1) Second Class post is now no longer an option as the deadline for posting Second Class Royal Mail items was Saturday 17th December

2) First Class and First Class recorded orders must be placed by 2pm on Tuesday 20th December

3) Next Working Day (Special Delivery) orders must be placed by 2pm on Thursday 22nd December

4) If you’re taking things down to the wire, then if you use the Saturday delivery option and we receive your order by 2pm on Friday 22nd December, then your item(s) will arrive on Saturday 23rd.

5) Airmail: it’s too late now to guarantee that any items sent to Europe or beyond will arrive by Christmas. Sorry. You can still order of course, just please don’t expect your stuff to be with you by 25th December.

6) Er that’s it.

Snorestore will be dispatching every day before Christmas up to and including Friday 23rd December. After Christmas, we will not be able to send anything until Wednesday 28th December as the two preceding days are Bank Holidays in England.

Anyway, here are the last posting dates as published by Royal Mail:

UK
Sat 17th December: Second Class and Second Class Recorded Signed For™
Tue 20th December: First Class and First Class Recorded Signed For™
Thu 22nd December: Special Delivery™
Fri 23rd December: Special Delivery™ with Saturday Guarantee

Airmail
Mon 5th December: South & Central America, Caribbean, Africa, Middle East, Asia, Far East (including Japan), Australia and New Zealand
Fri 9th December: Eastern Europe, USA and Canada
Mon 12th December: Western Europe

British Forces Post Office (BFPO)
Fri 2nd December: Airmail to Operational BFPOs
Thu 15th December: Airmail to Static BFPOs

Yes, it was basic, and yes it was hand-built using a teach-yourself  HTML book. But yes, it did the trick. We started getting orders straight away, even though we could only accept cheques to start with. It wasn’t until December 2001 that we were able to take payments online.

Anyway that’s all by the by, what we really want to talk about, is what Snorestore is like now, ten years on from those cringe-tastic early days.

For reason which are a bit obvious, we didn’t mark Snorestore’s ten year anniversary publicly in September. There was other more important stuff going on.

Instead, we got together with Lee Hackett, one of the best web designers in the business and between us came up with a brand spanking new sharp-as-a-button design which is so fit for purpose it aches with cool and useability:

All the earplugs you know and love are still there, but we reckon we’ve made it easier to find them. There’s less duplication and the pages are clean and bright and – we hope – enticing.

We had what we call a soft launch last weekend. We didn’t go mad telling the world that Snorestore has changed because, well, what if we’d got it horrendously wrong?

We did send out a discount code to our newsletter subscribers though. And so far, the reaction to our new shopfront has been overwhelmingly positive. In fact, we haven’t had a single negative comment. We’re thrilled.

Anyway, here’s to the next ten years. And thanks for the last ten. It’s been great. Cheers.

——– Original Message ——–
Subject: Feedback
Date: Thu, 3 Nov 2011 09:29:21 -0000
From: abc@ukabc.co
To: Snorestore

I can only echo the other endorsements on your web site. Spectacular service – ordered at lunchtime, delivered following day – suggest you should take over the running of Royal Mail!!  Thank you.

= = =

Followed by:

——– Original Message ——–
Date: Thu, 3 Nov 2011 10:53:52 +0000 (GMT)
From: xyz@xyz.co
To: Snorestore

Order Number: SNO123456
Order Date: 2 November 2011 14:47 GMT
Shipping: First Class
As the postage for my order is First Class I would expect to have been emailed
to advise that my order has been despatched

Would you please advise me when you intend to despatch If you cannot do this please
arrange cancellation so that I can order elsewhere

= = =

Now, which of those two emails would *you* prefer to receive?

“Well, you certainly know how to lose customers! I am an expat so I must be dishonest! You remind me why I never want to live in the UK again.”

We thought about replying:

“Dear Ms Dog-Barker,

We feel we should advise you that your email address may have been hacked, as it is being used to send emails which are a bit rubbish.

Yours, with increasing respect,

Glyn Jones (rtd.) “

But we didn’t. Because we are RESPONSIBLE and HONEST and we LOVE our CUSTOMERS.

Dear 1and1

It would be lovely if you’d apologise to everyone, including Snorestore’s customers, for the two-hour breakdown which took hundreds of thousands of websites offline today.

But I guess that’s too much to ask from a big company? You could learn some good lessons from us.

Best,

Snorestore

Tweet

Every now and then, a product comes onto the market and you go, “now why didn’t someone think of that before?” Well that just happened to us here at Snorestore.

We’d heard from customers over the years who had adapted their reusable earplugs to incorporate a headphone lead – but we’d never found a supplier who was prepared to do this commercially.

But that’s all changed now, with the advent of Plugfones. We’re the first company in the UK to stock their superb reusable headphone / earphones and we’re sure they will prove to be extremely popular. They work like earplugs, in that they stop outside noise getting in, but they incorporate an audio lead so you can listen to music without being interrupted by annoying external noise.

Plugfones are particularly useful for commuters (who hasn’t got hacked off on a packed bus or train by other people’s conversations or loud music?), factory workers and tedious but noisy DIY. Reusable and washable, and just £12.99, Plugfones could be the best piece of audio kit you buy this year.

Tweet

Sorky Surfing Earplugs

This last week saw the arrival at Snorestore of two new earplugs, both of which we are delighted to be stocking for the first time in this, our tenth anniversary year.

First up: Sorky Earplugs. Designed primarily for surfers, they hail from France and as you can see from the picture, are of a unique shape and configuration. They’re specifically designed to keep water out, but to allow the wearer to hear what is going on around them. The reviews speak for themselves – don’t go in the water without them.

Mighty Plugs

Our second new brand are Mighty Plugs. We’d seen these over the years and wondered how the manufacturers managed to get such glowing testimonials for their product without apparently having to advertise them at all. Now we know. They are AWESOME. Best for sleeping and general noise reduction, it took 24 hours from them appearing on the Snorestore website to the first review coming in. We’ll reproduce it here in its entirety:

“I just wanted to let you know that I am so grateful for your Mighty Plugs earplugs.  For the first time in ages I get a good nights sleep.  A wonderful invention and I can’t imagine how I used to survive before Mighty Plugs entered my life.  I’m even more delighted that you exist in GB now and I can cut down on the shipping costs.  Keep up the good work!”

Click the images for more details and to buy now.

Well no actually. It’s just that we’ve moved our old blog from standard WordPress hosting to our own Snorestore servers. So if you want to keep up to date with what’s new on the earplugs front, book mark this link now: http://www.snor.in/u/blog

Sexist Earplugs from Snorestore

We had someone call us today (020 8861 3149) who wanted advice on which type of earplug would be best for them.

This is always a tricky one for us at Snorestore, as, with the best will in the world, we don’t know without seeing the person in situ what the noise level is they’re being exposed to, how sensitive they are to noise, or how big (or small) their ear canals are.

Undaunted, we will do our level best to come up with a solution. Makes sense, huh? We’re a business after all.

Today Fred suggested to our caller that a Women’s Sample Pack would be the best place for her to start her quest for a suitable earplug to drown out the noise of her partner’s snores. Her response? “Earplugs for wimmin? That’s soooo sexist!”

*snort*

If it’s sexist to say that most men are stronger than most women, most men are taller than most women, most men weigh more than most women, then yes, dear caller, it’s absolutely sexist to have a sample pack of earplugs designed for women, by women. Because like it or not, most women have smaller and shorter ear canals than men. And not surprisingly, the Women’s Sample Earplugs Pack is the first port of call for any woman coming to the Snorestore website who’s fed up with her noisy partner depriving her of her sleep.

Sexist, my arras.