Shop FAQs
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SHIPPING
Where do you ship to?
We ship worldwide but with some conditions.
Be aware that cards are region-specific. If you are sending to anywhere in the USA or Canada, you need to choose the cards specifically made for you. The rest of the world can choose the main listing.
Prints are not region-specific. They are just plain old worldwide shipping.
If you’re unsure, check the tags we’ve applied to products. It will either say ‘worldwide shipping’ which means no restrictions, ‘US & CA shipping’ which we apply to cards created for that market, or ‘rest of the world shipping’, which means that people from the US & CA can’t order those products.
Shipping costs and taxes will be calculated at checkout. You can find out the shipping costs and experiment with different quantities in your cart before deciding to buy. (Or take a look at the shipping costs charts for select countries in the charts at the bottom of this page.)
Prices are listed in British Pounds.
Why do you list cards separately for the USA & CA?
Our distributor organises our printing with local printers in over thirty countries. But the USA & CA do different print sizes to the rest of the world. In order for us to be able to send you cards, we have to work with their sizes, so we have to create cards separately and list them just for you. If you’re unsure, check the description and/or tags on a product. You either want worldwide shipping (for prints) or US & CA for cards. You can filter out cards just for you using the tags.
NOTE: It is about the address you are sending it to, not the place you’re ordering from.
So …If you are in the USA or Canada but you’re sending it to any other country or region, choose the original.
If you’re in any other region but sending it to the USA or Canada, you’ll need to choose the cards for the US & CA.
Example: If you are from the UK but want to send to a friend in the USA, choose the cards for the US & CA.
What does ‘rest of the world shipping’ mean?
This means every other country but the USA and Canada. So that’s Europe, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Asia … All of them.
All prints ship to everywhere in the world, but cards are region-specific. Either you are the ‘US & CA’ or you are the ‘rest of the world’. Prices are listed in British Pounds. Note that it’s about the address you’re sending it to, not where you’re ordering from.
Example: If you are from the UK but want to send to a friend in the USA, choose the cards for the US & CA.
How long does it take for an item to get to me?
Our distributor organises printing and shipping with their partner printers, and they are very fast. Many orders are printed within 72 hours and most orders arrive within 7 days. But the printing and shipping are out of our hands and sometimes delays happen. All our orders are tracked from our end, and if you think there’s a problem, let us know and we’ll see what we can do.
PAYMENTS
What currency do you use?
Lisa, the artist, is based in the UK, so we use British Pounds.
All our prices and shipping rates are converted from EUROs which is the currency our distributor uses.
What payment methods do you accept?
We accept all credit cards or debit cards.
Do you use PayPal?
No, we don’t. We wanted to but we couldn’t for several reasons. Firstly their fees are astronomically high compared to everyone else. We make the smallest margin of profits on every item and Paypal was taking at least a quarter of it.
Secondly, PayPal made our lives thoroughly miserable, refusing to release our funds from test payments until we could prove we had shipped the product to the customer. The problem with that is, it’s an automated system. The order won’t go to the distributor and thus the printers UNTIL the funds have been cleared and the system triggered. So how could we prove we could send the order to a customer when the order wouldn’t be triggered due to PayPal withholding the funds? We were in a Catch-22 and long, long hours on the phone to Paypal to explain all of this met with deaf ears. In the end, we found a far better system – an Australian-owned company that is making waves around the world called Airwallex. Our fees are much, much lower and they haven’t got us in a payment bind.
Is your name Willow Lane or The Lonely Creative? What is NB Graphics on my invoice? What are all the names I see?
Willow Lane Art & Design is our registered business name for our art and design – the art side of our business. Willow Lane is also our pen name on Amazon for our notebooks.
The website, The Lonely Creative, is Lisa’s original artist and author website where we set up the shop because our designs are based on her art. It’s the website that began it all. Now our novels use The Lonely Creative or TLC as our imprint. So TLC is the publishing and writing half of our business.
NB Graphics is Naomi’s design business in Australia and one of the businesses we are registered under. It may appear on your invoice instead of Willow Lane Art & Design. Want to see Naomi’s design site and maybe hire her for book covers, brochures, web graphics and the like? Go to www.nbgraphics.com.au.
Behind the Scenes is the name and purpose of our blog. If you subscribe, you’ll be getting Behind the Scenes updates from The Lonely Creative.
We’re kind of a UK-Australian business because Lisa is originally from Australia and Naomi’s graphic design business is set up there, but now that Lisa is living in the UK and as our distributor is in Europe, we decided to set the shop in pounds.
SHIPPING COSTS
What are your shipping costs?
It depends on the item and where it’s headed, as each item is charged differently. See our samples of shipping costs in the charts at the bottom of this page. Note that most items have either a very small extra charge for more items, or no extra charge at all. That means the more you order, the cheaper the shipping gets. All our products are posted using tracked mail.
