Thursday we took more steps toward unearthing our diamond mine in the rough. We filed Articles of Organization for a limited liability company with the Secretary of State's Office. We are told that this offers greater protection to business owners than a sole proprietorship. When we open our ropes and obstacle course, we figured it would be wise to have this.
Today we secured an Employee Identification Number with the Internal Revenue Service. This will facilitate us hiring employees in the future and it also allows us to start selling t-shirts and golf shirts on our website using credit card payments through iPayment.
Because our business proposal was not accepted on the crowdfunding website we had hoped to use, we decided to go ahead and publish our proposal on our website. We had a difficult time with our GoDaddy account, so Thursday we also switched our website to iPage web hosting, which is ranked as one of the top companies. For $3 a month, they will (supposedly) offer a much better website than what we could get with GoDaddy. We made some progress today, but we still have a long way to go. If only building a website were as easy as filing Articles of Organization.
Part of the website we built today was a page featuring the video that we discussed on our blog last week (see "'Wild Man' to the rescue"). Wild Man added our logo onto the end of the video Wednesday, prepared the video file and uploaded it to YouTube. We linked our website to that page today. We can't wait for you to see the video, but we will wait to unveil it when the website is ready to take orders.
Wild Man's dad, the owner of Bennett Design Group in Little Rock, is working to get a few khaki-colored t-shirts on which to print our logo. We will then take photos of them and put them on our website. While we are disappointed that our proposal didn't make that fundraising website, we are encouraged that we are making progress every week.
Thanks for your interest. We are anxious for you to see our new website.
Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure blog
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Sunday, March 25, 2012
The best investment Little Rock has made
We love Little Rock! It's a pretty good place to live and raise a family. In about three minutes from anywhere in the city, you can enjoy a beautiful view, thanks to the river and the rolling hills on which the western part of the city is built. That's part of the reason we want to build our Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure here.
Saturday we enjoyed a treasure Little Rock and North Little Rock have developed in recent years: the Arkansas River Trail and the new Two Rivers Bridge. If you haven't visited the new bridge over the Little Maumelle River, you need to grab your kids and your friends and make a morning of it. We would say it is the best investment the city of Little Rock has made in many years.
First we enjoyed a picnic and watched the fishermen catching fish near the dam. Then our Diamond in the Rough (our 8 y/o son) didn't complain as we rode up and over the Big Dam Bridge from the North Little Rock side and made our way west to the new Two Rivers Bridge. It will be even better in October when construction is completed on the new ramp from the dam bridge heading west.
I would guess that we rode our bikes eight miles, and it is a wonderful path through the trees. Robyn and I rode our new tandem bicycle (thanks, Grandfather!) which we love. Our little guy can't make it all the way downtown from the dam, but for those with strong legs, make the time to ride the river trail all the way downtown, cross over at the Clinton Library and come back on the North Little Rock side. The NLR trail is even better than the LR trail.
Take plenty of water and wear sunscreen. Summertime may be months away, but it's already hot out there, and we got sunburned. If you are prepared, it is a bike ride you and your family will treasure.
Saturday we enjoyed a treasure Little Rock and North Little Rock have developed in recent years: the Arkansas River Trail and the new Two Rivers Bridge. If you haven't visited the new bridge over the Little Maumelle River, you need to grab your kids and your friends and make a morning of it. We would say it is the best investment the city of Little Rock has made in many years.
First we enjoyed a picnic and watched the fishermen catching fish near the dam. Then our Diamond in the Rough (our 8 y/o son) didn't complain as we rode up and over the Big Dam Bridge from the North Little Rock side and made our way west to the new Two Rivers Bridge. It will be even better in October when construction is completed on the new ramp from the dam bridge heading west.
I would guess that we rode our bikes eight miles, and it is a wonderful path through the trees. Robyn and I rode our new tandem bicycle (thanks, Grandfather!) which we love. Our little guy can't make it all the way downtown from the dam, but for those with strong legs, make the time to ride the river trail all the way downtown, cross over at the Clinton Library and come back on the North Little Rock side. The NLR trail is even better than the LR trail.
