Thread: Do you have a subscription to FWW magazine?

Like others I am VERY frustrated with FWW.

In April 2021 my subscription was auto renewed for 2 years and until yesterday I had not received a single FWW since then. After numerous emails they sent me edition Nos 288, 289 and 290 which were delivered by courier in separate envelopes yesterday via ALT ParcelRight.

In early August FWW advised “Please allow until September 1, 2021 for delivery of your September/October 2021 issue.” I am still waiting.

FWW have told me “once your issue is in the postal system, we no longer have control over delivery”. I can understand this for one issue but when none arrive the problem is clearly at their end.

In Australia if we pay a business like FWW for something and it is not received and the matter is not addressed, we have the option of contacting the ACCC and/or in NSW, the Dept of Fair Trading.

Hopefully FWW can get their act together and send their hard-copy magazine subscribers each issue on a regular basis as they have done for many years.

Not to entirely reinvigorate this thread ...

I received the following email earlier this week#292 - Nov / Dec 2021
Our latest issue is hot off the presses, featuring Kerf-bent wall cabinet ; How to tame curved parts with patterns; Crosscut sled for large panels; How to upholster a slip seat; Build a handsome chair with limited tools; and much more. Read on to see what's inside,



I don't expect to see the issue "in the flesh" till around Christmas, perhaps a bit later


BUT
I do feel for FWW subscribers in Australia

About 10 days ago, I received three envelopes, each with a magazine therein. I wonder why these were not sent in just one? Then, out of the blue, I received a fourth envelope at the end of the past week containing a fourth magazine. Not the one that Ian mentions, however. Perhaps that may turn up in due course?

It appears that FWW may have got the message - I posted on the Knots forum (which FWW run) and others replied there as well.

Regards from Perth

Derek

Originally Posted by derekcohen

About 10 days ago, I received three envelopes, each with a magazine therein. I wonder why these were not sent in just one? Then, out of the blue, I received a fourth envelope at the end of the past week containing a fourth magazine. Not the one that Ian mentions, however. Perhaps that may turn up in due course?

It appears that FWW may have got the message - I posted on the Knots forum (which FWW run) and others replied there as well.

I'm entirely sure that FWW's distribution system requires that each issue is wrapped and addressed individually. Which explains the four separate envelopes.
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.
.
.
BUT
Have other subscribers received their missing issues? or are they still waiting?

Originally Posted by ian

... I received the following email earlier this week
#292 - Nov / Dec 2021
Our latest issue is hot off the presses, featuring Kerf-bent wall cabinet ...

Yes; I also received that teaser email.

Back in the days when FWW actually delivered magazines, I routinely received that teaser about 5 days before the magazine arrived from the Netherlands. I won't hold my breath!

Originally Posted by derekcohen

... About 10 days ago, I received three envelopes, each with a magazine therein....

Congratulations; I have't received anything, yet - except subscription extensions.

... I'm entirely sure that FWW's distribution system requires that each issue is wrapped and addressed individually. Which explains the four separate envelopes. ...

Yep; all done by a machine.

Originally Posted by ian

I received the following email [on Thursday 7 October 2021] Issue #292 - Nov / Dec 2021
Our latest issue is hot off the presses, featuring Kerf-bent wall cabinet ; How to tame curved parts with patterns; Crosscut sled for large panels; How to upholster a slip seat; Build a handsome chair with limited tools; and much more. Read on to see what's inside,



I don't expect to see the issue "in the flesh" till around Christmas, perhaps a bit later

Well what can I say ...

Issue #292 (December 2021) was in my mailbox this morning (Friday October 15, 2021) -- that's only 9 days after I received the "hot off the press" teaser email.

Either Taunton has changed their delivery contractor for Canadian subscribers -- unlikely as the return address is the same as was used the last time.
or magazines to Canada are no longer being delayed crossing the US-Canadian border -- for me the more likely scenario


Perhaps, despite my earlier pessimism, international supply chains are starting to return to "normal"



How are Australian FWW subscribers fairing?

Originally Posted by ian

... Perhaps, despite my earlier pessimism, international supply chains are starting to return to "normal" ...

One swallow does not a summer make.

Had a very enjoyable dinner with a former colleague, an economist with a special interest in logists - we used to call it transport economics, but times change. He gave a rather interesting explanation of the causes of the supply chain delays and suggested that it might take four or five years to clear them.

According to Ken, the Japanese invented the JIT - just in time - supply chain concept in the 1960's and it was ubiquitous in Japan by 1980. The other countries followed, roughly 20 years behind, but since around 2000 the world has largely operated on the JIT system.

