08:40 – For the first half of April, I thought it would be an excellent month in terms of kit sales. Last year, something like 80% or 85% of our April sales were in the second half of the month, so I was kind of expecting the second half of this April to be big as well. Not so, as it turns out. Things have been pretty dead since the 15th. We’ve sold only five kits so far in the second half of April. Still, month-to-date we’re doing very well compared to last April, and for the first four months of 2013 we’re running ahead of the total sales for the first seven months of 2012–well into our busy season–so I can’t complain too much.
Barbara was finally able to get to the gym yesterday, which was the first time in at least a couple of weeks. That was a very good thing, because the gym is a stress reliever for Barbara, and she certainly needs that given the constant crises for the last several months. It’s been just one thing after another. The amount of stress on Barbara and her sister caused by caring for their parents is similar to the stress of caring for a baby. The obvious differences are that new parents are typically in their 20’s or 30’s rather than their 50’s, and that with a baby one looks forward to the future rather than dreading it. With elderly parents, there’s nothing to look forward to except more of the same and worse.
10:54 – I didn’t notice until this morning, but Amber Marshall is now Amber Turner. Congratulations to her and Shawn. (I hope he realizes he’s not good enough for her…) Amber will soon be shooting season 7 of Heartland. I wonder if she’ll decide to be credited as Amber Turner in the new season or to keep Amber Marshall as her working name.
Our finished-goods inventory is starting to dwindle, so I’m building more science kits today and over the weekend. We’re still trying to build stock for the rush period that begins in July, but we’re constrained by backorders on a couple of key components. One of those is the thick cavity microscope slides, which are included in the biology, forensic science, and life science kits. We have apparently cornered the US supply of those slides. I had 200 dozen on order as of 15 March, with expected delivery of 15 May. Earlier this week, I got a shipment that included 41 dozen, with the remaining 159 dozen backordered, now through 17 June.
To conserve our supply, I decided to reduce the quantity included in the biology kits from a dozen to half a dozen. None of the biology labs require more than six of these slides, so cutting the number included in half allows us to build twice as many biology kits with the same number of slides. The forensic science labs actually use the whole dozen, so those kits will continue to include the full dozen. The Life Science kits include only a two-pack, so they’re not a major issue.
Rather than reduce the price of the biology kits, we’ll simply reduce the price increase that’s due to take effect soon. In fact, ordinarily we’d have increased kit prices as of 1 January, but we’ve held off on doing that. We had been adjusting (read, increasing) kit prices on 1 January and 1 July, but I decided we could afford to go to annual rather than semi-annual price changes. As of now, kit prices are scheduled to increase on 1 June. Cutting the number of thick cavity slides in the biology kits just means the prices of those kits won’t increase as much as they otherwise would have.
Meanwhile, my vendor tells me that they shipped us every box of thick cavity slides they had in stock, and there are no more to be had anywhere until their next shipment arrives. They actually did get a shipment last week, which was the one they were expecting on 15 May. But that shipment had so much breakage that they ended up refusing it and keeping only the 41 undamaged boxes that they just sent me. So I should get another 159 dozen in mid-June, and then the pipeline is dry. If I reorder around then, the new batch of slides would show up 60 to 90 days later. Unless, that is, I want to pay for air-freight in. Believe me, I don’t. These slides are glass, and I shudder to think what the air freight charges would be on a case of them coming from China.