Yesterday we launched our annual 2-day charity auction, for which I select 10 amazing content creators in the tabletop gaming community that I want more people to know about and they each choose a charitable organization important to them. Stonemaier Games offers an auction bundle with each creator/charity, then we match each winning bid to […]
Crowdfunding provides a great reminder that I shouldn’t take anything for granted. Every month–and sometimes every week–I see a project that I assumed would do well based on the designer, publisher, or IP…yet the project is vastly underperforming. Here are some articles on those topics: Top 5 Mistakes That May Sink Your Crowdfunding Project Preventing […]
Compared to when you backed your first crowdfunding project, where would you say your confidence currently stands? Every creator is different, but when you have a particularly bad (or good) experience with a campaign, does it impact the lens through which you view other campaigns? I recently learned of a publisher, Doomsday Robots, who has […]
Is there any resource more valuable than time? I often feel that way, so a recent crowdfunding campaign called Fateforge: Chronicles of Kaan stood out to me due to their focus on respecting players’ time. I’ve corresponded in the past with the designer, Gordon Calleja, to contribute some thoughts for his recently released book, Unboxed. […]
Yesterday preorders opened for our two most eco-friendly to date, the Between Two Cities Essential Edition and Smitten. Shipping starts next week. This news follows last month’s announcement that the newest reprint of Wingspan will feature high-quality sugarcane pulp trays and inserts instead of plastic, wooden eggs, compostable plastic bags, and all sustainably forested sources […]
This weekend I helped some friends assemble a new couch. In doing so, I forever endeared myself to the couch via something called the “IKEA effect“–that is, I inherently value that couch over an identical couch that someone else assembled. While the IKEA effect takes place post-purchase, there are similar marketing techniques designed to trigger […]
In last week’s reveal of our 10th anniversary surprises, there were two digital developments I didn’t mention because I wasn’t sure if they would be ready in time. Since then, both of them have launched, so I’m excited to share two more anniversary announcements with you today! Stonemaier Scores Earlier this year, someone brought to […]
To this day, I still sometimes make the mistake I mention in Kickstarter Lesson #106. Today’s post recaps that post and a few others. *** Over the last 10 years, I’ve written over 1000 articles on this blog to share my thoughts, observations, mistakes, and insights with my fellow creators. That’s a lot of content […]
On September 10, 2012, Stonemaier Games changed from a conceptual to an actual company. That’s the day I woke up to Viticulture reaching its funding goal on Kickstarter. I filmed a brief emotional video to thank backers for helping my dream come true, and then I headed off to my day job. Ten years later, […]
Five years ago on Labor Day, I shared that $20/hour is the minimum we would pay an independent contractor or volunteer for a specific task. At the time, I thought that was a fair starting point, with highly specialized contractors earning considerably more. The three full-time employees at Stonemaier Games (and our part-time employees, Alan, […]
At the beginning of the pandemic on an eerily quiet Saturday afternoon in March 2020, I sat down to design a game. My sense at the time is that a lot of people were scared, isolated, and/or lonely. I thought if I designed an infinitely scaling, remotely playable game that anyone could print out at […]
Some content instantly connects with people while other content falls flat. I’m fascinated by identifying patterns to determine the difference. Specifically, today I’m curious about YouTube videos. I create a bunch of different content for the Stonemaier Games YouTube channel, including a long-form weekly video that premieres on Sunday. It’s usually a top 10 list […]
I have the happiest memories of eating lunch as a staff at my first post-collegiate job. It was a small office–we were project managers for academic textbooks–and every day we’d take a 30-minute break to eat, chat, and laugh. For the first 8 years of running Stonemaier Games, it was just me, though my co-founder […]
What has 11 years and a hit TV show done for George R. R. Martin’s next book? Changed it quite a bit, according to a recent interview: “My stories grow and evolve and change as I write them. I generally know where I am going, sure … the final destinations, the big set pieces, they […]
Based on how often I’m asked, “Will the insert fit sleeved cards?”, I was under the assumption that the majority of gamers sleeve all cards in their games. So I was shocked by the results of a recent poll I sent to Stonemaier Ambassadors. Granted, this is a small, niche sample size (hence the poll […]
Sometimes another company does something I find appealing, though I’m not entirely sure how effective the method is when used elsewhere. Today’s example is that I recently decided to try a DNA test via 23andMe to learn more about my roots, and I received the following a few days after I signed up: I thought […]
I’ve learned that many steps towards eco-friendliness are small and incremental. However, today I have some big news about several leaps we’ve taken towards making our products significantly more environmentally sustainable. Panda Is Now FSC Certified We’re incredibly excited that Panda now offers all FSC-certified materials if a publisher chooses them, so Stonemaier Games is now […]
I am not a graphic designer, but I am in charge of marketing at Stonemaier Games. I’m constantly trying to find better ways to help potential customers understand our products and decide if they’re a good fit, and I often do this using a combination of images and text. This is an area for which […]
With Gen Con 2022* beginning today, I’m going to highlight 3 awesome things I recently noticed about other publishers. Far Off Games 2022 Charity Auction to Fight Cancer Far Off Games (of Xia and Arydia fame) is currently hosting a charity auction on BGG. They’ve selected 5 different charities and paired a robust set of […]
Almost the entirety Stonemaier Games’ marketing strategy is based on a few key elements: Contributing to the gaming/creative community (e.g., blog posts like this), opt-in subscribers (e.g., our enewsletter), other content creators (e.g., reviewers), and play-and-win sections at conventions. Every now and then we pay for a banner ad on BoardGameGeek or a Google Ad, […]
I made this game.