Take plenty of water and wear sunscreen. Summertime may be months away, but it's already hot out there, and we got sunburned. If you are prepared, it is a bike ride you and your family will treasure.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
'Your project has been declined'
Have you ever received a letter in the mail from someone you loved, and you were so excited to open it but then discovered that it was a rejection letter? That's the way we felt when we opened our e-mail last night from the funding website to which we submitted our Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure.
"Thank you for taking the time to submit your project. Unfortunately, this isn't the right fit for us. We receive many projects daily and review them all with great care and appreciation. We have determined that your project does not meet our guidelines. We wish you the best of luck as you continue to pursue your endeavor."
We are very disappointed, but we see it as ... an obstacle, not a dead end. We had just watched "The Adventures of Tintin," and near the end of the movie Captain Haddock encourages Tintin, "You care about something, you fight for it. You hit a wall, you push through it." My dad used to love to quote a short speech made by Winston Churchill to a graduating class: "Never, never, never give up." And of course there is Romans 8:28, "All things work together for good to those who love God."
We will continue looking for funds to finance our dream. We hope to start selling our t-shirts online soon. Meantime, we'd love to hear how you overcame difficult circumstances.
"Thank you for taking the time to submit your project. Unfortunately, this isn't the right fit for us. We receive many projects daily and review them all with great care and appreciation. We have determined that your project does not meet our guidelines. We wish you the best of luck as you continue to pursue your endeavor."
We are very disappointed, but we see it as ... an obstacle, not a dead end. We had just watched "The Adventures of Tintin," and near the end of the movie Captain Haddock encourages Tintin, "You care about something, you fight for it. You hit a wall, you push through it." My dad used to love to quote a short speech made by Winston Churchill to a graduating class: "Never, never, never give up." And of course there is Romans 8:28, "All things work together for good to those who love God."
We will continue looking for funds to finance our dream. We hope to start selling our t-shirts online soon. Meantime, we'd love to hear how you overcame difficult circumstances.
Sunday, March 18, 2012
'Wild Man' to the Rescue
We are so excited about our business proposal, website, blog and Facebook page. We believe that the Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure is going to be a hugely successful business. Our job now is to convince others that it will succeed and that it is worth supporting.
This past week we entered our information on a website that supports entrepreneurs and helps them raise money. They "strongly suggest" that you develop a video to share your dream with prospective supporters. Every few months it seems that we see one of these videos in the news, including one last week with the headline, "Is This the Best Startup Launch Video Ever?"
Our friend Scott in Atlanta with Stormer-Brooks Illustration suggested six months ago that we produce a video to post on the Internet. Last week, we finally got around to writing a script and took our Diamond in the Rough (a.k.a. our 8 y/o son) into the woods to shoot the video. When we came home and watched the video, we were disappointed to hear that the wind had played havoc with the built-in microphone and made the video unusable. A few days later we tried again, and that time it worked. Here's a shot of our Diamond in the Rough from the raw video.
We loaded the video onto our home PC and tried to use the ImageMixer software that came with our video camera to edit it. Maybe some techie could figure out how to do something fancy with it, but we couldn't, so we immediately thought of "Wild Man." He is the very creative 13 y/o son of our good friends, the Bennetts. He's already produced a couple of videos with his older brother and sister, and we possess one of the first short stories he wrote several years ago, just in case he ever becomes famous.
Renee invited us to come over and let Wild Man edit our video on their MacBook Pro. Wow, I want one of those, but they're just too darn expensive. Anyway, we started to edit a little after seven Friday night, and about 2 1/2 hours later we were down to the last scene to edit. Then to our horror the software froze! Wild Man and I were almost to the point of tears thinking we had lost all of our night's work.
About that time, Mike came home from work and suggested we shut down the computer and turn it back on. Sure enough, the iMovie software automatically saved our project. After some experimenting, we were able to make the last edits and finished around 10:30 p.m. Wild Man did a great job, not to mention giving up a night of watching the NCAA basketball tournament. We see big things in store for him.
Thanks to Wild Man and his dad, we were able to save the final version and upload it to the Internet that night, though we didn't finish that until about 11:30 p.m. (My apologies again, Mike and Renee, for keeping you guys up that late.) Now we excitedly wait to hear if our project will be approved and put on the website so that the world can view it and decide if they want to support it. We will keep you posted.
