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The Spoon

Daily news and analysis about the food tech revolution

ChopBox

After Crowdfunding $2.2M and a Year Delay, Chopbox Asks for More Money

Sometimes, the hardest advice to take is your own. Every time I write about a crowdfunded hardware campaign on Kickstarter or Indiegogo I include a “buyer beware” disclaimer. These types of projects have a tendency to run into production issues that either severely delay their fulfillment (see: Spinn coffee maker) or result in the product not being fulfilled at all (see: Rite Press).

Despite knowing all that, last September I plunked down $99 (plus $20 for shipping) for the Chopbox, which promised to be a cutting board + timer + sanitizer + scale + knife sharpener all in one. Sure it was a bit gimmicky, but my cutting boards were getting long in the tooth so I figured why not.

I wasn’t the only one who thought the Chopbox was a good idea. The crowdfunding campaign raised more than $2.2 million from nearly 16,000 backers across Kickstarter and Indiegogo.

The original ship date promised by the Yes Company (creators of the Chopbox) was December 2019. Given that I backed it in September of 2019, the three-month turnaround seemed too good to be true. And yet, I proceeded, though knowing in the back of my mind that it would most likely be delayed.

And delayed it was.

In February of 2020, the Yes Company said it had experienced delays in China because of the then-emerging COVID-19 pandemic. But in the subsequent months there have been more production delays. Long story short, almost a year after the initial ship date promise, I have yet to receive my Chopbox, and, it looks like neither have most other people.

According to a company update on Kickstarter this week, the Yes Company said it shipped “two batches” (whatever that means) to the U.S. and Europe. In the same breath however, the company said that shipping has gotten more expensive over this past year and it asked backers to cough up more money. In my case, I think they are asking for an extra $30, but it’s hard to tell based on the information they provided.

If that wasn’t bad enough, the Yes Company has sold or is selling Chopboxes on the general market at Touch of Modern and on the Yes Company website (though when you try to actually buy it on the Yes website, it returns a message saying “We are not able to accept online payments,” which is… weird for an online transaction). It’s unclear whether these transactions are being fulfilled before crowdfunders get theirs. We reached out to the Yes Company to find out more information.

The comments section of the Chopbox Kickstarter campaign has understandably lit up with disgruntled backers demanding refunds and cries of “scam.”

I can’t go that far, but I’m definitely not giving the Yes Company any more money or back anything they do again. I should have heeded my own advice. Hopefully I won’t get similarly burned by the Bru tea maker I also backed last year and have yet to receive.

A Tale of Two Kickstarter Campaigns I Backed (One is Delayed)

If you are my wife or my parents, please don’t read this, there are Christmas gift spoilers ahead. Everyone else — I didn’t get you anything so please continue!

Call it hubris, but after writing about various Kickstarter campaigns that never made it to market, I thought I had a certain Spidey-sense when it comes to crowdfunding hardware. That I knew how to spot a winner and avoid a dud.

But then I backed the ChopBox, a multi-function cutting board that featured a built-in scale and timer and knife sanitizer all in one. It cost $100, but our cutting boards are getting raggedy and this one looked so cool, and how hard could it be to build a cutting board?

Evidently, harder than the Yes Company, the company behind the campaign, thought. Though the campaign zoomed past it’s $10,000 goal and went on to raise nearly $1.8 million dollars, evidently that wasn’t enough to keep the original shipping date of December 2019 on track. In an update sent on October 8, The Yes Company wrote:

We are on schedule this month to have our first production run of 50 units to test around October 20th. After that trial production run, around October 26-30th, we will start with a larger production run of 2000 units to start shipping out.

We plan to start shipping out Kickstarter orders between November 15-20th. Amount are 50000 units maximum before December we can produce.

Then on Oct. 19, the company sent out:

We expect all rewards to ship in the month of December 2019 (the “Super Fast” pledge will ship out in November).

They also promised that the shipping survey would be sent out “in a few weeks.”

Then on Nov. 21, the Yes Company sent out another update saying:

The time frame has delayed slightly, as during the one-time trial test, we found that there are 2 things that could potentially slow down the process and make the Chopbox in a mess.

