Paladin Shaving

Obviously people are getting these into Canada, I was asked and told they can`t be shipped here.

Maybe someone can help.

I don`t get it as I have the original first chief sent to me by Ken.

So It could be sent to me then but not now.

Anyone who can shed light into the situation let me know, please.

I was just about to post a comment that us poor Canadians will never get to know the joy of a Paladin since they won't ship them up north.

Oh well.

People can, I suppose, purchase from the second hand market.

Or, if you know someone in the forums, you can ask for their help. I, for example, won't mind if someone who I have interacted in this forum, ships a Paladin to my address, and I have to ship it to Canada/UK, of course w/o any charge.

A very generous offer Sourav!

Another sad sign of deteriorating relations predicted by that great American patriot John Candy and unfortunate spy coin incident. Word is Ottawa has quietly begun issuing reserve stocks of Ross rifles at key border points. That and our ever changing and frustrating customs laws.

I usually prefer more traditional colors, but this Brush looks outstanding in person. Glad to add a funky color to the mix in such a fun handle design, this brush will definitely brighten my day when I'm trying to wake up in the morning. The knot looks outstanding. I feel spoiled with these 28mm knots, but I have so many soaps it just makes good sense!

This is the famous Murano glass from Italy. Multi colored art glass has been found dating back to the Etruscans. So this is in it's own way traditional and in shaving future traditional. Anyone claiming originality on this one is just showing ignorance of design history along with LMF. I like it.

Obviously people are getting these into Canada, I was asked and told they can`t be shipped here.  

Maybe someone  can help.

I don`t get it as I have the original first chief sent to me by Ken.

So It could be sent to me then but not now.

Anyone who can shed light into the situation let me know, please.

Hi Walter, first apologies for not catching the note you sent to me on the site in November of last year. I just found it while searching for prior correspondence we've had and to see if I had any record of ever shipping a brush directly to you in Canada.

To be honest -- and this isn't to embarrass you or make you feel bad at all -- the second sentence of your post stands as proof of one good reason for us not shipping to customers outside the US even though the risks of getting caught and suffering bad consequences are probably very, very slim. It only takes one person to post in a public forum that we shipped a brush to a customer outside the US once in noncompliance with the law for 1) anyone I've told we wouldn't do it to conclude I'm a liar, and 2) for someone who might have a dark agenda to anonymously send a link to the post to the US F&WS enforcement division.

Is/was the "original chief" you refer to an M&F Group Buy Chief? If so, I didn't ship any of those. Lee made them and shipped all of them from the UK (see https://www.badgerandblade.com/forum/thr...ed.343759/). Lee made the brushes; Lee issued the invoices; Lee accepted the payments; Lee shipped the brushes.

When we started making handles that Lee knotted, he held back and shipped the brushes to buyers outside the US, including those in Canada.

I sent out an update  to our mailing list on November  7, 2015 that you should have received. It included the following explanation of our situation, which hasn't changed, except that Cody now lives in Oregon. That move made the potential solution we'd constructed non-feasible, and I was never satisfied with it anyhow. Again, I'm not trying to flog you with this AT ALL. I just want to give a clear and complete response to your post.

[Excerpt from 11/07/15 email follows]

Sales outside the U.S.

What follows under this heading is mainly addressed to potential customers outside the U.S. It’s painfully long, dry, and doesn’t lead to a very satisfying conclusion. Nevertheless, we greatly appreciate the international wet-shaving community, and the least we can do is be honest and try to explain the challenges we face in connection with exporting Paladin shaving brushes. We’ll do the best we reasonably can to accomplish that for all within the given legal parameters. Any helpful suggestions will be welcomed.

To date about 25% of our sales have been to buyers outside the United States. Lee shipped all of those brushes directly. So far, we have not engaged in commercial export of shaving brushes

U.S. Federal Law provides that any person or entity engaged in either commercial import and/or export of wildlife or a wildlife product (which a shaving brush containing badger hair qualifies as) must 1) have a permit issued by the US Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and 2) comply with all applicable inspection, reporting, and record-keeping laws and regulations.

I strongly suspect the law in this area is most often observed in the breach (which places those who choose to abide by it at a competitive disadvantage); nevertheless, we intend to maintain ourselves in scrupulous compliance for several reasons.

First, I have a keen sensitivity to the ethics I model, especially given my son's involvement in this venture.

