July 2022 Financial Update

Patreon is getting fancy with updates and even showing us in-progress month charges. So here's our financial update for the month of July.

After platform fees and merch that'll be sent out soon, we got $7,768 of the $9,029 that was pledged for July on August 5th which was transferred to our PayPal. We then took $6,000 of it and transferred it to our bank account. We keep some in PayPal to pay for things like Epic Games, some subs, and crew.

Patreon's cut totals $969 and payment fees (like billing costs) were $538.

The merch this month was $851.

YouTube ad revenue brought in $1,259 for the month of June on July 21st

Our expenses for the month of June were:

• Lawyer fees to the ex-GmbH: $2,565*

• Seven members of the core and some volunteers: $3,722

• Subscriptions for three monthly and one our PO Box (yearly): $351

• Postage: $130

• Ads for our store and site which we have 100% canceled as of August: $274

• Misc. store refunds, COGS, purchases, and fees totaling: $565
  
  *What are the lawyer fees? The German company wished to hire a bookkeeping and lawyer group to make sure everything was done correctly. Which is pretty understandable since things are a lot more difficult over in Germany (you can open a company here in the US for $100 in probably 5 minutes vs. the intense amount of paperwork and money it takes in Germany.)
  
  It was thought, by some, that it would only be necessary in the beginning to help out the German GmbH of VDR with funds until they were self sufficient with, more or less, side projects, to fund the company and project. VDR LLC, in the US, would pay invoices from across the Atlantic, until they made profits. As time went on, EU profits did not materialize and bills got higher.
  
  A brief mention of the ex VDR GmbH's finances and incorporation: It was very expensive and still is relatively. However, the roughly $30k that was immediately sunk into it's founding and various other funds did not come from Patreon nor contributions but (sadly, very sadly) Matt. We never even had a large enough Pateron audience nor monthly income to cover the costs of the GmbH.
  
  While that was money intended to go towards the game regardless, it could have gone into something much more productive than what came from it. Much was promised by talented individuals who fell short.
  
  When we decided to remove ourselves from the GmbH and the owner, part of the final agreement was the pay the outstanding bill to the lawyer - which was, in theory, generated when the GmbH was aligned with the LLC. There is only one payment left, in September for €2,500.