to customers, conventions are postponed or cancelled, fulfillment centers are limited, and consumer budgets are tight, how do you continue to sell your brand to the world? This was the subject of a recent phone call between me and another publisher, and today I’m going […]
I can’t remember how it all started, but I’m pretty sure it was something like this: One of our shareholders pointed out that in photos of our games–all taken by me–the backgrounds looked like the shabby condo of a cat owner. Because, well, that’s where I took them. I think it was around this time […]
Recently I mentioned in our 2019 stakeholder report that “2019 was a string of unfortunate events involving a prolonged series of threats, harassment, attempts at character assassination, and triangulation fraud.” While I don’t want to provide more ammunition to the person behind all of that, I’m worried that some of these techniques might be used […]
Recently I was watching animated Disney version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame for the first time. Early in the movie, Megan exclaimed, “Wait, go back a few seconds–that’s Belle!” Sure enough, the star of Beauty and the Beast appears on the streets of Paris for a moment during an overhead shot. Personally, I love […]
I continue to revisit the Kickstarter Lesson posts I’ve written over the last 8 years in chronological order, highlighting the core elements of each. Kicktraq (#21): Kicktraq.com tracks Kickstarters and predicts the final funding. For the most part, I just think it’s important for project creators to be aware of it. But I also […]
On a recent Facebook Livecast, someone asked me what I thought about anniversary editions of tabletop games. I had a few off-the-cuff remarks, but it isn’t a topic I’ve thought about much, so I thought I’d explore it more in detail today. While I’ll focus on games in this article, some of these concepts could […]
Yesterday when we announced two new silly–but very real–products on April Fools Day, something that should have been obvious quickly became clear: People don’t believe much of anything you tell them on April 1. Despite a wealth of evidence that our chocolate-colored candy egg trays and custom magnifying glass were real–videos and photos showing the […]
“How is Zoom any different than Google Hangouts?” This is a question I pondered recently when the world switched over to remote connections and I started hearing Zoom all over the place. I realized that what may be obvious to other people may not be obvious to me, and maybe there are others like me, […]
Before I jump into the topic of today’s article, I’d like to share the big news that Charterstone Digital releases today! This full-AI app from Acram Digital is available on iOS and Steam (and Android later today), and you can play against the app or against other humans. It’s been really neat to see my […]
Does the day of the week impact your spending habits? Specifically in regards to crowdfunding, this is a question that researcher Jun Yang is trying to answer. Jun and her coauthors have been studying millions of data points from Kickstarter as they prepare a paper focusing on some statistical anomalies. Jun works at Indiana University, […]
When times get tough, how do you take care of your employees, customers, family/friends, contractors, yourself, and others? Great leaders are often defined by how they respond in a crisis. Yesterday I watched a short video on CNN featuring Top Chef producer Tom Colicchio. I generally agree with Tom, but I was dismayed by these […]
Have you ever bought something because you thought your significant other might like it? As I’ve talked about on this blog over the last year, I’ve been intentionally single for most of Stonemaier Games’ existence (2012-2020). That changed last year when I started dating Megan. Since then, I’ve found myself considering her when I buy […]
I made this game.