We would like to give you an update on our situation here at GHQ. About 10 days ago we sent on an e-mail letting you know that operations at our factory in Uptown Minneapolis would be interrupted, and irregular for an unknown amount of time. That day we boarded up the building and spent the day pulling much of our vital intellectual property out to a location far away from the chaos that was going on in our area. At that point all that we could do was hope, and pray, that we would not have the damage that some of our neighbors had suffered. Every night we helplessly watched what was happening on TV, and every morning we came and surveyed our area.
It’s always awful to see that type of destruction happen in any area. It’s very surreal to see it happening on TV, be able to recognize all of the buildings, and know that the rioters could be at your doorstep at any second. Many businesses in our area were hit very hard, and some will likely not be able to recover. Some were burned to the ground. Thankfully we managed to come through relatively unscathed. We have a lot of graffiti, but no structural damage, or burning.
Things have continued to be tense in Minneapolis, and we wanted to proceed cautiously. In the middle of last week we started to bring back our computers, and started to get things operational again. There was supposed to be a large protest in our neighborhood last Friday night, so we pulled our computers and server out again. Fortunately that did not happen in our area, and nothing happened over the weekend. We are back at it again this week, and will continue to get things back to normal, but will remain cautious about the safety of our employees and our 53 years worth of design work, hand castings, hand molds, computer data, etc.
We are fortunate to have a large number of wonderful customers, and we just wanted to keep you in the loop about the status of things at GHQ. We started sending some orders out last week, and will continue to ship more this week. We are continuing to work on our website overhaul, and think that we are very near having online ordering capabilities again.
The last 3 months have presented the largest challenges that we have ever experienced in our 53 years. The coronavirus has disrupted the world, our website issues have caused us to lose an enormous percentage of our income, and the rioting has threatened our very existence. With your help, and understanding, we are hoping that we can move on to another 53 years that will be even better than the first!
We hope that you and your families are safe and doing well!
Thank you for your support,
GHQ
PS Please note that our mailing address is different from where everything is produced at our factory.
GHQ Update
Moderators: dnichols, GHQ, Mk 1
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- Site Admin
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Thanks for letting us know. The level of uncertainty has to be the worst.
Stay safe, protect the IP and let us know when you are ready to go. I have a decent sized GHQ order arriving today or tomorrow. I will find more stuff to call in or order online with you guys again.
Hopefully, we can all pitch in to help with the lost revenue.
Stay safe, protect the IP and let us know when you are ready to go. I have a decent sized GHQ order arriving today or tomorrow. I will find more stuff to call in or order online with you guys again.
Hopefully, we can all pitch in to help with the lost revenue.
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- E5
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Troubles
In the UK we have little idea what is going on in Minneapolis - sorry to hear it affected you so much. I don't order directly from GHQ but I do order regularly from a UK company so I have not noticed any delivery issues. I hope you get back to normal as quick as possible. There is no chance that I will stop buying GHQ models anytime soon so you'll have my custom for the foreseeable future.