Our distributor organises shipping, and most goods are coming from the EU or the UK. Rates begin as EUROs and are converted to pounds for our shop. (Or if you relate better to US dollars, choose it from the drop-down menu on the shop home page.)
If you’re from the USA or Canada most of your goods come from the USA, and shipping costs are worked out differently. (You can choose US dollars from the drop-down menu on the shop if you prefer.)
To find out the cost of shipping any items, add them to the cart and you can experiment with an order size as much as you like before committing to a purchase.
Why are prints charged separately to cards for shipping?
All our items are packed specifically for their shape and size to get them to you in the best possible condition. For that reason, cards are sent separately to prints and unframed prints are sent separately to framed prints.
But the good news is, most items have a very small or no extra charge for shipping for each additional item. The more you order of a particular product, the cheaper per item it gets.
What are the taxes added?
We have to include taxes for the UK at least because we get charged taxes on products at a hefty 20% VAT. If we didn’t add taxes, it’d be a huge chunk of our small profits. But not every country needs to have taxes added so we add it at the end for certain addresses. Add your product to the cart to see if it includes taxes in your country and how much. Our printer and distributor calculates these taxes for us. This is out of our hands.
RETURNS:
What happens if I’m not happy with my order?
If something has gone wrong with the printing or quality of your order, or something went wrong in the mail, email us. Please take clear photos of the problem, describe it as best you can, and email it to us along with your order number and name, or forward the order invoice. Our email will be on your invoice.
We will contact the distributor immediately. They are very good and their customer service is excellent. They will most likely resend the items. You don’t need to send the goods back to us.
Do you do returns?
We can’t really help if you change your mind but we can help if your order is not up to scratch. If there’s a problem with the quality or any damage from shipping, email us with photos and a description of the problem. The email will be on your invoice. Send us the order number and your name or a copy of the invoice.
RETAILERS:
Can I resell your cards?
Absolutely. Whether it’s physically in a store, to your friends and local community, or even through your own online shop such as an Etsy store, you are welcome to resell our cards and we’ve priced them accordingly.
We also offer a discount for multiple purchases. See our Sell Our Cards page for more information.
PRODUCT QUESTIONS:
Where are the goods coming from?
Our cards and prints are printed and shipped from Europe and the UK. However, if you order the US & CA specific cards, your goods are printed in the USA.
Why are your prints smaller sizes?/Will you ever offer larger ones?
We’ve tried to get as close as possible to the original for all our prints. That includes original sizes of any art additions on our designer range. All paintings have a point at which they look best, and we believe that the original size gives the most authentic experience. So we’ve gone as close as we can to the exact size, including the border, and cropped as little off the painting as we can. For that reason, we will always keep our prints small.
Prints and posters are usually either 8×10 inches or 8×12 inches.
Why do you only sell cards as packs of 10?
We checked out many distributors and suppliers before we settled on the one we have, and they only offer cards in packs of 10 because their ethos is to eliminate waste. The wasted paper and ink on printing one card at a time would be too high. Not only that, but the cost to ship just one card around the world would make that one card too expensive for most countries. The cheapest and less wasteful way to get cards is to buy sets.
We think many of the cards in our range make great gifts and cards all in one – a card with a piece of art to keep – and are great framed on a wall. Or you could cut them up for scrapbooking and other craft projects because they are word-free. Keep some for yourself and give the rest away, or find a friend who would like to share the pack with you.
If your aim is just to get a single piece of art, you might like to see if it’s offered as a print or poster.
Can you choose a set of 10 different cards?
No. Our distributor doesn’t do that. Their whole ethos is to reduce waste in printing and the way to do that is to do a print run of ten of the same card. We like their ‘less waste’, ‘less burden on our resources’ ethos, and that’s one of the reasons we chose them. That and the fact that because they do print-runs of 10, they can offer us different sizes and shapes of cards which many other suppliers can’t do.
Why are your rectangular cards bigger than normal cards?
Our distributor partners with printers all across Europe and in the UK (and the USA for US & CA orders). To keep things consistent, and make sure that if you order x you get x, they offer a limited range of sizes that are common to all printers. Square cards are easy and just the right size, but for rectangular cards, for the UK market in particular, the choice was either very large (A5) or very small (A6).
As our cards are all about the art and design, we opted for the big ones. Some of our card designs would look impossibly small on the smallest card. And we would rather you were surprised by how big they are than be disappointed by how small they are.
We think our larger-than-average cards make great artworks to keep and frame, or a great present and card all in one. They are rare and special and show that you went to a lot of trouble to find just the right card.
When it comes to the USA, we had a better choice, but we decided to let the design dictate whether we went for the larger one, or the average sized one. So you’ll find both, depending on the artwork.
