Coolest Cooler is still hanging on. And its founder says he’s still making deliveries to weary backers, though just a few dozen at a time.
The Portland cooler company has run into a slew of problems since it broke Kickstarter records by raising $13 million in 2014.
When factory workers in China went on strike, production was delayed. Then the company ran out of cash — the $185 backers paid didn’t cover the cost of the cooler, which comes with a blender, a Bluetooth speaker and a USB charger — and production came to a halt.
To cover its manufacturing costs, the company in 2015 started selling coolers for $500 on Amazon, shipping to those customers while thousands of backers waited, cooler-less.
Complaints stacked up, and in September 2016, the Oregon Department of Justice confirmed it was investigating Coolest Cooler. At that point, production had restarted and 40,000 coolers had been shipped. The project had 62,000 total backers.
In the company’s latest update to backers on Friday, Coolest founder Ryan Grepper acknowledged that the last few months of 2016 have been tough.
Amazon Launchpad posed the biggest problem, he said. That arm of the e-commerce giant sells products that gained popularity on crowdfunding sites, and in September it was selling Coolest Coolers for $225 each, 50 percent off an earlier price of $450.
At the time, Grepper called the price cut “disastrous,” and said Amazon broke a verbal promise to Coolest Cooler not to sell its wares for less than $399.
Amazon has not yet responded to a request for comment.
In his Friday update, Grepper said the deal almost drove them out of business. Luckily, he said, Launchpad ran out of inventory before the holidays, helping Coolest generate enough sales in December to ship a few more coolers to backers.
Since then, Coolest has shipped 35 coolers to backers, with another 50 scheduled for next week, Grepper said.
It’s unclear how many backers are still waiting for coolers.
Eugene Ivancic, of Euclid, Ohio, pledged $185 for a cooler back in 2014. He’s not very encouraged by the latest update, he said.
“At this pace I should see a cooler by 2020,” he said in an email to The Oregonian/OregonLive.
Grepper admitted it’s not a huge number, but it’s a “step in the right direction,” he wrote in his update.
Meanwhile, the DOJ investigation is ongoing. Grepper said he hopes it will be concluded soon.
The company is now “smaller, leaner,” he said.
Grepper did not immediately respond to an email from The Oregonian/OregonLive, so it’s unclear who has left the company, or just how small it is.
Regardless, Grepper said he’s still committed to getting a cooler to every backer.
— Anna Marum
amarum@oregonian.com
503-294-5911
@annamarum
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