Air hockey table reaches its ultimate destination!

By Teresa Nov 6, 2002

That’s right, Joe H. of Georgia, U.S.A., was the lucky guy with the winning bid on ebay.com, and purchased an autographed air hockey table. Let me refresh your memory, in case you forgot. A few months ago BioWare decided to auction off our air hockey table, personally autographed by the BioWare staff, along with 2 autographed boxes of Neverwinter Nights. The money collected was contributed to the BioWare Kids’ Fund, which is a charity for sick kids at the Royal Alexandra Hospital. This money was matched by BioWare, and in total we contributed $12,000.00 CDN, to the BioWare Kids’ Fund. This fund is set up to support special outings for the sick kids at the hospital, and gives them a break from their otherwise stressful lives. The amount of money raised was very impressive! The hospital and kids are pretty happy.

"Making the delivery" Open Image in Gallery: View Small | View Large	"Crackin' the crate" Open Image in Gallery: View Small | View Large	"The table revealed" Open Image in Gallery: View Small | View Large
"Table art" Open Image in Gallery: View Small | View Large	"Table art 2" Open Image in Gallery: View Small | View Large	"Don't worry, it arrived in one piece!" Open Image in Gallery: View Small | View Large

Well back to my original story…the games that were auctioned, were no problem to package and ship, but when it came time to ship the air hockey table, well that took a little time to put together. Our biggest concern was making sure that it was packaged properly so that it did not get damaged in shipping. That’s where our friends over at Cratex came in. Cratex is a company specialized in building wooden crates, in order to transport items or for storage, etc. They did a great job building crates for our goodies at this past E3, so obviously they would be the right people for the job in this case.

I called up Darren, one super cool dude at Cratex, and asked if he could help us out, and the very next day he came around took some measurements, went back to the shop where his guys built us a swanky crate for the table. Darren called me to let me know the crate was ready to go, and that because this was for charity, Cratex had decided to donate it to us! Needless to say we were extremely grateful for that. Cratex rox!

So we had the packaging sorted out, now we had to deal with the shipping. We turned to our friendly neighborhood shipping company, Cole Freight. The folks there were extremely helpful and knowledgeable about shipping huge items from Canada to the United States. Lots of paper work to fill out, and we had to make sure the proper documents were completed so that the air hockey table arrived to its final destination.

We worked with both Susan and Russ over at Cole Freight, and both were so helpful to us. Susan made sure we had the right documentation and information, and she made some calls to arrange for the truck driver and meeting point in Georgia. Susan and the fine staff over at Cole Freight were also generous as well – donating the cost of shipping the air hockey table to Georgia! That was so kind of them. They also rock!

Finally, we had everything in place. The packaging and the shipping was all set up. On a bright and sunny day, Cole Freight came by and picked up the air hockey table. The driver brought it over to Cratex for packaging, and then off it went into the sunset…

This brought a smile to the new and proud owner, Joe, over in Georgia. After all this time, chatting back and forth, emails, paperwork and everything else, he finally would get to see and take home a personally autographed air hockey table, and a little bit of Canada. I sent an email to Joe, to let him know, and he was pretty pleased to hear that it was on its way. A few days went by and then finally I received an email from Joe saying that his air hockey table had arrived. He took a few photos to commemorate the moment, and as you can see he looks pleased as punch! Whew, Joe received his air hockey table.

Thanks so much to generous people over at Cratex and Cole Freight. They were extremely helpful and so nice to deal with. They sure made the whole process easier! Their generosity is much appreciated. And a HUGE thank you to the people who so generously donated the money in the first place to the BioWare Kids’ Fund. It’s being put to good use. :)

In the end, I made a new friend in Georgia, and now I know how to ship an air hockey table across the border.

Cheers…