Playing Grounded, Ltd® launched their first Kickstarter campaign Wednesday, August 5, 2015 to jump start their premier line of 1000 piece geek art jigsaw puzzles featuring artwork from around the world. Eric and Lara Andersen, founders of Playing Grounded, Ltd,® chose five of their favorite puzzle art selections to offer backers. They will need to raise at least $30,000 by September 5th to proceed with production.
The Andersens founded their Pennsylvania based puzzle company in May 2013. Their mission was to create collector quality jigsaw puzzles featuring art that is unique to the puzzle industry, with an emphasis on geek and otaku subject matters more popular with teenagers and young adults. They have spent the last two years researching and contracting talented artists and photographers from the U.S. and countries around the world, including Germany, Argentina, Georgia and Japan. To date, they have compiled a diverse collection of puzzle art.
With the high cost of puzzle manufacturing, and after investing their funds in translation and licensing fees, the Andersens decided to turn to Kickstarter.com to seek support to ‘kickstart’ their new venture.
According to company founder, Eric Andersen, “Putting together jigsaw puzzles has been a favorite pastime of ours for nearly 20 years now. Since we are also fans of geek and otaku culture including anime, manga, graphic novels and gaming, we decided to combine the two and create the next generation in jigsaw puzzles. We’re doing this because we love jigsaw puzzles, we love [this] art and we want to support our artists and share their work with the world.”
The Kickstarter campaign features puzzles at $24 USD a piece, plus the cost of shipping. All Playing Grounded, Ltd® puzzles will be manufactured in the U.S.A. to the highest quality standards possible, and each puzzle will come in a limited edition numbered Kickstarter box.
The puzzle selections include art from veteran Kickstarters Daniel Lieske, creator, writer and illustrator of the digital graphic novel “Worm World Saga,” freelance illustrator and graphic novelist Brett Brooks (“Dust Bunny” and “Deuces Wild”), as well as independent artist, Anuka Baratashvili, manga and game artist, Fuzichoco, and illustrator and concept artist, Sarah Webb.
According to co-founder Lara Andersen, “When we contacted each of the artists, they were all open, and even excited, about having their artwork featured on our puzzles. If nothing else, it’s been both a fun and rewarding experience working one-on-one with such extremely talented people.”
The Andersens welcome everyone interested to checkout and share their Kickstarter campaign.
Playing Grounded website: www.playinggroundedpuzzles.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com
Twitter: twitter.com
Kickstarter link: www.kickstarter.com
Contact Information
Lara Andersen
playinggrounded77@gmail.com
(610) 731-6250
