Here is an email I just received.
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Dear Mr Angelopoulos,
First of all I would like to thank you again for your kind, helpful and very welcome notification on what some of the participants have posted on Badger and Blade about our products and sampling. Also to apologise, I was called out of the country unexpectedly and only returned last night.
Since my last e mail, where I mentioned that we do not go onto the Forums as they are not our prerogative as a manufacturer to participate, I have, on this occasion, as you suggested, followed the thread you sent just so that I could see and ascertain for myself the feelings being expressed.
As a company we do not yet provide samples though we have been intending to do so for some time. We are striving to keep up with retail production and once we can get on top of this we hope to make some sample production runs, meanwhile we hand fill some pots and vials when we are able and post them out. Because sending samples from here in the UK is difficult and unreliable we made an arrangement with a company in the US to send out samples against customer e mail requests. Sadly this system didn't work as we were let down on so many occasions when we presumed samples had been sent, that we no longer work with them. We have, however, known that companies such as QED and Vintage Blades will supply customers either upon request or with orders. When I met Jim from Vintage recently I promised to replace the stock he had used for these samples. We have recently added Cathy at Colonial Drug to this list who is happy to send out samples and we have forwarded requests onto her. As I am sure you are aware, in order to maintain our specific quality, we can only manufacture batches of our shave cream which make 500 pots of 200 mls at a time. Any larger, and the cream is so solid it won't come out of the mixing vessel, any smaller and we get liquid 'soup'! As you also know we do not use the manufacturers used by our famous competitors. I devised the formulation with the help a Cosmetic Chemist friend. My background is perfumery and I have been involved in creating fragrances for some 35 years but, although being in the industry, had never been able to find a shaving cream which worked for me well enough not to have to shave twice a day. Knowing that there must be other 'suffers' out there we endeavoured to create a shave cream that was different and worked for problem shavers like myself! Thus the Castle Forbes Shaving range was born.
At this stage I should confirm that I had tried everything on the market and would be the first in the queue for anything new. I also have an allegiance to Trumper's as I have been having my hair cut there for about 25 years.
Castle Forbes is a very small family owned business, just the Forbes and the Frenches, but run by my wife Judy and I and we do not have the infrastructure like the other more established British brands. Our emphasis and ethos is always on best quality and passion for our brand and we are continually trying to improve our customer service.
In the US we have a new Pick and Pack warehouse in Baltimore called LCG who has received high praise from our US retailers which is very rewarding. We regularly visit our US stockists and have been told that we are the only UK proprietors to do so. We believe that if someone is prepared to stock our product we would like to support them. We offer personal product training where requested and hold shaving events, especially in Saks stores, where we bring over a British Master Barber to give free shaves and advice on how to get the best possible shave using our products. Though offered, this service is rarely taken up by our independent stores as they are mostly barbers who already have the required expertise and don't need lessons from us i.e. Truefitt and Hill, Chicago, Aidan Gill, New Orleans etc.
We have a small, but growing, number of outlets in the US (approx 25), and indeed in Europe, who are very loyal to us and in exchange we offer proper continued exclusivity. Exclusivity is important to us as, we do not want to be impossible to find but seek to open stores who truly understand and are passionate about their stores, their brands and their customers'. In fact, the stores we supply to in the US either approached us directly themselves or were approached by us on the recommendation of CF users seeking a stockist in their area. I appreciate that one of B&B's members was obviously very frustrated by us but you can be assured that we will not be selling in Target. We are upset to find out that customers feel so badly let down by us and apologise for doing so. The customer in N. California was not to know that Judy had indeed sprayed off some fragrance samples to send to him but we do have a problem, 'padded envelope syndrome' our letters rarely go astray but padded envelopes do frequently!
We hope that this clears up a few issues, we always try to respond to our customers. The Cedarwood & Sandalwood was created in response to CF customer requests for those wanting natural antibacterial preparations that did not contain Tea Tree Oil, similarly The Pre-Shave and the biggest bug bear of them all, our woefully out of date web site, the new one should be on line in mid July.
Unfortunately we do not have any outlets in Greece but if you know of anyone who might be interested in stocking CF we will certainly contact them for you.
Again my thanks to you for taking the time and the trouble to let me know that we had a problem.
