Weekly Updates & Estimated Challenge Calendar

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Calendar	Files	Launches	Tech & Payments	Community
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upcoming challenge timelines	file request deadlines and file prep updates	recent product & assortment launches	tech updates & upcoming payments	upcoming events, deadlines, & news

 Thanks for stopping by to read the projected Current Estimated Challenge Calendar for the next two months! Please note that this schedule is subject to change. We update this page every Friday. 

   Our team will be out of the office for Memorial Day on Monday, May 25th. We will not be
   hosting our weekly virtual Mintie Meetup, and will respond to any emails when we return on Tuesday.

Challenge Calendar 

Challenges are made up of (i) a Submission Period, during which artists submit designs, (ii) a Critique Period, a minimum of 24-hours of dedicated time for giving and incorporating peer feedback, (iii) a Voting Period during which Minted artists and customers cast their votes on submissions, followed by Minted's voting analysis & editorial review — analysis and review tends to take longer for Art and Partner Challenges, and (iv) Winners Announcements and File Requests. Below are current Challenge states.  

Notes on the calendar:

• [New 5/14] Do not submit Pure White designs to the current Foil-Pressed Holiday Photo Card Challenge We will no longer accept any Pure White Gloss-Press design submissions to the Foil-Pressed Holiday Photo Card Challenge. We are experiencing issues with our current Pure White Gloss-Press partner that may impact our ability to source more designs in this format. We have removed this texture from the current Challenge Kit, and ask that any artists who used this texture please adjust their designs to a new foil color. We apologize for this change and hope to share additional updates with you soon.

  • These limitations do not apply to our Iridescent Pearl Gloss texture — you may still submit designs using this texture. As a reminder, Iridescent Pearl should only be used on white or very light background colors. Please reference our Foil & Gloss FAQ page for more info.

• [New 5/8] Holiday Photo Kits: We have added more photos to each photo kit that better reflect the current stay-at-home state of many due to COVID-19. We will continue to source these types of photos, and may add more to each kit early next week. 

• [New 4/30] Backpack Fabric Challenge: Due to the uncertainty surrounding back to school season this year, we are currently reevaluating this challenge and assortment plan.

Add Challenges to Your Calendar >>    Submit to Challenges >>    Vote on Submissions >

Files

Top-rated winners and Editors' Picks receive a request for final Adobe Illustrator files (fine art is accepted in other formats). Requests are typically sent within a week after each winners announcement, with the exception of Holiday challenges where requests are sent before winners are announced. This gives our Production team time to prepare the holiday assortment to launch before our big reveal in the fall. Below are final file submission deadlines. 

Backpack Fabric Challenge	All requests have been sent. Please note that not all designs requested will be selected as winners.
Spotlight on Art Quickfire Art Challenge	All requests have been sent. Files were due on Friday, March 27.

For questions around stamp file requests, please see our recent email. 

Launches

Below we've listed recent or upcoming launches of designs from Challenges. Keep in mind that late or incompletely submitted files, the need to acquire licenses for non-Minted fonts, investigation of clip art usage, and technical difficulties can cause delays in the launch of specific designs.

Brushstrokes and Beyond Art		Pottery Barn Teen Picks: Launched!  See the new assortment here.  Pottery Barn Kids Picks: Launched! See the new assortment here.  Minted Editors' Picks: In Progress.  Expected to launch by early June.
Non-Foil-Pressed & Letterpress   Wedding Invitations*		Launched!
Foil-Pressed Wedding*		In Progress. Expected to launch by late May.  *Note: for Foil-Pressed Invitations, the website will most likely launch before the main suite + day-of items.
BHLDN Wedding Suites		In Progress. Expected to launch by early June. Main Invitation suites will launch first, followed by the Day-Of items and the matching website. *Note: For suites in this assortment, all designs will initially launch with the one winning colorway. If artists submitted alternate colorways, these will be added in at a later date.
Spotlight on Art Quickfire Art		In Progress. Expected to launch in early June. *Note: You may see longer file processing times than normal for pieces from this assortment. Due to technical issues, you may also see projects in "Pending QC" for extended periods of time.

* Please note that if you submitted Alternate Greetings with your Wedding Invitation suite, these will not be included when your design initially launches. Our team is still doing work to enable this on site, and we will update live designs with their alternate greetings once this is complete. 

For questions around stamp launches, please see our recent email. 

[New 5/22] Note: Our Holiday retirement timeline has been moved up to ensure a smooth transition to our new renderer on July 4. We will send notifications by the end of May. See the latest Palette newsletter for more information.

Tech Updates & Payments Schedule

All payments are processed through Payoneer. Commission Payments are paid monthly — with the exception of some sales made through partners, which are paid quarterly. Prize payments are sent every two weeks, at the end of the week, for all files received before that date. 

Latest Round of Prize Payments Sent:

May 14

The next round of prize payments will be sent the week of May 11. See our commission payment schedule here.

