Plastic Model Mojo

Shipping Resumes To The U.S.: KITMASX Update

Share episode

Big news for modelers who’ve been waiting on cross-border orders: Kit Mask is shipping to the United States again, and the process is finally simple, transparent, and predictable. We sit down with Kevin to unpack how tariffs forced a pause, why Canada Post’s suggested “solutions” came up short, and how Janelle engineered a multi-service workflow that calculates duties at checkout so there are no surprise bills after delivery.

We walk through the hard lessons of cross-border ecommerce: why unclear rules make risk management nearly impossible, how horror stories from carriers shaped the plan, and what it takes to test, refine, and relaunch without leaving customers guessing. Kevin shares early results from the reboot—clean deliveries, happy customers, and order volume ramping back to where it left off. We also talk openly about capacity, production catch-up, and the real people behind the scenes who keep a small brand moving.

Looking ahead, we’re gearing up for HeritageCon with full stock and on-the-ground support at the booth, plus a spotlight on One-Man Army products. As the exclusive Canadian dealer for new One-Man Army releases, Kit Mask will bring sought-after detail sets and precision tools directly to local builders. To celebrate the shipping comeback and ease the tariff sting, we’re rolling out a December-long sale with a clear promise: no panic, no rush, just fair prices and time to choose. Use the code MOJO30 for 30% off throughout December and get your bench ready for a strong finish to the year.

If you care about reliable shipping, transparent costs, and quality masking solutions that make paint work clean and fast, this conversation is for you.

Subscribe, share with a modeling friend, and leave a review to help more builders discover the show—and the savings.


KITMASX  - Use Discount Code MOJO30 for 30% off your order through the month of December

Give us your Feedback!
Rate the Show!

Support the Show!
Patreon
Buy Me a Beer
Paypal

Bump Riffs Graciously Provided by Ed Baroth
Ad Reads Generously Provided by Bob "The Voice of Bob" Bair

Mike and Kentucky Dave thank each and everyone of you for participating on this journey with us.

Mike:

Dave, one thing we've learned in doing this for so many years is how to pivot. Yep. We had scheduled to talk about uh some information that folks had sent us about their local clubs, and we still intend to do that, but it's not gonna happen until December now because our good friends and sponsors at Kit Mask have got some news to tell us, and we thought we'd rather have Kevin on. And it's good news. To tell us all about. That is good news. Kevin, how are you doing?

Kevin (KITMASX):

I am doing excellent. How are you guys doing?

Mike:

Man, we're fantastic with this. This news is gonna help some people out, I think.

Kevin (KITMASX):

That's right. There's a lot more happy people than there were a month ago.

Mike:

Oh, that's that's very good. Well, let's quit being so vague about it. Won't you uh start off by telling us the big change?

Kevin (KITMASX):

Well, since the tariffs went into effect, we had to pause shipping because we had really no way to work around it. It was almost impossible. Canada Post really didn't help us out. They sort of got everybody to use a third-party app, which is super expensive, not helpful, and and just terrible. That's three good reasons to not do it that way.

Kentucky Dave:

Wait a minute, you're telling me that the super efficient Canada Post wasn't on top of something 110%.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Canada Post is not on top of anything, they have lost so much money, it's ridiculous.

Kentucky Dave:

Mike and I have many Canadian friends, and not a single one says anything nice about Canada Post.

Kevin (KITMASX):

No, I just I don't know how a company can be run the way they're run and just get anything done.

Kentucky Dave:

Well, I'm glad you solved the problem.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, Janelle spent so much time looking into different shipping options. We tried some different apps, we tried different services, nothing worked, but we finally found a it's not really a workaround, it's just we have to use a couple different services to get stuff down across the border.

Kentucky Dave:

Great.

Kevin (KITMASX):

So a lot of the problem we had a lot of people, not a lot of people, I shouldn't say that. We had a couple people complain about us not giving others the option to send the stuff to Canada. We had a couple people that were concerned that it was a political statement that we weren't shipping to the US, which was absolutely not the case. Yeah, it was just it was just hard to get everything lined up because nobody, I don't think anybody still really knows what the actual guidelines are.