Best wishes,
Andrew
Andrew French
Director
The Private Perfumery At Castle Forbes, Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
Tel: +44 (0)1483 730944
Fax: +44 (0)1483 730945
web: www.castleforbes.com
-------------------------------
Dear Mr Angelopoulos,
First of all I would like to thank you again for your kind, helpful and very welcome notification on what some of the participants have posted on Badger and Blade about our products and sampling. Also to apologise, I was called out of the country unexpectedly and only returned last night.
Since my last e mail, where I mentioned that we do not go onto the Forums as they are not our prerogative as a manufacturer to participate, I have, on this occasion, as you suggested, followed the thread you sent just so that I could see and ascertain for myself the feelings being expressed.
As a company we do not yet provide samples though we have been intending to do so for some time. We are striving to keep up with retail production and once we can get on top of this we hope to make some sample production runs, meanwhile we hand fill some pots and vials when we are able and post them out. Because sending samples from here in the UK is difficult and unreliable we made an arrangement with a company in the US to send out samples against customer e mail requests. Sadly this system didn't work as we were let down on so many occasions when we presumed samples had been sent, that we no longer work with them. We have, however, known that companies such as QED and Vintage Blades will supply customers either upon request or with orders. When I met Jim from Vintage recently I promised to replace the stock he had used for these samples. We have recently added Cathy at Colonial Drug to this list who is happy to send out samples and we have forwarded requests onto her. As I am sure you are aware, in order to maintain our specific quality, we can only manufacture batches of our shave cream which make 500 pots of 200 mls at a time. Any larger, and the cream is so solid it won't come out of the mixing vessel, any smaller and we get liquid 'soup'! As you also know we do not use the manufacturers used by our famous competitors. I devised the formulation with the help a Cosmetic Chemist friend. My background is perfumery and I have been involved in creating fragrances for some 35 years but, although being in the industry, had never been able to find a shaving cream which worked for me well enough not to have to shave twice a day. Knowing that there must be other 'suffers' out there we endeavoured to create a shave cream that was different and worked for problem shavers like myself! Thus the Castle Forbes Shaving range was born.
At this stage I should confirm that I had tried everything on the market and would be the first in the queue for anything new. I also have an allegiance to Trumper's as I have been having my hair cut there for about 25 years.
Castle Forbes is a very small family owned business, just the Forbes and the Frenches, but run by my wife Judy and I and we do not have the infrastructure like the other more established British brands. Our emphasis and ethos is always on best quality and passion for our brand and we are continually trying to improve our customer service.
In the US we have a new Pick and Pack warehouse in Baltimore called LCG who has received high praise from our US retailers which is very rewarding. We regularly visit our US stockists and have been told that we are the only UK proprietors to do so. We believe that if someone is prepared to stock our product we would like to support them. We offer personal product training where requested and hold shaving events, especially in Saks stores, where we bring over a British Master Barber to give free shaves and advice on how to get the best possible shave using our products. Though offered, this service is rarely taken up by our independent stores as they are mostly barbers who already have the required expertise and don't need lessons from us i.e. Truefitt and Hill, Chicago, Aidan Gill, New Orleans etc.
We have a small, but growing, number of outlets in the US (approx 25), and indeed in Europe, who are very loyal to us and in exchange we offer proper continued exclusivity. Exclusivity is important to us as, we do not want to be impossible to find but seek to open stores who truly understand and are passionate about their stores, their brands and their customers'. In fact, the stores we supply to in the US either approached us directly themselves or were approached by us on the recommendation of CF users seeking a stockist in their area. I appreciate that one of B&B's members was obviously very frustrated by us but you can be assured that we will not be selling in Target. We are upset to find out that customers feel so badly let down by us and apologise for doing so. The customer in N. California was not to know that Judy had indeed sprayed off some fragrance samples to send to him but we do have a problem, 'padded envelope syndrome' our letters rarely go astray but padded envelopes do frequently!
We hope that this clears up a few issues, we always try to respond to our customers. The Cedarwood & Sandalwood was created in response to CF customer requests for those wanting natural antibacterial preparations that did not contain Tea Tree Oil, similarly The Pre-Shave and the biggest bug bear of them all, our woefully out of date web site, the new one should be on line in mid July.
Unfortunately we do not have any outlets in Greece but if you know of anyone who might be interested in stocking CF we will certainly contact them for you.
Again my thanks to you for taking the time and the trouble to let me know that we had a problem.
Best wishes,
Andrew
Andrew French
Director
The Private Perfumery At Castle Forbes, Aberdeenshire, Scotland.
Tel: +44 (0)1483 730944
Fax: +44 (0)1483 730945
web: www.castleforbes.com