This past week we entered our information on a website that supports entrepreneurs and helps them raise money. They "strongly suggest" that you develop a video to share your dream with prospective supporters. Every few months it seems that we see one of these videos in the news, including one last week with the headline, "Is This the Best Startup Launch Video Ever?"
Our friend Scott in Atlanta with Stormer-Brooks Illustration suggested six months ago that we produce a video to post on the Internet. Last week, we finally got around to writing a script and took our Diamond in the Rough (a.k.a. our 8 y/o son) into the woods to shoot the video. When we came home and watched the video, we were disappointed to hear that the wind had played havoc with the built-in microphone and made the video unusable. A few days later we tried again, and that time it worked. Here's a shot of our Diamond in the Rough from the raw video.
We loaded the video onto our home PC and tried to use the ImageMixer software that came with our video camera to edit it. Maybe some techie could figure out how to do something fancy with it, but we couldn't, so we immediately thought of "Wild Man." He is the very creative 13 y/o son of our good friends, the Bennetts. He's already produced a couple of videos with his older brother and sister, and we possess one of the first short stories he wrote several years ago, just in case he ever becomes famous.
Renee invited us to come over and let Wild Man edit our video on their MacBook Pro. Wow, I want one of those, but they're just too darn expensive. Anyway, we started to edit a little after seven Friday night, and about 2 1/2 hours later we were down to the last scene to edit. Then to our horror the software froze! Wild Man and I were almost to the point of tears thinking we had lost all of our night's work.
About that time, Mike came home from work and suggested we shut down the computer and turn it back on. Sure enough, the iMovie software automatically saved our project. After some experimenting, we were able to make the last edits and finished around 10:30 p.m. Wild Man did a great job, not to mention giving up a night of watching the NCAA basketball tournament. We see big things in store for him.
Thanks to Wild Man and his dad, we were able to save the final version and upload it to the Internet that night, though we didn't finish that until about 11:30 p.m. (My apologies again, Mike and Renee, for keeping you guys up that late.) Now we excitedly wait to hear if our project will be approved and put on the website so that the world can view it and decide if they want to support it. We will keep you posted.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Look Out, Old Chicago, Here We Come
As we give you a few more days to vote for which message to print on our t-shirts, we want to follow up on our post last week about Rhea Lana's Children's Consignment event. See that post to learn more about the popular business.
Robyn worked two days preparing 100 pieces of our children's clothing to sell at the Rhea Lana's West Little Rock event. She washed, ironed and hung the clothes, put price tags on them and uploadeded the details on their website. Both of us volunteered to work at the consignment sale because if you volunteer a certain number of hours, you get a pass to shop early and beat the crowds.
It was fun to watch Robyn get excited every night during the sale as she tracked her progress on the computer. She's a detail person, so she would go to the Rhea Lana website, log on and examine the list of what items sold and would keep track of her daily sales. She would pour over the list and express her surprise over what items had or hadn't sold yet. In the end she was hoping her sales would reach $200. That would be a nice blessing.
$200 may not sound like much, but with a wife like Robyn, we can stretch that out more than most couples. She is adept at shopping for bargains. Just tonight she found several shirts on clearance at Old Navy for $.97. They were marked down 92 to 97 percent! Thank you, Sweetie.
Back to the consignment sale. As we explained last week, Rhea Lana collects 30 percent of sales and consignors get to keep 70 percent. We are very excited to report that Robyn netted about $170. I don't know what she has planned for that, but I'm thinking that will pay for us to eat seven deep-dish pizzas at our favorite pizza place, Old Chicago, which is about a 2-iron shot away from our house. We also like Gusano's downtown, but we can walk to Old Chicago. They are not as good as Lou Malnatti's in Chicago, but they are close.
Please go to our Facebook page and vote for the message you like best for our t-shirts. Thank you.
Robyn worked two days preparing 100 pieces of our children's clothing to sell at the Rhea Lana's West Little Rock event. She washed, ironed and hung the clothes, put price tags on them and uploadeded the details on their website. Both of us volunteered to work at the consignment sale because if you volunteer a certain number of hours, you get a pass to shop early and beat the crowds.
