First and foremost … Thank you!

Secondly, please understand that you have ordered a custom piece of clothing that will last you for years (up to 30 and still going for some customers!) and these take time to craft. Even if you did not request anything special in sizing or style, please understand that sometimes it’s not how long it takes to make YOUR order, but how long it takes to first make everything for everyone who ordered before you. We are a small, home based, family business. [ Even if we don’t look like it. ] I personally sew 90% of everything Pendragon makes. Yes, everything you saw at the con or faire … that WHOLE booth full of wonderful clothing … I made. Ok, I had help: my brother Russell, and our one other full-time employee Jim, cut everything out, and then do all the finishing work, like grommeting. We also have Celia and Miriam who sew the soft goods like the chemises & skirts. Then of course, there is Jerry, who crafts all are wonderful tooled artwork pieces (by hand, each one individually). We do not have a warehouse full of costuming we can go out to and get your order from. We do not have a sweatshop full of laborers in a foreign country making things. We do not resell other company’s items. We make everything by hand, from scratch, in California, in what is supposed to be my living room. Please keep this in mind when you contact us and ask how soon your order is coming. That is not to say you shouldn’t contact us and say, “where’s my order?” … just maybe say it nicely. Pretty please.

As far as how long your order IS going to take … that is a tough question. There are a lot of factors involved. The biggest is time of year. During the spring we have two 8 week Renaissance faires running concurrently. In the late summer, our con season starts and we have some of the biggest shows in a two month time period. In the fall, we have 2 - 3 shows every weekend for over 10 weekends straight. Once winter starts, our shows end, but then we are usually facing the mountain of orders taken at all the previous mentioned shows. Phew!

We try REALLY hard to not make your wait longer than 6- 8 weeks. It just isn’t always possible. When you place your order, our sales staff (or website form) will quote a month for delivery. This is our best guess at the time we take your order. Many things happen between taking your order and delivery, and may affect the date you receive your order. At any time during this period, you are more than welcome to contact us, but know that we don’t usually have a better answer than, “we are still hoping for blank”. The reason is, we don’t work on your order over a period of time (other than buying the fabric/leather/etc and putting it in the queue for Russell to cut). The time it takes to actually sew your order is relatively short compared to the time it spends waiting for it’s place in line to be sewn.

“Need by Dates” : please, please, please … if you have a need by date, please tell us when you order. Even if your need by date is after the estimated delivery date. It never hurts to just make sure we know. We never want to disappoint anyone. While we never make promises or guarantees, we will always try to meet your date (within reason). Also … please don’t wait until the day before your event to ask us where your order is. At that point, there is nothing we can do about it. If you have a hard and fast need-by date (wedding, cruise, faire, con, etc) and you let us know that when you ordered, and if you haven’t received a shipping email from FedEx at least a week before that date, PLEASE reach out to us. Give us enough time to scramble, and get your order to you. You will either get the email saying, “yep, that’s shipping today” or “Oh, wow, we missed that. So glad you contacted us!” Either way, in the end, everyone is happy.

Now, I realize a lot of this sounds like we are asking you to babysit us. And, I suppose in a way, we are. As stated above, we are only four people with a lot of hats to wear. Sometimes, we slip and we fail. We’re human. We feel bad about it (really bad, sometimes). So we’ll just ask you to protect yourself from us.

Please also note, unless there is a problem with your order or we have a question, we do not contact you between when you place your order and when we ship. Don’t worry “if you haven’t heard from us” … but, again, if you are worried, never hesitate to email us.

Ok, enough of that …

When your order is finally sewn and ready to ship, we ship via FedEx Home Delivery (unless you’ve given us a business address, then it ships FedEx Ground). We ship signature required on all orders. You will receive an email from FedEx when we process your order. It will have an estimated delivery date. If there will not be someone home to sign for it on that day, we encourage you to contact FedEx to make alternative delivery arrangements with them. If you never have someone home during the day, you can contact FedEx to arrange for them to deliver it to a Kinkos/FedEx Office. or sometimes Walgreens, near you for pick-up. This is a free service. Walgreens will have extended hours that you can take advantage of if you work full time. IF you need to change your shipping address to a non-FedEx delivery location, there is an additional fee. If you know this will be the case, you should contact us BEFORE we ship so we can adjust the shipping address at no additional cost. FedEx will attempt three deliveries and then return your package to us. Unfortunately, if this happens, we have to charge you again for re-shipping your package so it’s really important that you pay attention to those FedEx emails.

Again, Thank you so much for your order, we really appreciate your business. Any questions or concerns, you can email us at pendragoncostumes@gmail.com. Make sure to follow us on FaceBook for notices on sales, promotions and where we will be next.