They also wrote:

You’ll receive an email from us with a special link to your BackerKit survey soon.

Then today, another campaign update was sent out saying:

The first batch is for the backers who selected super fast shipping, which will ship by the end of the month and come to you in January.

The second batch will be sent out around the middle of January

They also said that the survey was sent out. But I never received one and a quick look at the comment section of the Kickstarter page shows that neither did a lot of other backers.

This delay is obviously a bummer for anyone ordering this as a Christmas gift (I did not), but honestly, a month delay for a Kickstarter project is not that bad. Plus, the company offered to send a card that you could presumably hand to someone during the holidays as a placeholder. Think of that what you will.

I’m not super worried about my ChopBox purchase (yet). The company is at least posting updates and photos of the product in progress that I’ll assume are legit. But it serves as another reminder that the first rule of Kickstarter is caveat emptor. Buyer beware.

Contrast this with my other recent Kickstarter purchase, a set of GIR silicone straws. They’re meant to be a li’l stocking stuffer for my wife, who travels a lot, so she doesn’t have to use plastic straws at airports and such.

I got the notification this week that my straws have been shipped, and not only that, they are coming out ahead of schedule. I recognize that mass producing a silicone straw is not the same thing as manufacturing an electronics-packed cutting board, but still, it fills my heart with holiday cheer.

Hopefully that cheer and crowdfunding karma will continue with the BRÜ tea maker that I backed…

ChopBox’s Cutting Board + Timer + Sanitizer + Scale + Knife Sharpener Obliterates KickStarter Goal in One Day

Writing about the ChopBox instantly makes me feel like I’m writing one of those old TV informercials, so bear with me. Launched on KickStarter yesterday, the ChopBox is cutting board that also is a scale, a kitchen timer, a knife sharpener, a sanitizer, and oh-by-the-way, it’s also waterproof and made from organic bamboo.

But wait! There’s more! There’s actually a second cutting board that slides out for an additional cutting surface.

The ChopBox campaign is only on its second day but has already raised nearly $300,000, blowing past (which almost feels like too tame a description here) its initial goal of $10,000.

Full disclosure: I backed it. And while yes, I’m a sucker for cool food tech equipment, this cutting board actually looks like it could be extremely useful.

In addition to the ChopBox being a shiny new cutting surface, its most handy feature to me is the built-in scale. Being able to chop and then measure out precise amounts of ingredients on the same surface is smart and a time saver. And since I’m a germaphobe and paranoid about making people sick from cooking, I’m also intrigued by the sanitizer because it uses a built-in ultra-violet light to disinfect the knife and boards. From the ChopBox campaign page:

Now you can place your knife in between the two cutting surfaces and activate the small but powerful 254nm UVC light to sanitize up to 3 knives at once AND both cutting surfaces at the same time! Just one minute of UVC light exposure is guaranteed to kill 99.99% of germs and bacteria.

I’m less enthused by the built-in timer as my house is lousy with Alexas that are far more convenient for that sort of thing. And I guess the knife sharpener might come in handy in a pinch, but I know that it’s best to get knives professionally sharpened.

The ChopBox uses USB-C to charge, which is supposed to last for thirty days.

The ChopBox is faring far better than the NutriScale, which we wrote about a couple years back. That cutting board + food scale combo never met its campaign goal. Of course, it also didn’t blast your knives with UV rays.

The ChopBox cost me $99 plus $20 for shipping, but that was the super-early-bird pricing. The “early-bird” next tier is $119 plus $20 for shipping. The campaign page says the retail price will be $199. FWIW, you can pick up a bamboo cutting board and scale on Amazon for $30. But again, no UV rays.

Even though I backed this project, I’ve written about enough crowdfunded hardware projects to know that things can easily go south for the fully funded ChopBox and that my high-tech cutting board may never actually make it to market (just ask the folks who backed Rite-Press). The ChopBox is made by the Yes Company which is “a remote team with designers, production, and engineers all over the world, including the US and Shenzhen.” Not exactly a household name, and they have a rather aggressive December 2019 ship time.

Hopefully I’ll have my ChopBox in time for the holidays, where I’ll be able to use it to slice, dice and even make julienne fries.