Keyrings Complete!

Thanks to help from my friend and sister I completed my keyrings :D So those are complete and ready to sell, the only thing I'm slightly worried about is that i holepunched a couple of thema litle too close to the edge and am worried they might break easily but apart from that they look good ^^
Now just have to go into college and guilloting the rest of the keyrings and bookmarks and we'll be done! We also need to finish updating the website so people can buy everything online and I can start advertising it on things like my website and deviantART account.

running into trouble

okaaaayyyy spent £12 or so on printing credits at college to get everything printed but ran into SO MANY problems. Must also remember that Clym has paid me £20 back)

First of all we couldn't get any of the printers to work (was our first time using them this year) so we had to ask the IT guy and he explained about swiping in and putting money on our passes..
then we couldnt get the matt printer to work.. so we had to ask for help again and the problem was because we were trying to print portrait rather than landscape.. seems the bigger printers dont like portrait.
and then the printer ran out of pages and we spent ages trying to work out how to reload it but we had to call the IT guy again. Took 2 hours altogether to get it done!

Next, today I had to get a laminator off of my friend and I won't bore you with the problems there but what should have been a 40minute bus journey climbed to 2 hours... more time wasted!

but anyway, the biggest problem so far has just emerged.
Today I laminated everything - the bookmarks and the keyrings (clym is making the badges) and it was going great.

But the keychains we ordered don't work with the printouts! Basically the hole is too small to let the laminated paper go through..

(keychain on its own)



(and here is what it looks like if we leave it. the keyring has to be attached to the bigger loop as the other hole is too small)


So my sister came up with the idea of cuting off that loose end half of the keychain but the new problem from that is that there is no room between the keychain and the keyring which means the plastic might bend a lot easier and get in the way!
Although it is a solution and this way doesn't look as stupid..
Next time need to remember - buy beaded keychains!!

The only remaining problem is that cutting laminated paper with scissors really hurts my hand.. It's okay for the bookmarks as we're going to use the guillotine at college but I have to cut my keyrings in different shapes!


Can't really afford to spend anymore on this project :(

working on quantity

We are going to make;

100 keyrings
100 bookmarks
74 badges

Rough prices (may change);
Bookmarks- £1
Keyrings- £1.50
Badges- £0.50
Commissions- £3-5

We will print everything tomorrow!

Keeping track of spendings..

Thought i'd write down here what I'd spent so I can sort it out with clym and work out if we make any profit later XD

£21.74 - badge maker
£13.98 - 2 badge refill sets..
£6.25 - 100 lamination pouches
£1.50 - practising buying a bookmark from the site

= 43.47
wooooahhh.. really need to make that back haha! i know clym has also spent some money on the keychains so we will need to discuss how to pay this all later XD

I also spent money on business cards and the banner but they are for my own persona use so i don't have to worry about that.. roughly that amounts to £60 though >< (350 business cards, plus holder, plus the banner)

am having a skype meeting with him at 2pm today so should write more on that soon~
he also fixed the paypal thing on the website and added postage and packaging..
oh! and i worked out i can borrow my friends laminator on friday so the rush now is to print everything on thursday and over the weekend prepare it all to be sold! wish us luck will be a busy few days!

other things to think about;
sending an email round the college
putting up posters to advertise
whether we're selling on the same day as anyone else for networking

evil lamination problems

Okay.. we are having a sliiight setback in that the laminator we were going to use is unavailable.. my friend thought she had one but it turned out she didnt.. so we have to find another method.

I posted on facebook asking if there was a place that sold laminators cheaply and got the suggestion of trying rymans which has this product which looks good.. but then again we are already over budget and £26 is a lot!
http://www.ryman.co.uk/1228059160/Texet-A4-Value-Pack-Laminator-Trimmer-and-50-Laminating-Pouches/Product

Sooooo.. we were thinking of trying stickyback plastic instead, but as Clym and some others have pointed out its quite fiddly and if it goes wrong you cant change it. Here is a video we found demonstrating that;
http://youtu.be/wB-NQsHZUzE

so we are thinking of a way round that..

in the meantime, clym created an awesome website for us! So people overseas can buy our stuff;
http://twoartistsinacorner.carbonmade.com/
and the paypal place;
http://artistspaypal.blogspot.com/

minor setbacks but we hope to go ahead with our plan to sell on monday!!
the facebook page is also going well..

Facebook Page

We now have a facebook page for our product!!

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Two-Artists-In-A-Corner/116904221729035?sk=wall

Just quickly set it up this evening, but this should promote our business a little better! Over the coming days we will add all of our products available and also do a bit of market research - posting a 'question' about what people will prefer to buy which they can then vote for.

Let's hope we are a success! We need to break even.

Formative

Me and Clym had our formative assessment on Tuesday and we have plenty to think about!

Advertising ideas;
-putting posters in the elevators... around the entrance to the college and random other places people will see them like bathrooms!
-sending an email round a few days before to advertise
-creating a facebook group to promote our business
-selling on the same day as other students on our course to draw more attention to all of us. This could also really help with networking :)

Refreshing our minds on the schedule;

I am ahead of schedule for most things.. Have draw everything and purchased everything (except the laminator and the frames... have scrapped the cakes idea) so things are going well and after we make some more should be on track to sell :D

Having a slight problem with the lamination though.. The college doesnt have a laminator! So me and Clym are going to see if we can find one elsewhere, and if not I'm going to check out amazon and see if I can buy one for us!

Also my banner arrived!! it is HUGE.. 2 meters tall!! It looks like this;

Tried to make the colours bright and eye-catching to attract attention.. and it really works hehe :D this will be better than putting up posters but i want to advertise it as much as possible all the same ^^ It can also stand up on its own so won't have to worry about ruining any walls or using bluetack.


REMINDER TO SELF - SCAN AND UPLOAD FORMATIVE FORM HERE! then email to robert~

Finished Drawing :O

Here are the finished result of the things I want to sell! Just got to work out where to print and laminate them :)

Bookmarks;

Keyrings and Badges;


Might be a good idea to print them off and for advertising research see if anyone is actually interested in buying them, and which ones are the most popular! Since that way we can make more of those ones... I'm quite happy with them, will try and have a prototype of each ready next week or the beginning of the week after.

Updates

More progress!

Have bought a badge maker here;

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bandai-Badge-It-Maker/dp/B0000BX8AU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1304116560&sr=8-1
and it should arrive tomorrow! We just need to finish making our badges and order some more.

We are making;
-5 badges each
-5 keyrings each
-5 bookmarks each
-50-250 business cards each (not sure yet)
and I've got my banner which should also arrive tomorrow.

I've already spent about 40-50 pounds on this project but I know in the long run it will be very useful.
So far I have;
done about half of the badges, half of one bookmark, half of a keyring, sent off for my banner and business cards and am looking into ordering key chains now.

We are making progress.. I hope to at least finish all the badges and half the bookmarks by Friday if not more! So much to do, it should be fun..
Also need to consider posters and sending round an email to the college before we have our stall!

Till next time...

p.s. am not going to post any of my designs here in case there are thieves about =p
here are some examples I am basing the designs and sizes on though;

So expect stuff like that but with my original characters XD

keyring ref;


bookmark ref;


badges ref;