Impacts of the new EU product safety regulation on MSB Patrons (Patreon)

Hi friends,

Here's a fun post to be writing on (American) Thanksgiving: As you may have heard, starting December 13th - two weeks from today, the EU is implementing new consumer product safety rules, the General Product Safety Regulation or GPSR, that apply to most products sold in or sent into the EU. Based on our reading of the GPSR, we believe it does apply to us even though the packages we send out to patrons are gifts rather than commercial products.

The GPSR introduces a few new requirements - safety testing, labeling, and so on. You can read more about it on the official fact sheet or on eBay's very helpful guide for sellers. The most impactful one for us is the new requirement that manufacturers have a business representative in the EU who is responsible for GPSR compliance. Frankly, we're not going to be able to do this.

The items we put in the gift boxes come from a mix of sources - some we make ourselves, many we buy from small independent artists and others are manufactured for us by print shops, custom t-shirt makers, and the like - most of which are also small, local businesses. It won't be possible for us or most of the makers we work with to comply with the new regulation and, as of now, none of the larger companies we work with have announced plans to do so.

This season's gift boxes are sitting in our apartment right now waiting for one more piece of art. We are going to take a week off from producing the podcast and scramble to get the boxes done, packed, and shipped before the new regulation takes effect December 13th. This week's episode is already recorded and will come out as scheduled this weekend, but next week there will be no episode. These packages will include your Year 6 pins even though we haven't done the regular pin promotion event yet.  

Going forward we will not be able to send any items, including gifts, pins, or contest prizes, to the EU or Northern Ireland. This sucks. We hate it. We've always tried to offer equal benefits to Patrons all around the world regardless of the cost. Unfortunately this seems like our only option right now. If you're an EU or Northern Ireland-based Patron and decide to change your pledge level as a result we will understand completely.

In the next couple of months we're going to look at revamping the Patreon in other ways. Circumstances have changed a lot in the nearly six years since we set it up and we'd like to spruce it up a bit. If you have ideas for things you'd like to see more (or less) of from us, please drop us a line here, by email (hosts@gundampodcast.com) or in the feedback channel on the discord and let us know.

Thanks so much for your support,

Thom & Nina