Dakota Expressions

It has been a busy week... I am a couple days late in writing about the training I did with Dan and Robin in South Dakota. Dan has certainly got his hands full of work in the basement of the couple's home. Their new embroidery machine is an addition to the pad printer and laser engraver that they have already been making money with. I am impressed with the attention to detail that Dan and Robin have; they certainly are putting out quality products!

On day 1 of training I worked with Dan and he had a lot of questions about digitizing (as many people do). He had sent a few logos off to a digitizing company in India and as we started stitching these designs out he saw the value in good digitizing. As I started teaching about digitizing and the importance of underlay, proper density and proper stitch types he began to understand why some companies charge more for the service. It is true that you get what you pay for!

The company that I use for digitizing is www.artworksource.com and if you would like to check out their services you can email them at service@artworksource.com and give them my code Nancy2000 and they will send you a coupon code to get 1 design digitized for free!

Patch Pals

I didn't get to meet Mackenzie this week because she is off to college these days, however in the basement of her parents' house in eastern Iowa there is a full blown business that was started because she was diagnosed with severe amblyopia when she was three.

To find out more about amblyopia or Mackenzie click here!

You may be wondering what Mackenzie or amblyopia have to do with embroidery... well, I'm going to tell you.   Cathy and Bill came up with an ingenious idea years ago when they were faced with reality of making their daughter wear an eye patch most of the day every day... make it fun!  They began looking for a way to decorate the eye patches and found embroidery to be an ideal solution.  For years the patches were being sent to a local embroidery shop to be embroidered.  This past week I had the pleasure of meeting Bill and Cathy and working with them to bring the embroidery portion of the business in house.   The use of their embroidery machine is going to give them more control of the lead time on the patches. 

If you have been following my posts you will remember the link that I posted about Marks book - "The Spirit of an American Entrepreneur" -  That spirit was alive in Cathy and Bill!   

One of my recent trainees sent me an email with a scanned image of a business card and was having trouble remembering how to use the vector conversion tool in Design Shop.  This doesn't work for those of you who have Design Shop Lite or Design Shop without the Vector Option.  The vector option is available in Package B when purchasing a BRAVO.   As with many things, there are more ways to accomplish the same thing, but this is my personal favorite.

Limitless Lasering

Traveled to the metropolis of Milan Minnesota this week to teach Randy and his son how to use their new embroidery machine. Randy isn't just learning about embroidery though.... Embroidery is going to add to the product offerings of his sign vinyl, sublimation and engraving business. The next step in the new business is going to be direct to garment printing. Sounds like Randy is well on his way to building a one stop shop for anything printed.

Randy raised his 4 kids while running a carpet laying business and he decided that laying carpet is getting a bit harder on him with each passing year. Randy also has several head of cattle, and now that the kids are gone he is having to take care of chores by himself. He began thinking it's time to change gears and cash in the cattle for some printing equipment that he can run without worrying about the weather (and believe me, it was freeeeezng in MN this week).

Maximum Promotions

I had a great time teaching Vesna and Alex at Maximum Promotions in Sioux Falls how to run their new embroidery machines. Maximum Promotions is a fairly large company that has gone national with it's flag business. As a Nebraskan, they were eager to show me the flag that they made for the Huskers. The 60'x80 flag that you can see in the attached photo has made by hand by Vesna and her team in the Applique department. Vesna and Alex are going to be instrumental in helping Maximum Promotions bring the embroidery production in house, giving them more control over price and lead times. Another benefit to having the machines in house is that they can create a single piece for their sales force to take out on sales calls. This is a very effective strategy in selling embroidered goods. If you haven't tried this yet, give it a shot!

Mark Nelsen, the owner of Maximum Promotions is also an author. As a fellow entrepreneur he recognized in me what he calls "a gift". The gift being the Spirit of the American Entrepreneur - which also happens to be the title of the book he wrote about those of us who choose to open our own business. I have read the book - it's free and it's online here.

Please take a couple of hours to read the book, especially if you feel like you also have the "gift".

Holy Coats!

Who wouldn't love to land a huge account?  Diane at Decorative Designs by Diane is working on an order of coats - in fact she has already done over 5000 coats for this one customer, and they are also needing caps, shirts, bags and other items.  MONEY!!!!

Diane has been embroidering for several years on a Happy machine and recently purchased her first AMAYA machine.  There was a few times today that she mentioned that she wasn't always happy with her Happy, so I hope that the time we spent in training will give her the knowledge base to appreciate the auto-tension system of her new machine. 

Diane's family experienced a rough month of January this year including the loss of her job as an ER nurse after 20 plus years.  Nursing full time while building her embroidery business was a great way for Diane and her husband to support their family, but after the loss of her nursing job the family is still going strong with several clients including the money client with the thousands and thousands of coats.

Just like Diane, many people purchase embroidery machines and start building their business while working a full time job.    Not only is it possible to have a part time job working for yourself to pay for those extra things like a trip to Hawaii (yah, that's what I'm saving my embroidery money for this year), it is possible to build a solid business that can provide the income you need in case you find yourself in a situation like Diane.