Enduro - Toy Cars Built for Tough Drivers |100% Sustainable
Created by ThoughtFull Toys
Enduro was born out of our love for beautifully crafted, high quality toy cars and trucks. Enduro vehicles have true-to-life, "hands on" driving mechanics and superb build quality. They are built tough from 100% sustainable materials and designed to last for generations - just like the great classic toy vehicles of the past, but even better.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Enduro - Manufacturing Update #3
almost 7 years ago
– Mon, Jul 10, 2017 at 10:02:48 PM
Hey Backers!
Short update for you today. As we said before, everything with Enduro is moving along slowly but smoothly. Currently, the sourcing of our rubber has been the main setback for us, since we can't start building our tools without 100% certainty of all the materials being used. We've been doing a lot of research and communication with all kinds of manufacturers in search of the perfect rubber. Last week we received six different samples from potential suppliers:
Sustainable Rubber Samples
A few of these samples are great - they're 100% sustainable, very durable, and they have a great feel to them. Unfortunately, the lifespans of these samples just aren't long enough for us. These toys need to last a lifetime... so we can't have rubber deteriorating after 20 years of play. After discussion with our suppliers, we have found a very promising mixture made from the materials we received as samples, which will satisfy our commitment to lifelong play. We will be receiving new samples of this long-lasting rubber within the next 10 days.
Our wood samples will also be arriving in the next 10 days, as well. This means we will be able to test the durability of the material ourselves... ensuring that the beautiful wood will stand up to the most barbaric 8-year old with a hammer :). We will also be receiving our aluminum samples shortly, and we will be doing quality and durability testing of this material as well.
We know that things look to be moving at a snail's pace, but as we've said before, we won't be cutting any corners or sacrificing quality while making Enduro. This toy is very important to us and to our backers: we want to deliver a product that exceeds our own expectations. In order to do this, no material or process can be overlooked - everything needs time to be reviewed and tested to ensure that we are building the product we set out to make. Once we get all of our materials finalized, the pace will pick up and we can actually start building. We are just as eager to see Enduro built as you are!
Thank you for your patience and support!
-The Thoughtfull Toys Team
Charity Donation Update! We've Upped the Donation!!!
almost 7 years ago
– Sat, Jun 24, 2017 at 01:03:18 AM
Hi backers!
When you backed Enduro, your pledge either directly, or indirectly donated Modarri cars to the Toys for Tots charity foundation. When we say indirectly, we mean that for every 10 Enduro vehicles pledged for (truck or racer), we donated 1 Modarri car to Toys for Tots. Direct donations were a part of most rewards as well, often donating 1 Modarri car per pledge, or even a 3-pack.
In total, this accumulated to 814 single Modarri cars, and 50 3-packs - for a total of 964 Modarri cars being donated to less fortunate children. That is AWESOME. But then we thought about the play experience for these kids; if some of them only receive 1 Modarri car, then they don't have the opportunity to experience one of the greatest parts of Modarri - the ability to mix and match parts to design their own cars.
So, we decided that we could provide these children with a much better play experience if we were able to give them more options. We are super excited to announce that we have upgraded every single "1 Modarri car" donation to a 3-pack donation!!!
5 Pallets of 3-packs Donated!
YES... With your help, we are now donating 864 Modarri Original 3-Packs to the Toys for Tots charity. That means, because of YOU - 864 children who wouldn't normally get a gift this Christmas will now be receiving a Modarri 3-Pack! I can't help myself from smiling when I write that (and *maybe tearing up a little).
At ThoughtFull Toys, we believe that play is one of the most important aspects of a child's development. This is why we are so excited to have the opportunity to provide new open-ended play experiences to kids who need it the most - with the hope that it brings happiness and long term benefits to their lives.
Today we are shipping 2,442 Modarri cars to Toys for Tots as a charity donation, in the form of 3-pack bundles with tons of play value! We couldn't have provided this donation without your pledges, so thank you. Your pledge will bring loads of joy to a child this Christmas, and maybe for years to come!
Thank you for your support and we hope you have a wonderful weekend! We'll have another manufacturing update for you soon.
-The ThoughtFull Toys Team
P.S. Below is a list of Enduro backers who directly donated a Modarri 3-pack to Toys for Tots. Modarri 3-Packs have been donated to Toys for Tots in these people’s names:
Enduro Manufacturing Update #2
almost 7 years ago
– Tue, Jun 13, 2017 at 02:20:40 PM
Hi Backers!
We are now underway with designing the tools to manufacture Enduro's parts! Right now, everything is looking good. We have come to a final decision on materials being used for Enduro, with the exception of our natural rubber material. This means that we know exactly what metals, woods, plastics, and alloys we are sourcing and manufacturing for Enduro.
With this information, we have begun drawing up the tools for each of these materials, so that we can build the tools used to manufacture each part of the Enduro Truck and Racer. We have also made small improvements to the Enduro designs, which will be reflected in the tool drawings.
