durtbagz: cutting myself a mullet would be easier than this

a look at the daily grind of a first-time entrepreneur trying to create an online retail company. being an IT nerd never sounded so good. at two weeks from launch, the stress is starting to show.

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durtbagz: we've moved

hey gang.

i moved the blog to wordpress...way better.

head over to http://durtbagz.wordpress.com and be sure to change it in your favorites. seriously.

durtbagz: less than 30 days to launch

on sunday i realized that if i didn't get my rear in gear, this thing wasn't going to launch by my deadline. this was sunday at about 2am. awesome.

so yesterday was full of dealing with the bag issue...still. you know, in my head, this idea worked out so well. i'd find a style of tote bag that i liked and a style of messenger bag that i liked. how hard could that be? aren't there only so many styles of these simple bags out there? no. there aren't. there are millions. and then you get into the details of each bag.
for example the size of the bag; fairly important. too small and you can't carry enough, too big and it's too full and heavy to want to carry it around. so when the right size, design is found, then we start looking at the material it's made of. the last thing i need is to start selling bags with the handles coming off or the image rubbing off of the outside. these are durtbagz; i want you to be able to back over them with your car, if ever the need occurs. i want you to be able to throw them in the wash if a banana gets smashed in it, (btw, i don't know if you know this or not, but banana peels are actually slick so don't step on one. if you don't believe me, then try it. you'll move like dawn on a slip 'n slide. i've proven this to many friends and a husband....it never gets old ).
now that we've covered all of those things and think that the bag is found, the imprint area comes into play. it doesn't do me much good to print a sign on an area that is 4" x 4" or smaller. it's not a logo, it's a picture. a real, made-up picture. it exists to be seen. period.

then, if i get all of these categories locked down to fit my needs, we now begin dealing with the distributor of said bags. and their minimum print orders and their turn around time and their shipping costs. typically, we get knocked out by their minimums, which can require us to buy anywhere from 12-99 of ONE image for EACH order. now eventually, i can confidently say that i will be purchasing images in the hundreds each month. but not right meow.
hence why i now know that something so simple in theory is so not simple in real life. welcome to my life of starting a business. i've just joined it myself.

i believe by the end of the week, i will have a distributor. my partner in crime on the bag situation and myself spent most of yesterday talking to distributors and running numbers and looking at different bags. we've got about 3-4 that we have narrowed it down to and i think we've found a place with a minimum that we can afford and handle. of course, now that i wrote that, we'll be starting the search all over again on thursday.

one other lesson i learned this morning: do not continue to add brown sugar to your oatmeal until you can taste it. at that point, it seems that it might be about three servings of sugar, which, as it turns out, is roughly two too many. wow.

happy fourth of july. hope you live somewhere you can shoot fireworks. like not in the desert. later this week, i'll post the winners for the first round of signs we'll be featuring.

click on the button and add me to your RSS feeds, if you are nerdy enough to know what that means.

durtbagz: flake-off friday

this morning i got up and i was talking to malcolm (husband), when it hit me what i was going to write about today. you know how it's funny when people mess up sayings that everyone knows? it's hilarious to me and mal does it on a regular basis. so i thought today's post would be funny mis-quotes and conversations...

while on our way to yellowstone, we were eating wasabe peas, when mal asks, 'what are these things? garbanzo beans?'
i reply, 'wasabe peas?'
'yeah', he says. 'what are they?'
'keep thinking on it for a little bit, i bet you can figure out what wasabe peas are', i say.
'yeah, but what are they? what's this green stuff?' he asks.
'it's peas. they are peas. they are called wasabe peas. wasabe peas are made with peas. they are peas,' i reply, maybe overreacting a bit.
'oh. well, i didn't know.' end of conversation.

'i am hotter than a horse in church!' spoken by a sorority sister of mine my junior year at ku during rush.

'people just turn a blind shoulder to all of this stuff...' malcolm at lunch last year.

'yeah, just trim it on the top and sides 'cause the party's in the front!'
'the party's in the back, honey.'
'oh yeah.' malcolm this morning in a conversation about mullets.

'yeah, those judas priests knocked on my door...'
'you mean jehovah's witnesses?'
'whatever...' penner. awesome.

people, you know you've got some, add to the list.
happy friday.

durtbagz: don't call us easy

first and foremost, this afternoon at lunch, i spotted (actually, it was pointed out to me, i'll be honest) the rarest of rare scottsdale mullets. it was in the middle of scottsdale in a rather la-ti-da restaurant. completely shocking and rare. i was a bit impressed at its bravery.

okay, on to biznass. we're still looking into adding some software to the site that will allow you to create your own sign right there on the site. i just had a look at the bare bones version and it's ugly. that will not be what you all will see if, and this is a big IF (say it like bob does on Office Space), we figure out how to incorporate this into the site.

i know i talked about this the other day, but it's a really big issue for this company. think about it, (and maybe i'm wrong on this) but i feel that if you go on the site and you can immediately create your own sign, you are more likely to do so. especially if you don't have too many options to worry about as far as tools and colors are concerned. the signs are all the same shape and colors. really, you'd just need a few tools to create the symbols. once you've created it, you'd be able to save it and submit it right there, with the click of a button. it could be just that easy.

