The Crowd Supply Guide: When are Funds Received?


After spending months developing a new product, launching a crowdfunding campaign, and watching the pledges roll in, creators are understandably anxious to get started actually manufacturing their first batch of product to send to backers. As such, it’s important creators understand when they can expect to receive their funds.

Similarly, backers who use their hard-earned money to support campaigns and order goods from Crowd Supply want to know when and why they are charged, and when they can expect their orders to be fulfilled. These are all fair questions that span a lot of territory, so we thought we’d take some time to explain it all here.

There are two basic types of transactions at Crowd Supply: crowdfunding campaign pledges and post-campaign sales. Each works a little differently:

Crowdfunding Campaign Pledges

These are pledges to live crowdfunding campaigns that will help launch a project. That means backers are giving money to a creator who will use the capital to fund the first manufacturing run and bring the product to life. In exchange for this early support, backers are first in line to receive the product, typically at a discount off the intended retail price.

Backers are charged only if and when the project meets its funding goal. Once the goal is met, product creators will receive their backers’ contributions from Crowd Supply.

Should the goal be reached before the end-date of the campaign, creators can get funds shortly after the goal was met (collecting and transferring the money can take a few days), with any additional contributions transferred to the creator on the end-date of the campaign (assuming there were additional contributions).

Post-campaign Sales

For successfully funded projects, Crowd Supply will usually place an initial stocking order with the project creator at the same time crowdfunding funds are transferred. This way, the project creator can increase their initial production run to meet anticipated future demand. The exact purchase order terms, such as quantity, price, delivery schedule, and payment schedule, are mutually agreed upon by Crowd Supply and the project creator on a case-by-base basis and can depend on demonstrated demand during the crowdfunding campaign, among other factors. Project creators are also free to sell their products through their own site or other resellers.

The initial stocking order purchased by Crowd Supply serves to fill three kinds of post-campaign sales:

For all post-campaign sales (pre-orders, in-stock orders, and backorders), customers are charged at the time of the sale and products are shipped as soon as they are available.

We’ve built Crowd Supply to support new products as they evolve from crowdfunding to post-campaign sales. Each stage in this life cycle is aligned to both help creators and protect backers.


Question not answered here? Contact us to see how we can help.


The Crowd Supply Guide: Table of Contents

For Everyone

For Backers

For Creators

Getting Started

Before Your Campaign Launches

During Your Campaign

After Your Campaign Concludes


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