If you are like me and live in Canada, you may be frustrated when it comes to buying geeky toys and accessories for you and your family. Why? Because most of our favorite online geeky retailers are based in the United States, which means being hit with high shipping costs, plus customs and brokerage fees on most orders exceeding $50.00 USD.
Canadians, you can now say “goodbye” to those fees and say “hello” to Fortress Geek.
Based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Fortress Geek launched in May 2013.
As Fortress Geek is a new company, they are still building their inventory. Currently, they have just under 400 items from which to choose. These items include toys, clothing, and accessories from our favorite fandoms, including Star Trek, Star Wars, Doctor Who, The Big Bang Theory, and Game of Thrones. Fortress Geek is constantly adding to their inventory, nearly doubling their stock since launching in May. If there is something you’d like them to add to their stock, let them know and they’ll see if they can make it so.
Aside from saying goodbye to all those extra costs, Fortress Geek has some other benefits that may excite my fellow Canadians:
- Free shipping on all orders over $100.00 CAD.
- You can pay with BitCoins, cheque or money order, PayPal, Visa or MasterCard, and American Express or Discover Card via PayPal.
- If you live in the Vancouver area, you can wave shipping and arrange to pick up your order at their West 7th Ave location. This option also allows you to pay with cash. If you attempt to drop by the Fortress Geek warehouse without first placing an order online, there is a $2.50 CAD service fee.
- For a $5.00 CAD fee, you can have your entire order gift wrapped, with a custom gift message.
- Fortress Geek has electronic gift certificates.
- Fortress Geek will hold your order, for up to one month, if you want to arrange for your shipment to coincide with some special date. Full payment of the order will be charged when the hold is lifted.
- Fortress Geek has weekly sales.
- Yes, Fortress Geek will ship internationally, if you want to send gifts to friends who reside outside of Canada.
If you are wondering about savings, I’ll be comparing prices in another post.
I, for one, am excited to welcome Fortress Geek; our new Canadian geek overloards!
Ooh – my apologies. Point of clarification; pickup if you order online is free. The $2.50 handling charge is only if you drop by the warehouse trying to buy something without ordering it online first. The charge is for the disruption caused in our normal warehouse processing for making an order directly there.
So, to clarify no charge if you order online and choose local pickup.
No worries, Tao. I’ll update the post accordingly 🙂 Thanks for the clarification!
Hey GeeK H.Q I’m not Canadian but I have a friend in Ontario desperate to obtain the knitting patters. Is that possible.
Harry The woolleydog from Downton Central.
I’m not sure it’s possible through Fortress Geek. That said, is your friend aware of the book “Geek Knits”? It contains 31 patterns and is available on Amazon. Also, Ravelry.com has a bunch of geeky knitting patterns.