Impact of COVID-19 on business operations

Post updated on 17 March 2020.

In addition to making people sick, the COVID-19 disease sadly also has an impact on the global economy. Production and logistics world-wide have been impacted, albeit to varying degrees.

If you plan on ordering, have ordered or pre-orderd an item form us, then please keep an eye on our news section and Twitter feed for updates on possible manufacturing/shipping delays.

Current status (UPDATED 17 March 2020):

• Day-to-day dispatching/shipping of in-stock goods from Germany and the US: NO IMPACT.
• "Made-in-Japan" inflatable pillow production scheduled for March/April 2020: NO IMPACT.
• Standard inflatable body pillows and dakimakura ordered from late Jan 2020 onwards: ca. 4-6 weeks delay; scheduled production for February/March has been moved to March/April 2020.
• Dirty Bird Orca/Classic Blue Whale pre-orders (delivery planned for June/July 2020): impact unknown/possibly minor delay of less than 4 weeks.
• T-shirts: NO IMPACT.

Some delays in deliveries may be experienced in most receiving countries although goods movements are generally not covered by travel bans or restrictions throught the US, EU and other regions.

Can the virus be transmitted by goods? The current state of knowledge is that it is highly unlikely (see general descriptions here and here). Some empirical tests suggest the virus can survive between 4 hours (on stainless steel) and 16 hours (on plastics). Given current mail run times the shipment contents should be "safe". If you're concerned about a potential for virus contamination of the shipping carton through the delivery handling, then the shipment should be left untouched for 24 hours.