So guys where to start. It’s probably been the most trying period of Mephisto since the early days.
Earlier in the year we had to move out of the original farm, we’d been renting it all of this time and had some new neighbors move in.
Shouldn’t be too bad right, but things in the countryside can often be a bit messy.
When power was brought down to the property over 20 years ago, our landlords and the neighbors clubbed together, as the Neighbors house wasn’t legally built, so the power came to our house and then a line was diverted to supply them. They only used it as a weekend house, mostly in summer, so the draw from them was low. They’d then just come around each month and pay let’s say a token amount for their usage.
However they were old folks now both pushing 80, their kids had no interest in taking the place over and it was a lot of work for them to travel to and upkeep the property, being in the woods, it soon takes back over if you leave it be.
So they sold it to a younger couple who would use it full time, and that’s when problems started. We found out there were another two distant neighbors that we had no idea existed, were also tapped in to our supply. This also coincided with the old school electricity meters being updated to ‘smart’ meters. Where as before we could take more power over the contracted amount as the spinning disc could only spin and meter to a certain point, now you’re contracted to an actual power level and the electricity company know exactly how much you’ve used. Which is okay at best for a normal home but to have a grow facility it makes it impossible.
If we would have wanted to contract more, all the lines and installation would need to be upgraded. Which would mean running a few kilometers of cable through the woods = mega bucks. So we were essentially left paying for a whole facility, paying other peoples electricity and only being able to run 6/30 lights not even at full chuff without the power tripping.
We thought about solar or switching everything to LED lighting but for a rental property we just couldn’t justify it. There’s never been any functional heating there so we also relied on the ‘wasted’ heat energy of HID lighting to keep the environment correct and decent in most seasons.
It was a sad time, as it was a major part of our adventure, and life really. Where it all started, And so it was hard to say goodbye to.
So we broke everything down, re-decorated, put everything back to how we found it, sorted through and moved out 7 years worth of equipment and associated crap, and since then we’ve been renovating a new spot that we purchased to become our new facility, but is taking time, money, resources and focus to get it done.
It’s not been fun for us, this has been the longest period in well over a decade that we’ve not had a plant growing. But we’ve taken it all on the chin as a necessary thing for the greater good and future.
The other side of the coin to the above has been our payment issues. Namely finding a company to facilitate card payments for us.
This really started last September, when we lost PayPal as a payment method. It was never really supposed to be a proper solution as of course Seeds are on their naughty list, but being busy growing we found a way to manage it as effectively as possible for orders in a semi-manual way.
But after three years, either they cottoned on, or someone reported us. Either way we needed a new solution that would better cope with more orders. We found a bank in Spain that had a division for high risk that would accept us, and after some teething problems getting it integrated it was pretty smooth sailing. Until at the beginning of April they said a law had been passed in the States on a federal level that would put them in a bad position, so with no notice they terminated our contract.
Since then we’ve been from pillar to post trying to find a payment solution that works internationally, that can integrate with our website platform, that won’t rape us with charges, conversion fees, transfer fees, crazy set up fees etc etc.
Simultaneously Dealing with jargon, trying to explain to people that seeds DON’T contain THC. And largely these people from multiple sources have promised that they can sort it but no one has been able to deliver on those promises.
I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve now told our team internally that we have something in place for it then to fall through.
And I’m personally sorry to everyone that was excited to get their hands on the new strains, we’ve had all the new seeds pre-packed and prepared for the drop since April, we also had the next several drops figured out including our 5 year anniversary which passed in May, But it’s a must that we run these promos with card processing otherwise it’s a complete nightmare for everyone. Trying to chase payments. If there’s for example 600 during a promo weekend, and it’s for example 4 emails to sort a single order out using offline payments that’s 2400 emails to work through. Yes it’s not impossible but we feel like we have a duty to everyone to make a smooth promotion, you pay your money you expect an efficient service, that’s what we strive for.
And so as the time has stretched out where we’ve no doubt lost a significant amount of orders due to not having card payments we’ve been running some mini promotions of our not brand new strains, just the existing catalogue to basically make ends meat. We started the business with more money than what’s currently in our business account. I don’t think many companies could go approaching 5 months without their bread and butter income.
And part C of this is, unfortunately the other MG founders’ mother has recently passed after a long battle with cancer, he’s obviously had to be there attending to those affairs, being with family and rightly so. I’ve basically been alone a good while managing what I can online, between the renovation, and searching for processing.
And this isn’t to be a sob story or cautionary tale, it’s just to be real about it. We’ve not disappeared, we’re still here, still working, still planning. I’d much prefer to say we’re taking a sabbatical, sipping on mojitos somewhere with some ladies of the road in tow, but it’s not the case.
Every year we think ‘this is the year’ when it’s all going to be gravy, every year there are inevitably hurdles to overcome, but we do.
This has just been as first stated a bit more of an exceptionally tricky time.
We’ve tried to keep the bulk of this private as they are kind of private matters as long as the company is working. But for anyone that had questions or felt they needed a deeper insight to things, here it is.
And you may think oh you should do this or this, but the fact is we’re our own people in our own unique situation and whatever we are doing isn’t without good reason.
So again we’re just asking again for some people to bare with us during this time.
And once things are back on track we’ll let it be known, Immediately.
Cheers. And sorry if I’ve not been available or replying to things that ordinarily probably deserve a reply.
-Mitch
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