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As some of you may already know, the HMS/GRD warehouse/office was the subject of a fire in early August. The fire killed two people, injured 25 more, and severely damaged much of the upper floors of the building. You can read more about this on our website, starting at http://www.new.hmsgrd.com/?paged=3 starting with the HMS News 07 Aug 2012 entry. Fortunately the HMS facilities were on the bottom floor and thus suffered no fire damage, almost no smoke damage, and only slight water damage limited to the office area only. However, the fire also rendered the building unsafe and we were thus prohibited from recovering any of our material for several months as various state and local agencies decided what could be done. The final decision was that only a specially trained and licensed company would be allowed to recover our materials. The recovery has now been completed, but it was very expensive and essentially exhausted the funds we had set aside to complete the printing and then ship Total War. The purpose of this fire sale is to raise the money needed to print the final components and ship Total War.
For the current and final version of the Fire Sale see the HMSFireSaleFinal link under the HMS News – July 18, 20
Early this week we picked up the last load of our material that could feasibly be recovered from the damaged building. An unexpected bonus was the research material that we hadn’t expected to be recovered. We were able to get most of the company’s research folders and notebooks, including Arthur’s draft Turning Point, First to Fight II, A Winter War II, and Bloody Eagles maps, OBs, and research notes. Much of this week has been a reorganization of the incoming boxes to make them fit into the newer, and much smaller, storage area. This meant opening and repacking 1200+ boxes into the 500+ that fit in the new storage, inventorying the contents, and restacking everything so that things are as accessible as possible without having to shift boxes again.
We still have a number of boxes staged at a temporary site that need to be inventoried, but the results of the inventory so far show that the bulk of the Total War components were recovered undamaged. This included almost all the maps and most of the counter-sheets. We also recovered most of the older game and magazine inventory that was still in shrink-wrap and/or sealed in boxes. The good news is that we will definitely have enough counter sets and maps for those who preordered. The counters and maps are the most expensive parts of Total War and it looks like we won’t have to reprint any of these.
Unfortunately we lost more than half of the Total War game boxes. Essentially we lost all the boxes that we had previously assembled and that were stacked up in the warehouse as some of our earlier photos showed. This was expected as each box top and box bottom had to be treated as a separate item making the total recovery cost significantly higher than just reprinting them. Still, it was very sad to see these being treated as trash in the end-of-process photographs provided by the recovery firm — you can see a couple of these photos below. We may have enough of the game boxes to cover the preorders but that should be determined shortly.
Also, although we recovered most of the counters, we lost a few hundred sets of collated counter-sheets that we had not moved into sealed boxes before the fire. And, we lost all of our accumulated shipping supplies: boxes, mailers, packing peanuts, bubble-wrap, box tape, and shrink-wrap; and a lot of older games/magazines that were not in sealed boxes at the time of the fire. Finally, a lot of equipment like desks, bookcases, etc was lost. We did, however, recover tables sufficient to put together the Total War assembly/shipping line, plus the shrink-wrap machine itself.
Recovering our material cost much less than reprinting the Total War counters and maps, but it was still expensive. The cash reserve we had accumulated to complete the printing and shipping of Total War essentially went to pay for the recovery. To make that up, plus replace the lost shipping supplies, we will be holding a (what else) Fire Sale soon – check back here later this week for details. It will include all of our older games that are available and a special offer available only to those who had preordered Total War.
As many of you know, when we established HMS we purposely accepted as our obligation the preorders that had been made prior to our purchase of the company, even though the previous owner had already spent those preorder funds. Most of you know about the lawsuit against the company and us personally that followed the purchase. The suit effectively halted publication for a number of years, saw the withdrawal of our planned operating capital and cost us almost $70,000.
Part of our new financing for Total War came from individuals who loaned the company money secured by interests in the game. These folks contractually have a say in what we do with the finished game. They naturally will not approve shipping of any games until we can show that they will be repaid. The business plan is to repay them with the sales to stores after the preorders were sent. That is still the plan and we will use the fire sale to raise the cash to complete the printing of the game and begin shipping of the game.
Photo 1 of the aftermath – boxes everywhere!
Photo 2 – another area, with more boxes.
We have been working for the last week to pick up and store our cleaned inventory. With only a couple of days notice, the remediation company began to recover our material after the Colorado Department of Health approved their recovery plan and process. We had given them the priority for recovery, detailed maps and photos. While we have a way to go, it appears that most of the Total War material will be recovered.
There will be some material that could not be recovered, principally: 1) about 1300 printed box tops and bottoms that were already assembled as shown in our photos earlier this year, 2) a few hundred collated counter sheet sets that had not been moved into sealed boxes before the fire, and 3) most of our shipping supplies (unassembled boxes, mailers, bubble wrap, packing peanuts, shipping tape, shrink wrap, etc.).
The logistics involved one truck counter and two (tired) loaders and drivers. The recovered material appears to be in good shape and the remediation folks have been very helpful. Once all material available for recovery has been picked up and stored (fireproof storage), we will do a detailed inventory. Part of this inventory will let us know how many Total War and older games will be available for sale. This will determine how many copies of the Total War rules, OBs and charts we will order from the local printers to complete the games. There should be no delays in the printing since we now have three printers on tap.
The recovery has been very expensive (over $13,000). We apologize to our customers for not returning all calls and e-mails immediately while we were recovering the material but we were putting in twelve hour days picking up (and putting down) tons of boxes. Arthur and I are getting a little old for this and probably wouldn’t have been in the best shape to talk or type at the end of the day. We want to thank the volunteers who offered to help with the move. We would certainly have accepted your offers if we were more certain of the timing, size and complexity of the move.
We will have more information shortly. The sample for this update is the Hungarian and Romanian conditional reinforcements for Total War.
We met with the remediation company staff at the end of this week. We received the cost bid and it contains both good and bad news. The bad news is that recovery of all our material is possible but will be very expensive. It will mean that we will have have to leave some of the less valuable games and parts. The good news is that all of the recoverable Total War components will in the contract we sign with the company. In addition, we were able to reduce the cost somewhat by identifying a duplication in clean-up on the Total War material.
The cleanup plan is still on track to go to the Dept. of Health on October 18th. Work on preparing the building for recovery will start shortly after approval. This will include sealing the building openings, providing electricity and water (for showers for the workers) installing negative air pressure equipment and setting up a series of clean work areas. We were learned that this part of the recovery process will take approximately three weeks. Our inventory will be the first material to be recovered.
The Total War sample included this week is the historic Finnish OB demobilization and reorganization plan put into effect in late 1941.
This last week has had some very positive news. I met with the owner of the building early in the week. He had just hired a firm to remove the asbestos. In Colorado, the owner of a building with asbestos must usually contract with at least three different firms. One company does only the testing and safety procedures. A second removes the asbestos under the direction of the Department of Health. The third company restores the building for habitation.
Part of the owner’s delay had to do with the multiple firms and an even larger number of regulatory agencies. The owner expects the apartment building to be reopened for occupancy in mid-July of 2013.
I was assured that the new firm would work with us to recover most of our inventory and that we would have the priority for their help. We then met with the removal company staff and received more good news. They have been through our areas and confirmed that most of our material can be recovered. This now includes most of our research material and notes. No price as yet.
The remediation project leader will meet with us at the end of this next week and they intend to submit a cleanup plan to the Dept. of Health on October 18th. We should be able to start the recovery shortly after DOH approval is given. We will give you updates as we get information.
The Total War sample included with this update is the Axis Initial Setup and OB for June II 41.