It was fun to watch Robyn get excited every night during the sale as she tracked her progress on the computer. She's a detail person, so she would go to the Rhea Lana website, log on and examine the list of what items sold and would keep track of her daily sales. She would pour over the list and express her surprise over what items had or hadn't sold yet. In the end she was hoping her sales would reach $200. That would be a nice blessing.
$200 may not sound like much, but with a wife like Robyn, we can stretch that out more than most couples. She is adept at shopping for bargains. Just tonight she found several shirts on clearance at Old Navy for $.97. They were marked down 92 to 97 percent! Thank you, Sweetie.
Back to the consignment sale. As we explained last week, Rhea Lana collects 30 percent of sales and consignors get to keep 70 percent. We are very excited to report that Robyn netted about $170. I don't know what she has planned for that, but I'm thinking that will pay for us to eat seven deep-dish pizzas at our favorite pizza place, Old Chicago, which is about a 2-iron shot away from our house. We also like Gusano's downtown, but we can walk to Old Chicago. They are not as good as Lou Malnatti's in Chicago, but they are close.
Please go to our Facebook page and vote for the message you like best for our t-shirts. Thank you.
Friday, March 9, 2012
Please vote for our t-shirt message today
We are down to the final days for you to vote for what message to print on our t-shirts. We will sell these t-shirts to help raise money to build our business dream, the Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure. Please go to our Facebook page to vote for one of two messages to print on our T-shirts.
One day last week David thought of "Get a piece of the rock," but one of you reminded us that Prudential Insurance might not appreciate us using their trademarked slogan. Originally we thought of "I can't wait to play at the..." or "Follow me to the..." After we solicited suggestions here and on our Facebook page, our friend Kerry in Atlanta suggested, "I got ICED at..." In the end, our friends at Stormer-Brooks Illustration in Atlanta gave us our two finalists, so they get a free t-shirt.
We're pleased that our finalists are: "Join The Adventure!" and "We'll Show You The Ropes!"
Please vote by Sunday. We want to start producing and selling t-shirts soon.
One day last week David thought of "Get a piece of the rock," but one of you reminded us that Prudential Insurance might not appreciate us using their trademarked slogan. Originally we thought of "I can't wait to play at the..." or "Follow me to the..." After we solicited suggestions here and on our Facebook page, our friend Kerry in Atlanta suggested, "I got ICED at..." In the end, our friends at Stormer-Brooks Illustration in Atlanta gave us our two finalists, so they get a free t-shirt.
We're pleased that our finalists are: "Join The Adventure!" and "We'll Show You The Ropes!"
Please vote by Sunday. We want to start producing and selling t-shirts soon.
Monday, March 5, 2012
A successful business model
Last week Robyn worked feverishly preparing to participate in a relatively new and wildly successful venture known as Rhea Lana's Children's Consignment. It is a business idea that Rhea Lana Riner of Conway, Ark., started from her living room in 1997. Her dream was to get her friends to bring clothes and toys their kids had outgrown and sell them for them at a reduced price to other moms. After several years the idea exploded, and now they have 52 franchises in 17 states.
Robyn washed, ironed and hung 100 pieces of our children's clothing to sell. She did all the work except that I helped pin the price tags to about half the items. Tuesday I volunteered to help with the setup of the consignment sale because if you volunteer a certain number of hours, you get a pass to go shop early and beat the crowds. Plus, I wanted to see what all the hoopla was about. Maybe I could learn some things for our business dream.
Having never been to it, I had no idea what to expect. They rent approximately 25,000 square feet of warehouse space for the west Little Rock sale, which other workers told me is smaller than their typical sales space. This year they rented room on the east and west sides of the Little Rock Climbing Center, which I've wanted to see since it will be competition for our business dream. "Kelly" and another lady, who work regularly with Rhea Lana, welcomed me and gave me numerous tasks during my shift. The organization was impressive, and the number of racks on which to hang clothes was equally impressive.
A few days later we went to shop at the consignment sale for clothes for our son. The warehouse, as you can imagine, is chock full of clothes. You can hardly walk through it because of the clothes and the people. But I think what impressed me the most is how Riner and her partners have put together such a fine product/organization/service that people like myself and my wife would take hours (and days, really) out of our lives to volunteer to put this venture on twice a year.