Kentucky Dave:

I can absolutely tell you that is correct. That this whole stuff has been done on the fly and with very little advanced planning, and therefore nobody knows what for 100% sure what the rules are.

Kevin (KITMASX):

No, and as a business, you can't operate that way.

Kentucky Dave:

Exactly. That's the big problem.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, and and we heard horror stories. We went to UPS to try to do some stuff, and they were telling us the similar issues that some of their customers were having, and it was just like we have we we can't do that.

Kentucky Dave:

Well, if you know what the rules are in advance and have enough notice, and the rules are gonna be set, any business can work the problem and figure out what the new process is.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Absolutely.

Kentucky Dave:

When it all just drops on you and it creates this kind of hiccup, and thank God you've got Janelle who's willing to put in the time and make the effort to try and figure out the answer to the problem.

Kevin (KITMASX):

She did a lot of work. There wasn't a day that went by where she wasn't looking for some kind of solution, fielding questions from from people, assuring them that you know, we're not trying to make a statement. We we want to do business with everybody, we don't care about politics, we just care about other modelers, and we want to be able to supply them with what they want.

Kentucky Dave:

You all supply a really good product and you want to sell it to anybody, no matter what location they're in.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Oh, yeah. I don't I don't care what anybody's politics are. That's their business, that's none of my business.

Kentucky Dave:

Well, I am so glad that you all have figured out a solution. And so when exactly is the date where you're gonna be shipping to the US?

Kevin (KITMASX):

We started about a week ago, maybe a week and a half ago. Yeah, so I'm I'm not sure when this episode drops, but I would say by the time this episode drops, we'll have been shipping for about a couple weeks.

Kentucky Dave:

Okay, well, that's great news.

Kevin (KITMASX):

So far, no no issues so far. Everybody's got what they paid for, and and we haven't had any surprises on our end.

Kentucky Dave:

Great, that's all good news because whenever you're doing something new like this, you're always worried that there's gonna be some something that that comes up on the back end that you didn't know about, the customer didn't know about, and the last thing you want to do is leave them a bad taste.

Kevin (KITMASX):

We can't handle any surprises, and we certainly don't want anybody that comes to our store to have any kind of surprise on the back end as well. I mean, sure, it's not cool if you guys have to pay an extra fee.

Mike:

That's not well, and if you do have to pay something, it's better to know ahead of time and get that over with up front. So yeah.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Mike:

Well, uh, along those lines, what does that mean? How is is you ordering from your website as you would normal and it just all works itself out?

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yep, just plug in your cart information and whatever whatever, and it does the duties and figures it all out automatically, and then you just pay it. And we haven't had any reports of anybody having to pay extra yet, so good. That's good. As soon as we got that sort of hopefully dialed in.

Mike:

We're glad to hear it because it just seems like when we got this sponsorship thing off the ground that the rug got pulled out from under us with this. And yeah, uh, you know, we've talked amongst ourselves, you Janelle and I and Dave about what's going on, how to handle it. We didn't know for the longest time, so we just kind of we're just gonna have to wait and see what happened to see if you guys are gonna be able to resume shipment back to the United States at some point. We we we hoped you would and knew you probably would at some point. We just was it gonna be four weeks or four years, right? We yeah, we just didn't know. So glad this is have produced a solution here for you. And and I'm sure the American customers of yours are are glad to be able to get your stuff again because it sure is good stuff.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, judging by the response we've had in the last couple weeks, I think everybody's happy. We're we're almost right back where we left off.

Kentucky Dave:

That's fantastic.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, and yeah.

Mike:

If you have capacity, hopefully you'll you'll exceed that soon.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah. Yeah.

Mike:

I know you can get busy.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, we're it's I did get I did have a chance to get caught up on on some stuff. Um Janelle didn't. I mean, all that just put her way further behind.

Kentucky Dave:

We know who we know who's actually the the brains behind the outfit. We're not we're not under any illusion. It's certainly not me. Kevin, can you answer the important question for Mike and I?

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yes.

