I do love that we can have these kind of conversations, and thank Alex for the forum to do so. He's been an inspiration to me and I hope that I can the same for someone else.
As Alex said, while it *looks* like a giant pile of money, each and every one of those backers costs money. The product itself, shipping, fees, credit card processing, taxes. Trust us, we are not printing up some cards on a whim and walking away with $15,000.
For people like me (and Alex I'd imagine) we need this process to get that initial boost, but if we are passionate and interested in it, we necessarily need to be thinking down the road. Look at the music industry and the number of "one-hit-wonders" out there that we all fondly remember but feel sorry for. Nobody wants to be that way, so we look at our first project and sees what we can do better/different. Momentum in a market is precious and you have to take advantage of it.
Unless you've done the entire thing, I'm not sure everyone truly knows the amount of detailed work that goes into making a project like this a real thing. There are countless hours of details to work through, over months of time. Not just design, but business, financial, fulfillment, marketing, etc. For example today I have to research if I can get a reseller tax certificate from the state so that I can legally resell a product without additional taxes. That's just one of the dozens of things to consider. We work hard on these first ones because the goal is that the next one doesn't need so much "support" and blind faith that you all graciously give us, but instead can be in your hands like any normal thing you decide to purchase.
I am already working on my next design, but if you see it in print by the end of the year that will be fine. If I literally dropped everything in my life and worked each day on this new deck, I doubt I would have it done in a months time. Perhaps D&D can pump out a deck every week, but I sure can't.
The support of the community is important, humbling and inspiring all in equal measures. Don't think, though, that this is "easy" work for big profit. If you add in all the costs and pay yourself minimum wage for your time, I bet all of us designers are deeply in the hole.
