Games
How do you fund a board game with crowdfunding?
Price the art, the print run and the heavy postage, prove the game is fun, then sell copies as rewards. Miss the goal and backers take their pledge back.
Short answer
Sell the first print run before you order it: each reward is a copy of the game, shipped once the goal is reached and the run is made. Price the art, the graphic design, the prototypes, the print run at the factory's minimum, the freight and the postage, which is heavy for a boxed game. Launch only once strangers have played it and asked for more. If the goal is met you claim the funds and order the run; if not, every backer takes their pledge back.
Key facts
- Each reward is a copy, an edition or an extra: never a share of the game or its sales.
- Up to 5 reward tiers, from a print and play file to a deluxe edition.
- No company, no ID and no approval queue to start. Writing and previewing costs nothing.
- All or nothing: pledges wait in escrow until the deadline.
- Each pledge pays 1.5% plus a flat $0.99.
What does it cost to make a board game?
Far more than the factory's price per copy. A game is many parts, and each one has a cost before the first box is printed:
- Art and illustration for the box, the board and every card.
- Graphic design, the rulebook, its editing and any translation.
- Prototypes: home made copies for playtesting, then a proof copy from the factory.
- The print run at the factory's minimum, with every component: board, cards, tokens, dice, miniatures, inserts, the box.
- Freight from the factory to you, and customs if it crosses a border.
- Storage and packing, if you don't do it at your kitchen table.
- Postage: a boxed game is heavy, so weigh a prototype and price it early.
- Toy safety and licences: check whether toy safety rules apply to your game where you sell, and get written permission for any theme or art you don't own.
- Fees, taken from each pledge.
How big should the goal be?
The cost of the smallest run the factory will print, plus everything around it. Cutting components is the surest way to bring it down.
For example: art $4,000, graphic design and rules $1,000, prototypes and a proof copy $500, 500 copies at $12 each $6,000, freight $1,000, postage at $8 a copy $4,000, and a buffer of $1,000. That is $17,500 before fees. At $45 a copy, about 400 backers. If your circle is smaller, start lighter: a card game with fewer components, or a print and play version that funds the art first. The goal planner adds the fees.
What rewards work for a board game?
Copies of the game in a few forms, and a way into it:
- Print and play: a file to print at home, cheap to deliver and good for a low level.
- The game: the standard edition, one copy.
- Deluxe edition: upgraded components, a numbered box or extra cards only backers get.
- Two copies: one to keep and one to give, or for a local game café.
- Your name or face on a card, for a few of the biggest backers.
- A signed copy and a game night with the designer.
- A small expansion with new cards or a new scenario.
Keep the levels to four or five at most, and price each one to cover its copy, its box and its postage. The reward tier planner shows what each one leaves you.
When should you launch, and who will back it?
When the rules are final, the art is far enough along to show, and players outside your friends ask when they can buy it. A game is easier to back once people see a turn being played, so film one.
Bring the prototype to game nights, clubs and cafés, and collect the email of everyone who asks for a copy. Ask the groups that played it to share the link, and set a share reward of up to 18.5% of each pledge for whoever brings a backer in. How to share your campaign covers the first week.
How do you keep a game from shipping late?
Promise a season, not a date, and leave months of room after the factory's quote. Late delivery is the main risk of any preorder campaign, and games have many steps that can slip.
- Get the proof, production and freight times in writing.
- Allow for the factory's holidays and for weeks at sea if it ships from far away.
- Approve the proof copy before the run starts, and check every component in it.
- Post an update at each step: art done, proof approved, printing, at sea, arrived, posted.
- If anything slips, tell backers that week, with the new date.
What does CoFunders cost for a board game?
Writing and previewing the campaign is free. Opening it costs $5 on the free plan. Each pledge pays 1.5% plus a flat $0.99, and the share reward you set comes out of the pledge too. The smallest pledge is $10, and backers pay by card or in USDC. The fee calculator shows what reaches you.
The percentage fee on a pledge follows the plan of the account making it. It's taken when the pledge is made, so it isn't returned if the campaign misses its goal. Paid plans aren't on sale today, so the published fee is the free plan's fee.
Check the VAT and tax on what you raise: running a campaign lists what to look at.
What if the game doesn't reach the goal?
If the goal isn't met by the deadline, you take your pledge back from escrow with one tap, and nobody has to approve it. What comes back is the amount held for you: your pledge minus the fees taken when you backed (the platform fee, the flat fee, any tip and any share reward the campaign pays).
You never order a run you can't sell, and a smaller edition of the same game can come back later.
How do you start?
- Playtest until strangers enjoy it, then get factory quotes for 500 and 1000 copies.
- Sign up in the app with email or Google.
- Write the story with a video of a turn, then the goal, the deadline and the rewards.
- Preview it, set the share reward and publish.
- Tell your playtesters on launch day, and post an update every week until the last copy ships.
How reward crowdfunding works, from the free course, explains the model. Everything you can fund has a guide for each kind of project, and every other question is in the answers.