Under the JIT system, manufacturers maintain virtually no stocks of raw materials. Components are delivered straight to the start of assembly lines - Contracts are very specific:

• Deliver 1,000 parts to factory door #6 at 11 am on 16-10-21,
• If truck arrives early delivery will be refused,
• If truck arrives late, very severe penalties will apply,
• A lot of social interaction between staff of both enterprises to ensure all understand the importance of ontime delivery.
• Raw materials and components cannot be kept in a warehouse because there isn't one.

This system is extremely efficient when everything works. But the entire process can be stopped by the absence of a single component - eg Car production has plummetted because the makers cannot get enough computer chips.

Even in retailing, companies try to avoid storage of goods and after unpacking deliver stuff straight to retail displays.

Then along came covid. Many components were scheduled for delivery to factories were already in the supply line, but the missing components caused the making process to stop. What do you do with the available components - the manufacturer and the supplier do not have sufficient warehouse space - the core of JIT is avoiding warehousing. The only solution is to keep the in the containers they were being delivered in, and find somewhere to store these full containers.

Thus whereas containers once were used to ship goods, many are now also being used as default warehouses, and the world has run out of containers. Now if someone manages to produce some of the missing components, they cannot find containers to deliver them to the client. The problem escallates. Full containers everywhere! Wharves/storage cluttered!

Ken's analysis is that the problem will not ease untill a pile of new containers are manufactured - something like 20% of existing world stocks. This will not happen overnight. Then the shipping world will quickly return to normal. Then their will be a glut of containers.

But, as Ken says, if I can predict a future glut of containers then so can the economists within the logistics industries. They may advise against investing in additional containers, and thus extend the problem.

Originally Posted by GraemeCook

Had a very enjoyable dinner with a former colleague, an economist with a special interest in logists - we used to call it transport economics, but times change. He gave a rather interesting explanation of the causes of the supply chain delays and suggested that it might take four or five years to clear them.

According to Ken, the Japanese invented the JIT - just in time - supply chain concept in the 1960's and it was ubiquitous in Japan by 1980. The other countries followed, roughly 20 years behind, but since around 2000 the world has largely operated on the JIT system.

Under the JIT system, manufacturers maintain virtually no stocks of raw materials. Components are delivered straight to the start of assembly lines - Contracts are very specific:

• Deliver 1,000 parts to factory door #6 at 11 am on 16-10-21,
• If truck arrives early delivery will be refused,
• If truck arrives late, very severe penalties will apply,
• A lot of social interaction between staff of both enterprises to ensure all understand the importance of ontime delivery.
• Raw materials and components cannot be kept in a warehouse because there isn't one.

This system is extremely efficient when everything works. But the entire process can be stopped by the absence of a single component - eg Car production has plummetted because the makers cannot get enough computer chips.

Even in retailing, companies try to avoid storage of goods and after unpacking deliver stuff straight to retail displays.

Then along came covid. Many components were scheduled for delivery to factories were already in the supply line, but the missing components caused the making process to stop. What do you do with the available components - the manufacturer and the supplier do not have sufficient warehouse space - the core of JIT is avoiding warehousing. The only solution is to keep the in the containers they were being delivered in, and find somewhere to store these full containers.

Thus whereas containers once were used to ship goods, many are now also being used as default warehouses, and the world has run out of containers. Now if someone manages to produce some of the missing components, they cannot find containers to deliver them to the client. The problem escallates. Full containers everywhere! Wharves/storage cluttered!

Ken's analysis is that the problem will not ease untill a pile of new containers are manufactured - something like 20% of existing world stocks. This will not happen overnight. Then the shipping world will quickly return to normal. Then their will be a glut of containers.

But, as Ken says, if I can predict a future glut of containers then so can the economists within the logistics industries. They may advise against investing in additional containers, and thus extend the problem.

The issue is also that when Western companies applied JIT they missed a key principle in that many of the supplying companies were localised nearby which is why they could minimise inventory.

Now companies equate JIT with just having low stock yet still using a worldwide supply chain. One issue like the Suez blockage, or covid and there is chaos.

So true. But even the Japanese companies have exported the JIT model and, until covid and the Suez blockage, have largely made it work. For example, Toyotas are made in over 20 countries with all parts of the company addicted to JIT.
List of Toyota factories - Wikipedia

Hi all. Have those affected received any outstanding copies of FWW? I have just got my October edition of FHB , so I am assuming that some of you have some reading to catch up on?

Originally Posted by Mountain Ash

Hi all. Have those affected received any outstanding copies of FWW? I have just got my October edition of FHB , so I am assuming that some of you have some reading to catch up on?

Mine arrived yesterday, the first since April. I still have to claim a credit for the missing issues. The envelope was marked Jersey (Channel Islands) post.

SWMBO has been receiving weekly copies of The New Yorker all year.

mick

Checked the club mail box earlier this week and still nothing but now I might have to check again in the next day or so.

Nothing yet; they owe me four copies.