Are your products sustainable?
Our distributor partners with printers all across the world and their distribution model is about reducing as much waste as possible. It is what got them started in the first place: the quest for a better, more sustainable way to do things.
All their products are made with responsibly sourced and sustainable materials.
Product safety
All their products are produced in accordance with international and national product safety regulations.
Responsibly sourced materials
They always strive to use responsibly sourced materials. Their printed paper products and canvases are made from paper and wood from sustainably managed forests with a sustainable forest management system in place.
Quality that lasts
They work with suppliers that offer high-quality products that they (and we) hope will be enjoyed and used over and over again for a long period.
Reducing travel miles
They find the closest print partner to each address to save shipping miles (130+ production hubs in 28 countries).
Ethical business practises
All their printer partners have to sign a supplier code of conduct agreement to ensure fair pay, fair working conditions, ethical practices etc.
And on it goes. We love our distributor’s ethos and that is one of the reasons we chose them.
PROBLEMS ORDERING:
I received an error message about my order from the distributor.
If you are in the USA or Canada and you ordered cards that aren’t listed specifically for you, it will register as an error in the system. The order will not proceed, and you can go ahead and put the right cards in your cart. You will not be charged.
Similarly, if you are in the ‘rest of the world’ – Europe, Asia, UK, Australia, New Zealand, etc and you tried to order a card that is listed for the USA & CA, it will register as an error and the order will not proceed. You will not be charged, and you can go ahead and order the right cards.
A frame I want is out of stock.
Our system updates every two hours with frame availability because sometimes sizes do go out of stock. It usually tells you it is out of stock. This is temporary. Keep checking back every few days. They do come back into stock.
Any other problems?
This is new to us and we’re not sure yet just what we’ll encounter along this adventure, so if you have a specific problem or question, let us know and we’ll see what we can do.
Email either Lisa or Naomi at info at thelonelycreative dot com.
Shipping Rates Examples
Shipping rates for CARDS:
| Region | Shipping first product | Shipping additional product | |
| USA | 7.15 EUR | – | |
| Europe | 6.05 EUR | – | |
| Scandinavia | 7.50 EUR | – | |
| UK / Ireland | 2.75 EUR | – | |
| Germany | 2.75 EUR | – | |
| Canada | 7.50 EUR | – | |
| EFTA States | 9.50 EUR | – | |
| Australia / NZ | 7.50 EUR | – | |
| Brazil | 6.50 EUR | – | |
| Singapore | 7.60 EUR | – | |
| Worldwide | 17.00 EUR | – |
Shipping Rates for PRINTS
| Region | Shipping first product | Shipping additional product |
| USA | 4.40 EUR | 0.30 EUR |
| Europe | 6.38 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| Scandinavia | 6.38 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| UK / Ireland | 4.62 EUR | 0.30 EUR |
| Germany | 5.50 EUR | 0.30 EUR |
| Canada | 6.19 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| EFTA States | 8.90 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| Australia / NZ | 6.56 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| Brazil | 6.56 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| Singapore | 7.13 EUR | 0.20 EUR |
| Worldwide | 10.44 EUR | 0.25 EUR |
Shipping Rates for PRINTS + FRAME
| Region | Shipping first product | Shipping additional product |
| USA | 8.10 EUR | 3.50 EUR |
| Europe | 10.13 EUR | 5.07 EUR |
| Scandinavia | 8.74 EUR | 5.07 EUR |
| UK / Ireland | 7.00 EUR | 4.81 EUR |
| Germany | 7.00 EUR | 4.81 EUR |
| Canada | 12.44 EUR | 6.95 EUR |
| EFTA States | 8.74 EUR | 5.07 EUR |
| Australia / NZ | 8.74 EUR | 4.55 EUR |
| Brazil | 11.19 EUR | 4.61 EUR |
| Singapore | 11.19 EUR | 4.61 EUR |
| Worldwide | 12.44 EUR | 4.61 EUR |
Shipping Rates for TOTES
| Region | Shipping first product | Shipping additional product |
| USA | 3.56 EUR | 1.38 EUR |
| Europe | 3.77 EUR | 1.21 EUR |
| Scandinavia | 3.77 EUR | 1.21 EUR |
| UK / Ireland | 3.65 EUR | 1.21 EUR |
| Germany | 3.65 EUR | 1.21 EUR |
| Canada | 5.35 EUR | 1.38 EUR |
| EFTA States | 9.10 EUR | 1.21 EUR |
| Australia / NZ | 6.29 EUR | 1.38 EUR |
| Brazil | 5.58 EUR | 1.38 EUR |
| Singapore | 5.58 EUR | 1.38 EUR |
| Worldwide | 5.58 EUR | 1.38 EUR |
