This is the second part of my bogu review for E-Kendo! After around a month and a half of waiting, I finally received my huge package in the mail. To remind you, I ordered the 4mm/2mm custom bogu set with a blue do (D06) and red mune embroidery (M25) both of which came free. It did take a little while for them to order in and alter the parts to fit the measurements I provided, but once it left the Korean warehouse it reached Canada within 4-5 days.

I finally brought it to class to try it out and was very pleased! Everything seemed to fit quite well – it’s all still a little stiff but just needs to be broken into. The men is awesome – the 2mm stitching protected my head quite well. I could feel hits but they weren’t painful for the most part – there were a couple of times I would flinch and duck my head, consequently receiving a blow to the back, but that was my fault .

I cannot believe how soft the kote palms are! E-Kendo doesn’t state whether the palms are made of synthetic material or leather, but it’s very, very comfortable.

The do was gorgeous, I was worried that the blue would be too bright (and it is in my dojo, everyone has much darker/subtle dos) but I love it. If I were to order again I would probably pay the $10 to upgrade to the fake plastic bamboo on the inside. I think that would make it a little more sturdy and make it look nicer.

I believe the tare they sent was meant for a junior (I’m small and they sent me a L tare, so I can only assume!). It’s a tiny bit big on me but does what it’s supposed to. Now all I need is a zekken!

The provided tenugui is BIG (compared to my other tenugui at least!) and the fabric feels a little thicker. It has kanji printed on it that I believe says ‘Shadow Sword’. It looks quite classy.

The free bogu bag is very helpful as well, there’s lots of room inside and it easily fits a hakama/gi along with the bogu. It comes with a strap, so you can sling it on your shoulder or carry it on your side. However after lugging it around not even a block I’m already wishing it had wheels!

The total cost for everything, including conversion rates from Korean to Canadian, shipping, the price of an extra tenugui/do buttons/kote and men protector and customs came to just under $500CAN.

Pictures speak larger than words, so below is a gallery containing a bunch of photos taken of a bunch of different angles. Have fun perusing!

Bogu Photo Gallery

Alright, let’s rip this parcel open, and expose it’s glossy innards for all to see.

I was curious to see approx. how much ScreenScape has spent to mail and create the supplies. Remember that ScreenScape is $9.54 in the hole so far, that’s the cost of shipping the package.

First up is free plastering supplies. Two black sharpie markers for marking the posters, a package of one hundred brass thumbtacks, a roll of double-sided mounting tape, and two blocks of sticky tack. A pack of 12 black sharpie markers comes to $9.99 on the Staples website. 2 markers would therefore cost about $1.67. A package of 100 brass thumbtacks is $1.96. The double-sided mounting tape is $3.56 a roll, and the two blocks of sticky tack (‘adhesive putty’) is $2.36. The total cost of poster-sticking supplies comes to $9.55. So that’s nearly $10.00 of free useful stuff even if you don’t do any work. Schweet.

Next is a package of wrapped stickers. There are about 50 in a pack, and just look like smaller versions of the ScreenScape posters. They have perforated peel-off backs, which will thankfully spare my nails. I was expecting the stickers to be smaller and thus easier to plaster around, but these are pretty large (4″x6″). I’m not really sure where I should stick these – they’d damage walls and cover too much of other people’s flyers. I guess that’s a big deal if I’m supposed to be, you know, courteous. The printed supplies are a little harder to price, since I’m not sure which company ScreenScape used. I did a search on printing services in PEI and came up with ‘Plus Printing’. It looks like this company does handle stickers so I’ll base my guess-prices off of there. Each sticker would run around 40 cents to print. For 50 stickers, that’s another $20.00 cost for ScreenScape.

You’re also given 10 fancy-smanzhy double-sided tri-fold brochures on THICK paper. These were also a little hard to price – it looks like with a double-sided print on the thick glossy card-stock, coupled with the cost for folding, each brochure should cost around $1.50. Thus the total cost for printing the brochures is $15.00.

And finally, the meat of the package – the posters themselves. I’m supposed to have received 50 in my starter pack (you can ask for more if you use them all up). They’re printed one-sided on thinner, glossy paper, and measures 11″x17″. You can see a comparison with a regular sheet of paper here, it’s quite a bit larger. The space on the bottom is where you’re supposed to write the venue name with the provided sharpies. You can see a much larger version of the ScreenScape Poster here. Full colour 11″x17″ posters on glossy paper is $1.00 each. If we assume there are 50 in the starter pack, it cost ScreenScape $50.00 to print the posters. Ouch.

So in total, the ScreenScape package contained: two sharpies, double-sided mounting tape, thumbtacks, stock tack, stickers, brochures, posters, and some photocopied-sheets explaining venue-plastering procedures and a grid to keep track of your posters. In total, the cost of purchasing, printing, and mailing these supplies comes to ~$104.09. Keep in mind they probably would get some sort of discount since they’re bulk-ordering this stuff, but that’s still close to $100 out of ScreenScape’s pocket for each person they hire, and that’s BEFORE they pay the $2.00 – $3.00/poster salary. And even though they mail you all this extra stuff, you are only paid for the POSTERS that you put up – not for the brochures you leave lying around or the stickers you slap everywhere. ScreenScape does mention that there are bonuses involved for going the extra mile and using the brochures/stickers, but this incentive isn’t fully explained. Also you don’t need to submit any proof of sticker or brochure-ing. Presumably the ‘secret ScreenScape members’ who check your work will also alert HQ if they see you’re doing extra work, but it seems like a lot of work and good luck for the possibility of an unknown bonus.

But we’ll see. I have some time this weekend to trek downtown and put these posters up. Stay tuned, and I’ll let you know just how long you can expect the job to be.

Holy smokes that was fast! After applying and being accepted as a ScreenScape Street Team member earlier this week, I’ve already received the package of supplies in the mail (took a total of 4 days – one of those being a holiday). Being a Canuck and an avid eBay shopper, I’m used to waiting 3-4 weeks for parcels to arrive. However it looks like these ScreenScape parcels are being mailed from Charlottetown, PEI, which is just a couple of provinces away. Canadians signing up for this program can therefore expect their parcel to arrive pretty quickly.

The package was gigantic, and pretty heavy.

I think it’ll be a neat idea to see just how much ScreenScape is spending out-of-pocket to hire ME, and from that try to guesstimate how much of their product they need to sell to at least break even.

A quick check with Canadian Post shows that a package 18x12x1.5″ at 1.9kg cost them $9.54 to mail from Charlottetown to Halifax in three business days.

Check back soon to see the contents of the package – I’ll also try to put a price on all this stuff.