Monday, February 19, 2007

One book down!

I'm happy.

I just got a sample book printed up, and it turned out GREAT. I'm very pleased with the result.




A little about what's been going on...

I'm currently doing a small business training course, as I explained in an earlier post. The basic idea of it is that I do the 7-week training, where they teach things like accounting, legal crap, marketing and generally all the little skills that are supposed to help a small business thrive. It's been pretty good so far. It's a lot of work, but I'm learning heaps.

Anyway, in a nutshell, my business idea is producing and selling personalised children's picture books. They're personalised in the sense that I'll have a few different story templates (some for girls, some for boys), and I'll change things like the character's name (the "Daniel" name in the book above is just a place-holder, chosen in particular for the nice alliteration), hair colour and skin tone to match the child whom the book is for.

There are ancillary things I'm going to be doing as well, to pick up the slack in sales. I'll be marketing myself pretty hardcore for freelance illustrating work, as well as producing and selling other illustrated products, like gift cards, prints, calendars and things like that. I'm thinking about having those personalised too.

There are still some problems to sort out, like finding cheaper printing to actually make the sale of the books viable. That's what I'm concentrating my energies on next.

So that's basically it. If all goes to plan, my business will be in full operation by the end of the course in about 5 or 6 more weeks!

I'm still tossing up on business names, but when I finally decide on one, I'll set up a website with order forms and the whole lot. I'll keep you posted on that.

No one is allowed to comment about the pink grass.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

What a great idea. When you get this up and running, consider this my expression of interest for like all of the kids that I know. It is so hard to buy non mass-produced non crap presents for kids.

ally said...

That is an amazing idea, and you are so talented I'm sure you'll do well :)

Anonymous said...

That's so awesome and the book looks fantastic (even resting on the pink grass!)

Well done mate.

Polia said...

Joe this is awesome!!!!
So freakin talented!!!