Kentucky Dave:

Are you gonna be at HeritageCon this year?

Kevin (KITMASX):

Oh, I am so looking forward to that.

Kentucky Dave:

Oh, that's fantastic. That is fantastic news. That is great.

Kevin (KITMASX):

I have been cutting sets. We're gonna be completely stocked when we go up there.

Kentucky Dave:

Great.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Um, we're gonna have everything we have we're gonna bring with us. We might even have to ship it out there before we before we fly. It might be too much stuff to take on the plane. Sure.

Kentucky Dave:

And then well, and can you know Canada Post will get it there right on time and no problem? Of course.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Of course, yeah. Yeah. We're also gonna be bringing all our one-man army products with us as well.

Kentucky Dave:

So that's fantastic. I love their stuff.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Hey, that stuff is absolutely amazing. I you hear about it, you see it, but once you actually have it in your hand and and check out the detail, it's it's mind-boggling. Yep, it really is.

Mike:

Yeah, that's some news too. Now, for for Canada, you guys are the the go-to for that, right?

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yes, we are the exclusive dealer for one-man army products in Canada. So when he gets new releases, we are the only ones that will have them available in our Shopify store. That's great. Yeah, there might be some other stock in other stores, but like I said, they won't be able to get the new products.

Mike:

All right, HeritageCon, shipping to the US again. It's all sounding good, Kevin.

Kevin (KITMASX):

We're we're excited. We're we're trying to expand. It's coming slowly, but we're we're working on it.

Kentucky Dave:

Well, that's fantastic. I'm I'm happy to hear this news from you, and I'm even happier to know that you and more importantly, Janelle is gonna be at HeritageCon.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yes, yes, we're definitely gonna be there this year. We're gonna have a a friend that's been helping us out too, Martin Chartran. And uh he's gonna be man of the tables with us this year, so that's that's gonna be a lot nicer for people if they have questions or or need help with something.

Mike:

Unless you catch a breather every now and then.

Kentucky Dave:

Yeah, exactly.

Kevin (KITMASX):

I'm hoping I don't have enough time to catch a breather, but I would wouldn't mind getting to walk around and looking at all the uh all the builds.

Mike:

In celebration of this announcement with the return of shipment to the United States, I think you and Janelle had a surprise for listeners, maybe.

Kevin (KITMASX):

We do. We we have a sale going on all month through December for everybody, just in time for Christmas. Yeah, we didn't want to do the typical Black Friday thing because everybody sort of scrambles to do stuff. So we decided let's do a sale all month of December. People can take their time, they don't have to panic about I'm gonna miss the sale or not. And so we're doing that all month of December. And for the listeners, your guys' listeners, when you hear about this, use the code mojo30 and you'll get a 30% discount off of your order. And oh wow, we're doing that to try to offset the amount of tariffs you guys have to pay.

Kentucky Dave:

Well, that is fantastic. That's a that's a good discount.

Kevin (KITMASX):

We don't want you guys to suffer and not be able to get our products, so that's what we're doing for plastic model mojo listeners.

Kentucky Dave:

Well, thank you very much.

Mike:

How long will the discount code be active?

Kevin (KITMASX):

I'll all through December.

Mike:

Oh, okay. Well, we appreciate that.

Kentucky Dave:

Yeah. Oh, speaking of which, go on the dojo and post that on the dojo as well so that people can start taking taking advantage of that right away.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, you guys need a break. Everybody needs a break with all the pricing around here.

Mike:

Amen.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah.

Mike:

Well, Kevin, we're again glad, glad you could get that worked out and sure looking forward to your product being available again. And Dave and I at Plastic Model Mojo, sure appreciate the support you and Janelle have given us. And our listeners will appreciate this discount code. And we look forward to watching your business grow, and we'll talk to you again real soon.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Yeah, it'll be a pleasure to talk to you again, and that'll probably be in March.

Mike:

Probably will be.

Kevin (KITMASX):

Please give our regards to Janelle. Oh, absolutely.

Contributor

Mike Baskette

Host
Contributor

David Knights

Co-host