Weekly summary 37/2020

Hi,

this is a summary of what was going in the doll world in the 37th week of 2020, as far as we at Dollstudio & DS Doll Europe were concerned.

1) Novel Coronavirus situation.

a) The pandemic situation in general. The amount of daily new infections keeps exceeding a quarter million per day on average. Most active hot spots in the past week were India, Brazil, the U.S., Argentina, and France (yesterday 10,561 new cases).

The number of total confirmed cases has exceeded 29 million; as of today, it is at 29,141,568. So far, 927,408 deaths were recorded.

The impact of the Wuhan virus, or moreso the rather anti-scientific political response to it, takes its toll in various lines of business. Virtually every line of work seems to be affected somehow.

Some anecdotal observations:

• Chorus singing in Brandenburg (Germany) requires the singers to keep 3 meters of distance from their co-singers. Between each line of singers and to the conductor, there needs to be 6 meters of distance. Obviously nobody has rehearsal rooms that large, so choruses can not rehearse, let alone perform. Violations against these rules can be punished with fierce fines.
• In local stores, Asian some fine teas like Japanese Sencha or Darjeeling from India are out of stock. Maybe there were no enough workers for the harvest, or the trade companies could not get the product to the customers. Whatever the reason might be, the result is that some spots on the shelves remain empty.
• Several types of lumber like Sierian larch have severe shortages.
• And tools… Basically all brands I am buying can not deliver at the moment, be it Dewalt or Woodpeckers (both USA), Hultafors (Sweden) or Festool or Mafell (both Germany). They have a few products left on stock, but for most parts of their portfolio delivery times are in the months. There is a lack of parts because supply chains are broken. And there is another side-effect: Prices go up. Compared to September 2019, most tools are now advertised for about 15-20% higher prices.

The shocking thing is that even premium brands which big-mouthed advertise their products to be "Made in the USA" or "Made in Germany" are similarily affected like cheap assemblers which admittedly rely on Chinese factories. Everybody seems to depend on international supply chains somehow – or political restrictions mess up the business operations. The outcome is the same. Production decreases, demand increases. That is the classical recipe for inflation. Oh yeah, that's what central banks were asking for. Probably just a coincidence.

b) Impact on the doll business. Sitation in a nutshell:

The pandemic keeps dominating what occurs or does not occur in the doll business. Slow shipments keep piling up, only one shipment with the new 'DHL special line' has made with with less than a month transit time to Europe. We are now considering the new train gateways as useless because processing a shipment on these routes can exceed 3 months. Plus, the operators of these logistics centres are completely unresponsive. We advise every customer to check with their vendor about the EU gateway to be used and to refuse shipments to be routed through Czechia.

The increase in lead times to make the dolls in China which I mentioned last week is still a thing. Doll Forever's new 80 cm miniature dolls, silicone variant, take over 30 days lead time to make the doll, and making a Happy Doll takes 5-6 weeks. Both lead times are well above what the suppliers put in prospect before placing an order. Something not yet known seems to be going on in mainland China – maybe it's just a shorage of factory workers, or there are new suppressed Coronavirus outbreaks which are not covered by international news.

2) New arrivals.

This week, two new heads were introduced:

• Doll Forever ›Zoe‹ head (D4E N/A) - TPE
• SE Doll ›Kathy‹ head (SE no. 078) - TPE

No new body styles were released.

As always, you can follow the latest updates in our Twitter feed: https://twitter.com/DollStudioEU

Also, we have the New products listing on all three Dollstudio websites. It is sorted in reverse chronological order, so the latest additions to our portfolio are on top of the listing:

• Dollstudio US - http://us.dollstudio.org/new-products
• Dollstudio EU - http://eu.dollstudio.org/new-products
• Dollstudio DE - http://de.dollstudio.org/new-products

On Dollstudio EU, there is also the New arrivals timeline http://eu.dollstudio.org/timeline with a slightly different display style.

3) Business updates, technical updates and dolls in development.

Only one week left! From September 5th - 19th (= two weeks), Dollstudio will offer a time-limited discount event for Xycolo. The 5% off coupon code is valid on Dollstudio US, Dollstudio EU, and Dollstudio DE.

4) Latest blog posts.

Our daily blog posts feature mostly new photo sets, showcasing dolls and heads in various configurations.

• 13.09.: New photos with Xycolo XC-170/E body style and ›Angel‹ head
• 12.09.: New photos with Gynoid GT-162 body style (= Model 11) and ›Yui‹ head
• 11.09.: New photos with Irontech Doll IT-163/G body style and ›Jennifer‹ head
• 10.09.: New photos with YL Doll YL-141 body style and ›Abbey‹ head (Jinsan no. 369)
• 09.09.: New photos with HR Doll HR-168 body style and no. 21 head
• 08.09.: New photos with SE Doll SE-163/C body style (= SED 091) and ›Kathy‹ head (SE no. 078)
• 07.09.: New photos with Doll Forever FIT-145/F body style and ›Zoe‹ head
• 06.09.: New photos with Xycolo XC-170/E body style and ›Muse‹ head

These blog posts are mirrored on the Latest blog posts section all three Dollstudio websites. It is sorted in reverse chronological order, newest posts on top:

• Dollstudio US - http://us.dollstudio.org/blog
• Dollstudio EU - http://eu.dollstudio.org/blog
• Dollstudio DE - http://de.dollstudio.org/blog

(EU and US sites in English, DE site in German)

5) Factory photos and shipped dolls.

This week we had one completed torso:

• This Climax Doll CLM-R5 lower body torso travels to Austria

This week we had no completed dolls.

6) Weekly Top 10 Dolls.

Based on our website access stats, here is the weekly report: What's trending this week?

These stats reflect what our (potential) customers are interested in; however, it does not indicate conversions. The stats are broken down by the geographical distribution area, so this might give some insight about varying regional tastes or preferences.

Dollstudio EU

1. Gynoid GT-150/81
2. Doll House 168 DH20-80/G
3. Gynoid GT-162/D
4. Jarliet JA-166
5. Irontech IT-170
6. Piper Fantasy PI-150/B
7. Piper Silicone PI-130/D
8. Irontech IT-140/M
9. Irontech IT-163/G
10. Doll House 168 DH20-80/E

Dollstudio US

1. Xycolo XC-170/E
2. WM Dolls WM-172/B
3. Irontech IT-169
4. Gynoid GT-162/D
5. Sino-doll SI-160/E
6. Doll Sweet DS-168 ›Summit‹ - Alexa
7. Sino-doll SI-155/H
8. Gynoid GT-165/E
9. WM Dolls WM-157/B
10. Piper Fantasy PI-130

Dollstudio DE

1. Piper Fantasy PI-130
2. WM Dolls WM-172/B
3. Ildoll IL-156/A
4. Sino-doll SI-152/D
5. Gynoid GT-162/D
6. WM Doll WM-135
7. Piper Mini PI-100
8. Doll Sweet DS-168 ›Summit‹ - Alexa
9. Piper Silicone PI-160/G
10. Sino-doll SI-162/D

Sandro

https://twitter.com/DollStudioEU/status/1305253433226788864?s=20