Ever since the KMM & Co. studio reopened this spring, we've been closely following CDC guidelines to keep our team, our community, and our customers safe.
Fortunately, our whole team is back in the studio and making totes! Here are some updates on how we're handling the pandemic – and what challenges we're running into right now.
Orders are shipping normally!
The KMM & Co. team is super small, and we're happy to have everyone back in the studio together! We're making and shipping leather tote bags and accessories as we typically do, and our lead times are all back to normal after the shutdown earlier this year.
Shipping times are noted on every product page for easy reference. But as a rule of thumb, totes and clutches can take up to three weeks, while smaller accessories often take one week. (If you have a specific deadline for your order, just let us know! We're always available at hello@kmmco.com.)
All of our totes and accessories are handmade and made to order in our Atlanta studio. When you place an order, your order goes into our production queue. Totes get made and shipped in the order that they were purchased. And if you placed multiple orders, your small goods are likely to ship before your tote because they're typically faster to produce.
The studio is closed to the public (for now!)
To keep everybody safe and healthy, we've decided to keep the KMM & Co. showroom closed to the public for the time being. We've heard some complaints that go something like this: Other small leather goods companies have reopened their shops, so why hasn't KMM & Co.?
We really miss seeing our customers in person! But we're looking to the CDC and other public health organizations, not other leather goods brands, to decide how to operate during the pandemic. In order to keep our staff safe and to keep our studio as sanitary as possible, we aren't accepting visitors or taking appointments right now.
Fortunately, our website is open 24/7, and you can always reach our customer service team at hello@kmmco.com! We hope to reopen the studio for appointments later this year, or when it's safe for our team and our community to do so. When the showroom does reopen to the public, it will be open by appointment only, as usual.
Some leathers are in short supply
You may have noticed that more of our leather tote bags have been going in and out of stock lately. The pandemic has affected almost every part of our supply chain, and that includes the tanneries that produce our leather. Some of our signature leathers, including a few favorites in our permanent collection, have been in short supply.
Here's the deal: We don't want our favorite leathers to be out of stock, either! But sometimes, our inventory levels are not within our control. We're doing everything we can to work with the tanneries and keep stock levels consistent. But our quality standards for every leather are high, and sometimes, things just have to be out of stock for a little while.
If a tote bag (or another item!) you want is out of stock, the best thing to do is to sign up for the waitlist on the product page. That way, you'll receive a message as soon as it's available to purchase again.
The USPS is running into delays
Like most other small businesses in the United States, KMM & Co. relies on the U.S. Postal Service to deliver our leather totes and accessories to our customers. We love working with the USPS! Our friendly mail carrier comes directly to our studio to pick up our shipments, and Priority Mail is affordable enough for us to offer free shipping on all orders over $50.
However, in recent months, we've definitely observed USPS delays. While Priority Mail shipments should take 2 to 3 business days to get from Atlanta to most other places in the country, some packages are taking longer than that. They seem to be sitting at USPS facilities longer, or sometimes remaining "in transit" between facilities for a longer period of time than usual.
Not every package gets delayed. But you can always check the progress of your shipment via the tracking number in your shipping confirmation email. And rest assured that even with the current delays, we've seen very, very few packages actually go missing. If you have questions or need help, just reach out!
We have exciting things in the works!
We're so grateful to all of the KMM & Co. customers who have been keeping us busy in these uncertain times! The team has been making leather totes (and leather clutches and accessories) at record speed. And our shipping team is sending hundreds of packages around the country each week.
While supply issues have complicated every part of the process of preparing our fall collection – try sourcing leather, having hardware made, testing new designs, and scheduling socially-distant photo shoots in a pandemic! – we have some exciting new things in the works.
If you want to be the first to find out what's next, follow us on Facebook and Instagram or sign up for our mailing list. We're so excited for the things we hav e in the pipeline and can't wait to share with you!
We've said it before and we'll say it again: It's a huge privilege that we get to produce American-made goods, and that customers like you make it happen. Every person on the KMM & Co. team is grateful for your kindness, your support for small businesses like ours, your patience, and your encouragement. 2020's been a challenge, but it's also shown us what an amazing community we have.
If you have questions or need help with an order, please drop us a line at hello@kmmco.com! Our customer service team would be happy to help, to say hello, or just to have a conversation with you about life in the time of coronavirus.