Problems with the new Bujin....
 

Is anyone else having problems with the new Bujin distributor? I have ordered from Aikido24 3 times and 2 of the experiences have been a bit fraught. The first two times were around Christmas last year. I ordered a Bujin tanto as a gift for my gf. It showed up quickly and fine.

Next, my gf ordered a hakama for me in very early November, and the website showed a 6 week lag time. Pretty reasonable. But she got NO communication from them for weeks. No order confirmation, and no response to 3-4 emails. I emailed Aikido24 about her order and got a response, more than a month after the order was placed. They were very apologetic, said that hakamas were really more like 8-10 weeks out from the order date, and since her order would miss Christmas, they'd throw in free name embroidery. Nice of them, but better, faster communication would have been more appropriate. 10 weeks went by (mid January), no hakama. It arrived on Valentines Day. Fourteen weeks. Long time, when the website claimed six weeks. We can cover the differences between the new Bujin hak and the old one in another thread....

Now, I ordered a new gi for gf. Everything was listed as in stock (although the gi top showed only 2 on hand) and ready to go. I placed my order on August 14. I got an email confirmation for the order that day. Things are looking up. Good. Dont need the gi soon, but I'd love for her to have it when Takeguchi sensei is in town mid-September. On the 16th, I get a form email (with automatic fields that dont fill in correctly, apparently) saying "Dear ###FIRSTNAME###"... some boilerplate purchase info and that I would shortly get another email with tracking info. Stoked....

....Nada. On the 27th, eleven days after I was told to look for an email, almost 2 weeks after I placed my order, I emailed the company asking about the order, can I get a shipping update, a tracking number, something? To Aikido24's credit, I got an email reply the next day (today, actually), complete with tracking number. Alright. So I go check out the tracking number. Two weeks after placing an order for items listed as in stock, Fedex shows that they have a shipment initiated, but they haven't got the package in hand. Now, when I refresh, they do have the package. Great. Here's hoping Fedex is its usual excellent self.

So, the upshot seems to be that Aikido24's communication and actual shipment of products is slow, slow, slow, and is driven primarily by customers prompting the company to fill their orders. I get that hakamas are going to be slow, semi-custom made, etc., etc., but I think 2 weeks is a long time to turn around an order for off the shelf goods. And it is suspicious to me that the ball only really started rolling after I waited almost two weeks to give it a kick. If there is a slow down, communicate. If there's a problem in the stock, communicate. If you say you'll send tracking information, communicate.....

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

a guy in my dojo ordered a hakama. methink, it was close to 3 months when he got it and some of the threads came off after a few uses. i ordered two bokkens at christmas. the wood is of bad quality, got a couple of cracks already. i am considering going elsewhere.

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

I ordered a hakama a while back, same deal, took forever. The koshita is super duper thick, not very friendly to your back when taking ukemi. I like their longer side splits for doing batto but probably will go back to Tozando for my next purchase.

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

Here's where I put in a plug for Peter Boylan and Mugendo Budogu:

http://www.budogu.com

Always great service, and they can do the kanji embroidery on hakama too!

Best,

Chris

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

Seconded! Happy customer since 1998.

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

I ordered a new gi to replace my old heavyweight ladies aikido gi from BuJin's Boulder days. I ordered a M, but the one I got was at least a 3X. I had no problem with getting in touch with them, and they sent a new one, which was also huge. They told me to keep both, and discovered that there was a problem with the manufacturer mislabeling the jackets. Finally, they sent me a small, which was still pretty big, and I'll have to hem it, but I've been supplying the larger guys in the dojo with some nice jackets. They were very nice to work with and responsive, but it's not like the old days.

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

I have been putting a Bujin uniform through it's paces for over a year now. The material is not as durable as the old Bujin material. I recently had to replace to velco strip. Sadly, I will no longer be buying my uniforms from them.

marc abrams

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

I've been thinking about ordering a new hakama; I'm glad that I found this thread before I put my order in.

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

I ordered 3 women's gi about a year ago (?) from the "new Bujin" after having 3 from the "old Bujin." It's possible they have changed things since my order - and I would be glad to hear if that's the case, but I'm not happy with the new ones and would like to find a new source.

Here are the problems I've had:

They say the pants are "unisex" but they are designed for men.

• The knee patches on the pants are placed too high, so that the bottom edge of the patch is across your knee (or not even that far down) when doing suwari-waza. It's a thigh patch, essentially, for women. It might work for men who wear their pants lower, but I wear the waistband at my waist.
• The drawstrings a long enough to tie easily once the pants are on, but if you have hips the drawstrings are so short that pulling the pants on without sucking the drawstrings into their holes is difficult. I have to hold the ends in one hand while pulling the pants on/off to keep from losing them.
• I wish they were longer. I'm 5'8" and these fit like capri pants, coming to my lower-mid calf. Again, I suppose for guys who might wear them lower, that wouldn't be a problem.

The women's jackets...

• The sleeves are too long for Aikido. All my old ones has shorter sleeves, which I didn't have to roll up. I have to fold the sleeves back at least 3" on the new ones.
• The bottom hem folds back up on itself every time I wash them. This didn't happen with the old ones. Now I have to spray them with water and flatten the hems out before folding the jackets.
• The side splits are failing. One tore recently when a partner knelt on it (fair enough), and I had to have it mended. But they are weak/failing on all 3, and I really should reinforce them before they get worse.

If anyone knows a decent supplier of women's gi, please share. I tried ordering men's (before ordering from Bujin), and they were either really tight around the hips, or fit like a tent. At best I could consider the larger men's ones to be a starting point, and have them tailored, but I'd rather find a source that are designed to fit women in the first place.

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

If you have a skilled seamstress in your area (fabric stores and sewing schools are often good resources for asking) you could consider buying Carol's pattern http://roundearth.stores.yahoo.net/dogiforwomen.html
which has bust and back darts on the jacket

Re: Problems with the new Bujin....
 

Thanks, Janet!