The one part/material that is giving us the biggest problem right now is the rubber. Natural rubber has proven to be a very difficult material to source and manufacture in a way that works best for Enduro. In order to keep the rubber both sustainable and durable, it looks like we will need to make it a natural rubber alloy, meaning that we will mix other natural materials into the natural rubber to give it more strength.
We are currently exploring materials to mix with the natural rubber, and the best manufacturing processes to use with these materials, to ensure the final output is clean and strong. So far, we’ve found vulcanization and casting to be our best bet – instead of typical injection molding. While this might be a more expensive process, it will be worth it in the end.
Right now, our major focus is to get the rubber figured out and caught up to speed with the rest of the material manufacturing so that we can get all of the tools designed and built. We will update you when we have figured this one out. But apart from that, Enduro is looking very good from an operations standpoint.
In other news, we will be shipping out a large pallet of over 900+ Modarri cars to the Toys for Tots foundation, all donated with the help of your support! That’s a lot of cars – and more importantly, a lot of happy kids!! We will have an update for the shipment next week, stay tuned.
Have a great rest of your week :)
Sincerely,
-The ThoughtFull Toys Team
Enduro - Manufacturing Update #1
almost 7 years ago
– Fri, May 26, 2017 at 01:49:34 PM
Hi everyone! We hope you are doing well.
We'd like to provide an update on the manufacturing of Enduro. We apologize for "going dark" for the last month, we've just had a lot going on and we haven't really had anything solid to share with you about the manufacturing of Enduro.
Upfront, we'll tell you that it has been a rough start for us. The manufacturers who originally gave us quotes to produce Enduro backed out when we explained the product requirements for sustainability and durability at a much deeper level. This forced us to find other manufacturers.
Unfortunately we were unable to find anyone in the United States who could produce the product for our budget. Instead, we found a handful of manufacturers outside of the U.S. who fit the bill and inquired with them.
On initial inquiry, most of the manufacturers said they could build the vehicles - but once we got deeper into discussion, they were unable to meet the specifications for sustainability. The problem is that this is groundbreaking manufacturing for toys. Toy manufacturers are very good at building strong toys from plastic, but not from natural materials like wood, metal and natural rubber.
So after many discussions and a whole lot of searching, we found a small manufacturer in Asia who specializes in the creation and assembly of high quality metal products. It is a small family owned business (run by two brothers) who can produce some really great metal products, but they aren't experts in wood, rubber, or leather. Therefore, we are sourcing the wood, and rubber components from two other manufacturers who are experts in hard woods, and natural rubbers.
We are still searching for a place to find leather scraps/remnants. We aren't looking for a leather manufacturer, because we want to make use of leather that would otherwise be thrown away. Therefore we are looking for businesses who produce leather goods and trying to work out a deal to buy their wasted scraps.
So, we are sourcing the wood, leather, and natural rubber components from other manufacturers around the world, and then shipping them to the metal/assembly manufacturer in Asia and having them built there. Sourcing parts has been difficult and this is the only method we've found to ensure a high quality product that is durable and sustainable - the way it was designed to be.
Due to the manufacturing/sourcing difficulties, this means that Enduro's ship date will most likely be pushed back to September, instead of July. We are doing our very best to stay true to Enduro's story - a product that is durable, sustainable, and made with quality; in order to do that, we can't sacrifice the quality of the product for speed of delivery. After all, we believe that the most sustainable toy is the one that gets played with the most.
We should be awarding business (finalizing deals) with the manufacturers by June 2nd (about 2 weeks from now), we will have another update for you near that time.
Thank you all for being so patient and supportive, we really do appreciate it.
Sincerely,
The ThoughtFull Toys Team
Blackout / Signature Editions Taken Off Website | Declined Backers Please PM Us
almost 7 years ago
– Mon, May 22, 2017 at 03:23:27 PM
Hi backers. We'd like to apologize for temporarily opening the blackout and signature editions on our website. We know that we stated these were Kickstarter exclusive vehicles, and they were intended to be purchased by the Kickstarter backers who's cards were declined by Kickstarter - but we should have handled this differently.
We were trying to allow the 27 backers who's cards weren't processed by Kickstarter the chance to get their blackout editions, since they won't have access to the survey.
We have nipped this in the bud and have taken the blackout and signature editions off of our website - don't worry as only one original edition was pre-ordered off of our website during this time. Therefore, Kickstarter backers will remain to be the only people to own these Blackout and Signature editions.
We are sincerely sorry if this came across dishonest in any way - the last thing we want is for our backers and fans to lose faith in us. We were trying to help a small amount of our backers out, but we'll find another way to do this through more private means. Again, we apologize for this and we can assure you that these limited editions will remain Kickstarter exclusives from here on out.
If you are a backer who's card has been declined by Kickstarter, please private message us so that we can find a better solution to this issue.