but there is a dark side to this. when something is that easy, people tend to take advantage. basically, i can see people getting on their and submitting signs that aren't exactly appropriate because it's so easily accessible. i'm picturing getting multiple signs a day involving penises, the f-word, and whatever else is not okay to put on a website catering to a somewhat decent society.

if we don't or can't go with this software, then we'll have to go with the original plan of accepting signs in multiple formats. like i said, i want everyone to be able to participate: if you can use 'the internets,' as our president calls it, you can participate in the competition at durtbagz. if you know how to find us on the web and discover the competition, you'll be able to submit your design in some way shape or form. the possibilities at this point are the following:

• draw on paper and fax it

• draw on paper, scan and email it

• create on applications on computer and email it

we'll have parameters that you will have to meet, depending on the method of submission. for instance, don't create a gigantic banner, saying, 'happy mother's day', fax it, and expect it to be on there for your mother to see. i'll tell you right now, i'm not having it. get your mother a card and take her to dinner like everyone else. seriously. and speaking of proud mothers, don't email me pictures of paris hilton to put on a sign either. although, i'm pretty sure celebutards will be a theme for the competition at some point.

there are a lot of factors that will go into determining how this will play out. i'm not exactly sure that the easiest is necessarily the best. (brittany spears is a perfect example of this theory: easiest girl around? sure, she is. the best singer around? um...does she sing?). however, is the attention span of my customer base so short that they won't want to take the time to draw out a sign for submission? i'm asking this question to you all: will your participation depend on the method of submission and the time required to create the sign? or are you interested in being a part of things no matter what? and what would sway you one way or the other? seriously, i'd like some answers...comment, people. i'm asking for your comments.

tomorrow is flake-off friday (already?!?) and i'll try to come up with something other than stories of my childhood. and i've added a button at the top right. click it so you'll be notified when i update this. up above it is a counter of how many people clicked on it. notice it's at zero...do you want to fix that or what?

durtbagz: the competition

i blacked out yesterday and agreed to get up and run with a friend at 5am this morning. actually, i think i remember me asking her if i could join in sometime, but i didn't think she'd take me seriously. since i've already been up for three hours, i decided to post while i'm on a roll before i crash in a few hours.
my friend is training for a half ironman, (yes, she is insane), and that got me thinking about competition and how the competition will work for durtbagz. my plan calls for the general public (aka, you) to create signs and post them on the website for voting. this sounds great in my head and the consensus among you all seems to be that it is something you want to participate in. this makes me happy. very happy. now, how do we make this theory into a reality?
how are you going to submit your sign? how are you going to create it so that it can be posted? we're working on the logistics of this right now, and to be honest, at this point, i'm just not sure how this will play out.
i got the idea for having the competition after reading an article on a company called threadless. it's a tee shirt company that has an ongoing competition for the designs that go on the shirts. they got the idea for incorporating the competition into their company after one of the founders won a tee shirt design competition. he's a graphic designer, as were the majority of the other contestants. his partner is some kind of IT nerd and they developed their own site and software for it (i mean it as a compliment being an IT nerd; they had over $20mill in rev last year). their competitions have grown tremendously since they began in 2000 and they now have hundreds of submissions a day. but...there is no way an average joe like me could submit a design. when i researched what they required as far as the format of the file and the blah blah be blah ba blah...no idea. i love their idea. their requirements for being able to participate are ricockulous.
i want everyone to be able to participate, whether you know how to create the signs on the computer or not. i don't want their to be issues with people wanting to participate and not being able to because they may not be 'tech savvy'. if you have an idea, i want to see it and i want everyone else to see it too. so at this point, the options are to submit them as either drawings you have created on your computer on paint or any form that is more advanced than that (i use paint so you know most people 10 years younger than me are pros at it). or to literally draw them and scan them into a .jpg to submit.
my web design firm is investigating incorporating a software that could allow you to actually draw on a 'pad' on the site with your mouse. in theory, you'd be able to save the image and submit it, right there. don't' get excited because i think the possibility of this happening is slim to none, (at least right now, in a few years it will be very likely).
my goal is to make it as easy as possible for everyone to participate, no matter if you are a pro on photoshop or just like to draw with a pencil. hopefully, we can accommodate everyone.
okay, i'm off to take a nap. sorry this post isn't that funny, but bags is a serious bidness and i am hurting for sleep big time.

durtbagz: the website demo

hey gang. i was busy wasting time on mybloglog and realized i hadn't written anything today. whoops a daisy...




anyway, i've decided that today is the day for showing you all the demo for the website. here are the things you need to keep in mind when you look at it:

1. it's not done
2. it is a bit busy, but not if you're 19
c. we're adding a real photo to it once we get bagz produced to break up the black/yellow
4. there will be 15-20 signs as options and they are going in the squares featuring random pictures right now (along the bottom when you open it)
e. this is only the home page, the rest will follow once this one is completed

here it is... (yes, click on this).


let me know what you think about it, although, i have to admit, we're not going to change much on this page at this point. so there.



also, we don't have a slogan yet and i'm thinking i'll have a contest after we've been online for a while and let you guys choose one for me. the only one i can think of right now is, 'you don't have to have a mullet to be a durtbag,' but i think i have mullets on the brain.