Tech Releases & Sales Emails

• [New 5/22] We've restyled our Challenge Voting page to better reflect our brand and improve the user experience.

• [New 5/14] We've removed the "Share This" feature on design submission pages due to bugs. The smaller social media share buttons are still available for you to use to share designs.

• [New 5/14] We've updated our sales notification emails to have a more visual look and feel and link you to relevant resources.
  

• [New 5/11] We have removed the "share this design" code generating box in the sidebar of the submission page. The social buttons in the upper right have been unaffected.

Custom Foil Text & Stamps

• [New 5/13] In order to continue making progress migrating products to the new renderer in advance of the July 4 deadline, we have temporarily turned off the Custom Foil Text option in the customizer for our entire assortment, including for designs currently available for sale onsite, while we work on fixing the issues with the new renderer. Our goal is to reinstate Custom Foil Text as an option for customers as soon after our July 4 transition as possible.

• [New 5/7] We recently learned that the United States Postal Service (USPS) is suspending the production or sale of any non-USPS stamps, including customizable postage, effective June 2020. Minted has no choice but to discontinue all stamps currently sold on Minted.com and we can no longer accept stamp designs from artists moving forward. The last day that Minted will be able to accept stamp orders from customers is June 9, 2020. Please read our email announcement for more information on this topic.

Wedding Place Card Category Pages:

• [New 5/5] We are aware of the bug affecting place card designs for wedding place cards on the category page, and are working on a fix. We will update once this issue has been resolved.

Art:

• [New 2/7] Pottery Barn Kids product page imagery: Pottery Barn Kids includes an image on product pages for Minted pieces that shows art pieces to scale. This image includes the same standard artwork across all product pages. This is an intentional choice to demonstrate product sizes, and will not always reflect the artwork being viewed.

Self-Launch:

The Self-launch Tool is experiencing some issues. We've listed the most common situations below.

• Stationery
  

  • "Unknown Error" - Make sure your design is using fonts from our Minted Font List. If you are not using any non-Minted fonts, but are still experiencing issues, please email [e-mail]

  • [New 3/12] Some artists are experiencing issues with backer logo colors showing up incorrectly as purple. We do not have an estimate on when this will be resolved but will keep this page updated as we make progress.

• Art

  • Due to recent system updates, you may experience longer wait times than usual when self-launching art. We are working on updating the self-launch feature and will post here when this is resolved. 

  • The self-launch tool is functioning, but we have been seeing delays and bugs affecting some pieces. Launching and fixing any bugs related to winning pieces is priority over launching self launch work. We will begin to notify and update artists with self launch pieces that we see are affected by a technical issue.  Please email [e-mail]  to let us know if your piece has not processed after seven days so that we can help move it forward. There are technical issues impacting pieces that can take longer to resolve and we will keep you updated if your piece is affected. 

  • We are continuing to move art prints to our new product page. If you see a previously launched piece moved to the "processing" status on your My Projects page, please check your store as it may be live there.

View the Commission Payment Schedule >>

Community

We encourage you to get to know your like-minded peers in the community by joining the Minted Community Facebook group, attending conference calls, and joining in Mintie activities. Below are upcoming ways to get involved.

• [New 5/22] The Palette Newsletter for May has been sent! View it here.

Virtual Testing Hangout:

• [New 5/21] In place of our social Mintie Meetup video call on Monday, June 1 at 9:30 am PT, we will host a virtual testing hangout! This is a great opportunity to test while connecting with your fellow artists, and as an added bonus, you'll also be able to talk through any points of confusion with the Minted team as you work through your designs.
  • Join us at this Zoom link at 9:30 am PT on Monday, June 1.
    
  • This hangout is for artists who have designs available to test in our new renderer.

Additional ways to connect:

• [New 5/21] Our Mintie Meetup on Monday, May 25 will be canceled because of the Memorial Day holiday.

• Fridays at 10:30am PT: Virtual social Mintie Meetup to discuss social topics via Zoom (for anyone interested). Join here: https://bit.ly/3ehWNam

• Every Tuesday at 9am PT (until June 30): Weekly Scene7 Support Office Hours via Chat (only for artists who have a live product for sale on Minted): https://bit.ly/34BkvKr

• Buddy Program: We recently sent out our first Buddy Program prompt! Keep an eye out for the next prompt in late June.

Add events to your Calendar >>     Join the Facebook Group >>    Host a Meetup >>

Scene 7 Office Hours

We are temporarily canceling our regular Weekly Office Hours due to low attendance rates. We will continue to update the Weekly Updates page every Friday. We may offer special office hours for specific topics in the future — for example, a chat specifically to answer holiday challenge questions. As always, we welcome your feedback. You can submit, even anonymously, ongoing feedback to Minted on our policies and processes for the broader team to our feedback form.

Join us here every Tuesday at 9am PT (until June 30) for Weekly Scene7 Support Office Hours via Chat (only for artists who have a live product for sale on Minted):