I've had nothing but horrible experiences trying to get one. October of 2020 I tried to buy one through Slow Pour Supply and their site failed. Contacted them and they let me purchase one for the December drop. December came and wait. Then January, then February. Get notice that my grinder shipped to their warehouse. It got there and it was the wrong color. I could have taken it but I was so furious that I waited 5 months for the grinder that I didn't want it. Reached out to James at Niche asking what the deal was and seeing if I could be helped; his response was get on the list and buy from the next batch. Did exactly that, and got hosed again.

I would rather spend 3X the amount on a Kafatek MC4 at this point; so I'm on that list and waiting for the next batch of those.

Making and selling a product should not be this complicated.

Nick

I think you had the wrong time if you are still on Central time. It was 8:00 Central time. They were all there right around 8:15 after the server temporarily crashed in the first few minutes. I had one in the cart. I kept getting a "please fill in all the information" thing every time I tried to buy. I still don't know what wasn't filled out, but I eventually got it to process. Got the confirmation order screen. checked my email to confirm only to find out my credit card declined the payment because its international or something. by the time I got back to try a different card they were all gone. I actually feel like there was more time this month to snag one than there was last time.

Yeah well I had the wrong time because they gave me the wrong time. They clearly said 2:00 PM GMT, which is 9:00 AM CST (where I live). This whole mess happened because they forgot to address (or maybe just realized much much later) that timezone in UK was switched to BST, which is an hour ahead of GMT. So yes, 2:00 PM BST is 8:00 AM CST. Had they given me the right timezone, I'm sure I could've snatched one.

I was told that they also sent an email like an hour before the actual release time to clear out the confusion, which I didn't even receive at all, but that just sounds like a bad practice and poor customer service.

I think my journey for trying to get my hands on Niche Zero ends here. Trying to meet this utter chaos of a demand still through IndieGoGo is already bad enough. Now they mistakenly give a wrong timezone when they KNOW the demand is through the roof? Yeah that's a no go for me. I'm sticking to Specialita for now, and maybe getting P64 later. Congrats to you for getting one though. Hope you like it.

I merged some posts from Niche Zero grinder complaining about Niche's ordering process.

UNREAL! After 30 minutes of crashing I finally got and paid for a black Niche Zero. Got my confirmation. Was STOKED! Then I get a text from MasterCard that they declined the purchase since it seemed suspicious! Then Niche emailed me that my payment was declined, so I lost the grinder to someone else. FURIOUS! I kept refreshing the site. Nothing. Fortunately I had seen some good reviews for the Giota DF64. Under $500 on Alibaba, will be in my kitchen in 3 weeks. Maybe one day I'll catch the unicorn NZ, until then...

The whole IGG website crashed the first 10min or so.

US Black versions were available for ~30-35min
White versions for about an hour
UK/EU/Australia versions a bit longer.

This is a "niche" product for a niche community. I think by now we all know it is a hassle to buy. There are other great grinders out there otherwise, no one is forcing you to buy.

What is crazy to me is how unflexible they are with:

• Shipping: if I need 110V they'll only ship it to US/Canada. Can I buy a UK 220v to ship to Germany and just use a dumb adapter: no way!!
• Volumes: I get that they got crazy demand since 1 year ago, but come on, this is no PS5 requiring advanced CPU, nor is it hand made in Scotland. This is a nicely designed but low-tech product made in China, can't believe they have no way to ramp-up production.
• UX: strange how they stick with Indiegogo and communicate so awkwardly with customers. Like when they sent the email correcting time to 2pm UK instead of GMT, they didnt even mention making a mistake or even apologizing. Kind of weird.

I completely agree. That experience was so frustrating. I don't know what it was exactly, but here it is several days later and I'm STILL upset. This company doesn't seem to care enough to find a better selling platform, or to find a way to stop ebay/alibaba resellers from spamming the site with bots. I suspect they thrive on the hype and demand. Which just adds to the annoyance.

Haha, that is exactly my experience! After failing to snag one, furious, I stumbled on a LOOONG thread about the DF64 and after reading it through to the end ordered it on Alibaba. It checks every one of my boxes. It will be on my doorstep in 3 weeks. I can't wait!

I doubt they enjoy seeing scalpers buy their product and sell it at a profit. It was possible to just go onto Indigogo and order a Niche for ~2 years, there was no competition or waiting for new stock to show up. So this problem of the website crashing and selling out in less than an hour is still very new to them, and I'd guess that they want to figure out a new system too.

"New" is relative. Niche's scarcity has been an issue for many months. As have scalpers.