Second, as a recovering lawyer, I wouldn't expect to catch any breaks based on claimed ignorance of the law (although I can honestly say I find this particular law to be incomprehensible from a policy perspective).

Third, I've been given to understand by a law enforcement officer of the FWS that individuals who fail to declare commercial import or export of wildlife products may be subject to penalties of up to $60,000 per violation. I care too much about what we’re trying to do to run that risk, however absurd it might be.

The most salient problem here isn't declaration (of an import or export) per se; it's that declaration triggers inspection, which carries a fee of $93 (or thereabouts) per shipped container. That’s not such a big deal when the $93 is being spread across 100 or 200 brushes. But it's a likely deal killer if applied to a single brush.

Apparently someone with a business interest and effective connections managed to bring this situation to the attention of the FWS.  On October 26, 2012, it published an interim rule providing an exemption from the inspection fee for businesses meeting certain criteria. FWS said the rulemaking was based on a recognition that its regular inspection fee schedule (adopted in 2009) may have placed an undue economic burden on businesses that exclusively trade in small volumes of low-value, non-Federally protected wildlife parts and products.

Since publication of the interim rule, businesses have been able to request participation in the low-risk user-fee exemption program. To qualify for the program, a business and all of its wildlife import and export shipments must meet the following criteria:

The wildlife does not require a permit or certificate under 50 CFR Parts 15, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22, or 23 or is listed as injurious under 50 CFR Part 16;

The wildlife is not live;

Each shipment contains 25 or fewer wildlife parts or products;

Each shipment contains wildlife parts or products valued at $5,000 or less;

The business has not been assessed a civil penalty, issued a notice of violation, or convicted of any misdemeanor or felony violation for any wildlife import/export violation; and

The business has had no more than 2 shipments that were refused clearance in the 5 years prior to the submission of the request to participate.

The Low Risk Fee Exemption Program was actually a grope in the right direction. However, it doesn't reflect a studied understanding of how regulations that over-reach legitimate policy objectives can adversely affect entrepreneurial efforts to compete on the international stage, which is brutal enough without being caught in the cross-hairs of friendly fire.

Dark Holler Design Works, LLC, (DHDW) which I solely own, holds the required FWS import/export permit. It does not, however, qualify for the low-risk fee exemption program by reason of the fact it has imported (from Lee) a shipment containing more than 25 badger-hair shaving brushes, and in the future it can be expected to continue receiving shipments that contain more than 25 wildlife products. (Presumably, if we simply imported a kilo of badger hair in bulk, that would be a single product. Make sense of that.)

So what we’ve done, per open disclosure and discussion with a senior representative of the FWS, is to establish an entity (Dark Holler Exports LLC), which is solely owned by my son Cody. DHDW turns handles and is responsible for badger-hair containing imports. Dark Holler Exports LLC (DHE), which also holds a FWS import/export permit and does qualify for the low risk fee exemption program, performs  design/drawing, finishing, engraving, web design/maintenance, and photography services to DHDW. In addition, it’s in a position to assume ownership and responsibility for brushes sold and designated for shipment to buyers outside the U.S.

That might sound like a great (if arguably sketchy) solution; however, it still leaves some kinks. One is that we’re not sure how to handle transactions on the website that would involve export. We were completely transparent with the FWS in working out our arrangement, but it requires maintaining arms-length dealing, as well as a separation of legal interests, between the two companies. Where that line might ultimately be deemed to fall isn’t entirely clear to me. I don’t think it’s clear to anyone at FWS either. Moreover, DHE would still have to fulfil the reporting requirements, and that’s a time-consuming task for the sake a single brush sale. For example, to complete the report form the exporter needs to identify in advance the US port through which the shipment will be processed by US Customs. There may be a simple way to obtain that information in the case of a shipment to be handled by the USPS, but I haven’t found it yet. FedEx and USP would be much easier to use in that regard, but the expense of shipping a brush from the U.S. using either of those carriers can be ridiculous.

The bottom line for now is that we don’t have this sorted yet. Best by far in any case, I imagine, would be for a prospective international buyer to make arrangements with a friend or family member in the U.S. who could purchase a brush on their behalf and accept delivery for forwarding.

https://www.paladinshaving.com/blogs/bro...ch-changes

I should have added that it completely sucks for us not to be able to ship brushes to customers outside the US. It's a painful disadvantage.