All Quiet On The Nici Front

For fans of our associated Nici site (nici.thestable.info) you will probably have noticed that no new content has gone up recently. Things died down over the holiday period and I was expecting to clean up my drawing ‘to-do’ list in January, however what I wasn’t expecting was a new job.

Fear not! New Nici art will be coming soon. I am hoping to get at least one drawing done this week and hopefully that’ll get me back into the swing of things. Keep your eyes peeled.

Also, I have lost access to the official Nici product pictures which are also available on nici.thestable.info. If anyone reading this has access to or knows where/how I can access these images again, please leave a comment or send me an email.

Finally, for those Nici fans who were visited by Santa - I hope you enjoy your present. We will be looking at a similar offer in the future and hopefully getting more retailers on board. For those who have no idea what I’m talking about, or missed out on claiming their gift, leave a comment and you will be notified next year when Santa comes by again.

Love your plush!

A First Look

For all you Jolly Mah fans out there, some new friends are coming to town very soon.  Have a look at Jolly Liselle and Jolly Wolf Hugo.

Liselle is the second female sheep by Nici following the success of Jolly Rosa.  Liselle does come in two styles, the one pictured and one with a purple scarf and pink thongs.  Hugo is the second wolf in sheeps clothing by Nici, this time in a stylish black fleece.  These new friends will fit in great with any flock and should spice up the lives of our other Jolly friends.

Feel free to tell us what you think of these new characters.

At Long Last And Yet So Soon

Finally, our new friends have arrived!  Jack and Jill Husky have survived their travel down under and are happy in their new home.  They are absolutely adourable - cuter than I ever thought they would be.  As far as I know, Mel and I are officially the first in Australia to own Jack or Jill.  Althought it’s nice, it’s also a little sad that others cannot enjoy the cuteness.

In our best Nici shops here, we have JUST got the Verano Caliente range.  Also, we miss out on heaps of other Nici things that is available overseas but is just too expensive to be worthwhile over here.  Many owners of a Nici toy in Australia probably don’t realise that Nici make stationary, mugs, bags and cushions.  Plenty of things you can have in the office and not look strange; let’s just say manly plush love is not commonly expressed though I know men do have plush love.

Hopefully, one day, I can either convince Nici to start a shop in Australia or do it for them!  Then we would see more Aussies loving Nici (simply through exposure) and we would also open the eyes for many Australian Nici lovers who think that Nici is just cute plush.

Nici Frenzy

Since the release of Nici’s Winter Husky collection a few weeks ago, Mel and I have been waiting patiently for them to arrive at Cuddly Kingdom.  Now they have, and our order is placed, the excitement is building as we wait for our new friends to arrive in the post.

Coincidentally, last night I got a sneak peek at some of Nici’s new product lines which will come out in the next 6 months or so and that has just built my excitement even more.  Check out the products section at nici.thestable.info for a sneak peek of your own.  Something very special that took me completely by surprise are the ‘Cozy Cups’.  I had heard of the other products before but the cups; totally out of left field.  And how cool!  A cup that is cuddly!

Anyway, I also got thinking about a cool idea.  I was thinking about making a Nici screensaver and realised that the easiest way was to make a flash animation first and then convert it.  Well I’m not much of a flash animator so the idea was lost - until I realised that Nici had already created the perfect animation for me.  It’s the story of Jolly Wolf and is no longer available at the Nici site, so here it is for you online as a flash file and as a screensaver file.  The screensaver file has been checked on my computer for viruses but it is recommended to run an antivirus program to be safe.  I trust me but you shouldn’t.

Download Screensaver

Free Postage From Cuddly Kingdom

Cuddly Kingdom is an online store of plush toys based in the UK.  For those readers located in Australia, you may already know how expensive it can be buying products from the UK because of the postage fees.  Cuddly Kingdom charge a flat rate of £11 postage to Australia.  What also annoys most Aussies is that the range available in online shops far exceeds the range in physical shops in Australia and the distributors (especially of Nici products) in Australia have a very limited scope of merchandise that they can supply.

Well Australian readers, I have an offer for you.  Mel and I are planning on making an order with Cuddly Kingdom when the winter husky range is released later this month and so we are offering to combine our order with your order to save on shipping costs.  You will get FREE shipping from Cuddly Kingdom and all you will pay is the few dollars it costs us to ship your items to you, from Melbourne.  That’s right … FREE shipping from the UK!

This is perfect for those lower cost items where the cost of shipping doubles or triples the cost of the item.  But you have to be quick as we will be placing the order in a couple of weeks time.  Don’t miss out on your chance to get quality merchandise without the added burden of shipping costs.

Q: Why are we doing this?
A: To see if it works!  If this is successful and there is a demand for us to continue, we are likely to do this again and/or set up a more permanent operation doing this regularly.

Q: If you are doing this again in the future, why should I rush to order now?
A: In the future there is likely to be an international AND local shipping cost - albeit a lot smaller than £11; whereas for this order you will only pay the local shipping costs.

Q: Sounds great, how do I participate?
A: Please email with the product you are interested in buying and we will go from there.  Also email if you have any other questions.

Jack & Jill - coming to a hill near you soon

The first images of Nici’s new winter collection are out. Jack and Jill husky are to be released in September in Europe (probably a longer wait for us ‘down south’). Last year the winter collection was the reindeer and bunny which you can still find in shops in Australia now (our local Myer store STILL has stock mostly because they have hidden them away in the back of the shop where no one looks) so hopefully when these guys are released in Australia they will stick around so everyone can buy one … or many.

Some of us are too excited for words and are going to import ours from the UK as soon as we can - for some unknown reason importing from Germany is too expensive albeit possible.  Though our supplier in the UK is usually very prompt with their new arrivals and often allow pre-orders on their site.

And now, meet Jack and Jill.

NICI Winter Catalogue (German)

New Nici Site

Mel and I have recently been working on releasing a new site here at TheStable, to celebrate and share the world of NICI.  At nici.thestable.info you will find product pictures and vector artworks of the various nici characters.  The site is primarily a visual experience although there is the ability to comment on the various images present on the site as well as giving a star rating to the pictures.

Another major benefit to this new site is the RSS feed.  Now you can keep up to date with any new content on the site by using RSS and you can be guaranteed it will be completely Nici related.  You can preview this using Snap-Shots.

We are also working towards having user galleries, where visitors can submit their photos to the site and share the products and pictures they have.  We are also looking at creating a section similar to the Forbidden Places page on the official nici site to show just how cheeky our little friends can be.

So if you want to have some fun and meet our collection, please drop by nici.thestable.info.