Notes on the new website

Question: Why are you called "German Boardgame Company"?
Answer: When we started out in 1999, the boardgame industry was centered almost exclusively upon the German publishing houses. Kosmos, amigo, abacus, Goldsieber, Hans im Glück....were all riding the wave started decades before -- a wave that hit tsunami proportions with the release of Klaus Teuber's classic "Settlers of Catan" game. In North America, a "German Game" became a catch-all expression for a game stressing appealing to the population in general (as opposed to appealing strictly to hard-core gamers) social interaction, a shorter time required to play, and new and interesting mechanics. These "German" games contrasted with the Avalon Hill/Hasbro/Games Workshop - style games of the time that tended to be more uni-dimensional in approach, had a much longer play time, dripped with theme, and were almost exclusively the domain of dedicated gamers. We became "German Boardgame Company" and acquired "germangames.com" as our domain name -- if we hadn't, somebody else certainly would have, the expression was that popular. At the time, these "German Games" were all the rage and certainly helped launch the current, worldwide, renaissance in board gaming.

Question: I want to order something I can't find on your site. Can you order it for me?
Answer: If we can order it, we will! Send us an email and we'll see what we can do.

Question: What is the shipping charge?
Answer: For our competitive flat-rate shipping charges, please see "Shipping Rates Canada and the USA" at the bottom of any page on the site.

We only charge ONE flat-rate shipping, up until 30 kg (66 lbs). You can get a LOT of games into a 30 kg box, so fill up that box and enjoy your savings!

Yes, this is a great deal and we take as much care as is pragmatic to pack our boxes.

Question: How long does it take to ship my order?
Answer: It usually takes between 1 and 3 Business Days (a Business Day is any day that is NOT a holiday or Saturday/Sunday) to ship your order. This varies a bit, depending on the volume of orders ahead of your order, staffing scheduling constraints, and time of year (Christmas can be extremely busy).

Question: I received a game but it's missing components. What do I do?
Answer: Please contact the publisher of the game to obtain the missing components and they will be happy to send you the missing components. If you do not receive communication from the publisher, contact us and we will communicate with the publisher to ensure you receive the missing components.

Question: If I create an account, will I be able to see everything I want to be notified for and what I have on my Wishlist?
Answer: Yes!

Question: May I combine orders and how do I do so?
Answer: Yes, you may combine up to THREE orders, as long as the other order or orders have not been packed yet. First, send us an email alerting us to HOLD the existing order. Your order status in your account will become "HOLD" instead of "pending". Go ahead and place another order. We will refund the shipping charge for the second or third orders. After placing an additional order, please send us an email stating clearly the orders that you wan to be sent together. 

Question: Do you do local pickups?
Answer: Sorry, we do not. We are a high volume/high stress warehouse operation and we do not have floor staff available to service customers. Not to send you away, but if you need to pick something up please visit your local hobby shop. If you want great prices and a smooth catalogue experience, order from us...but you will have to wait. Please do not ask us to be the exception to this rule. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

Question: How accurate is the Estimated Time of Arrival?
ETA for Upcoming games is based upon what publishers or suppliers tell us directly or what is stated in various gaming forums or as updates from publishers via Kickstarter, etc. ETA is a "professional guess", based on these communications. Please do not take our ETA as official word for a title's release. If you ever encounter knowledge of an update for an ETA and it doesn't match our estimate, please email us - referring us to the updated information for release. This way, we can update our ETA accordingly.

Question: Why don't you do Preorders?
Answer: 1) Unfortunately, there are administrative and accounting problems associated with doing preorders 2) We don't like accepting a customer's money if we can't be sure of satisfying the customer in a reasonable amount of time (and the board games industry is often an unreasonable and capricious industry) and 3) prices are heavily dependent upon the CAD-USD exchange rate and this can bounce up and down, quite severely at times. Depending on exchange rates when the item arrives, we can either end up overcharging on the preorder (angering the customer), or undercharging on the Preorder, wiping out our profit (at 30% off retail, there is no wiggle room).

Instead of preorders, we use the "notify me when this item is in stock" numbers to predict our preorders with suppliers...and we order MORE than this number.

Question: Do you have Sale Items?
Answer: Yes, we still have a sale category. They will be added to the menu, but for now you can find the sale items here: http://www.germangames.com/sale.html

Question: May I create a temporary order to hold items?
Answer: No, there is no way to do this -- so please don't try. Please either finalize your order by paying for it, or cancel the order if you are not sure about something.

If you have any other questions, please email us at info@germangames.com

Best Regards
The German Boardgame Company Team