It's a win/win situation. Rhea Lana provides the space, organizes volunteers and advertises the sale. Consignors provide the clothes and toys. Volunteers set up the racks, take the consignments, man the cash registers and then come back to buy what other people no longer need. Riner collects 30 percent of the sales; consignors get to keep 70 percent, and everyone is happy.
Here's a business model from which we all can learn.
Just a reminder...
We're hoping more people will go to our Facebook page to give us ideas for the perfect message to print on our T-shirts that we plan to start selling soon. The other day I thought of "Get a piece of the rock," but one of you reminded me that Prudential Insurance might not appreciate us using their trademarked slogan. Please share your suggestions with us soon.
Robyn washed, ironed and hung 100 pieces of our children's clothing to sell. She did all the work except that I helped pin the price tags to about half the items. Tuesday I volunteered to help with the setup of the consignment sale because if you volunteer a certain number of hours, you get a pass to go shop early and beat the crowds. Plus, I wanted to see what all the hoopla was about. Maybe I could learn some things for our business dream.
Having never been to it, I had no idea what to expect. They rent approximately 25,000 square feet of warehouse space for the west Little Rock sale, which other workers told me is smaller than their typical sales space. This year they rented room on the east and west sides of the Little Rock Climbing Center, which I've wanted to see since it will be competition for our business dream. "Kelly" and another lady, who work regularly with Rhea Lana, welcomed me and gave me numerous tasks during my shift. The organization was impressive, and the number of racks on which to hang clothes was equally impressive.
A few days later we went to shop at the consignment sale for clothes for our son. The warehouse, as you can imagine, is chock full of clothes. You can hardly walk through it because of the clothes and the people. But I think what impressed me the most is how Riner and her partners have put together such a fine product/organization/service that people like myself and my wife would take hours (and days, really) out of our lives to volunteer to put this venture on twice a year.
It's a win/win situation. Rhea Lana provides the space, organizes volunteers and advertises the sale. Consignors provide the clothes and toys. Volunteers set up the racks, take the consignments, man the cash registers and then come back to buy what other people no longer need. Riner collects 30 percent of the sales; consignors get to keep 70 percent, and everyone is happy.
Here's a business model from which we all can learn.
Just a reminder...
We're hoping more people will go to our Facebook page to give us ideas for the perfect message to print on our T-shirts that we plan to start selling soon. The other day I thought of "Get a piece of the rock," but one of you reminded me that Prudential Insurance might not appreciate us using their trademarked slogan. Please share your suggestions with us soon.
Friday, March 2, 2012
The power of social media
While we wait for folks to give us suggestions on what message to print on our t-shirts, we thought we'd write once more on social media. We are so unplugged into social media that we have a lot to learn, but one thing is obvious based on watching our five children: social media is powerful.
As we work to build this business dream of ours, we are aware that it would be helpful to tap into this powerful new resource. We would love to hear your suggestions on how we can do this. Is there anything we could produce at this stage that might become a YouTube sensation?
Scott, our logo designer, suggested we put up a video showing our son playing with broken bottles and rusty car parts wishing there were a place he could go and have fun. Then, like the old used-car salesmen of the 70s, we jump in and paint a wonderful picture of the Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure, but it only exists in our imagination. If it is to be a reality, we need people to help us.
We know that established businesses that provide poor customer service are going to hear about it, and see it, on YouTube. We immediately think of the video of the FedEx package deliverer who threw a computer monitor over a customer's fence in December. That video was viewed eight million times. A singer named Dave Carroll produced a music video, about United Airlines breaking his expensive Taylor guitar, that has been viewed 11 million times.
This kind of thing has birthed a new industry: customer complaining. We don't own an Apple iPhone, but we've read that there is now a ComplainApp for customers to broadly voice their displeasure with a company. Of course other entrepreneurs have seized the opportunity to offer software and other services to help companies better track their delivery folks and improve their customer service.
If you have a suggestion on how we could take advantage of this new media even before we have our family recreation obstacle and ropes course built, we would love to hear it.
As we work to build this business dream of ours, we are aware that it would be helpful to tap into this powerful new resource. We would love to hear your suggestions on how we can do this. Is there anything we could produce at this stage that might become a YouTube sensation?
Scott, our logo designer, suggested we put up a video showing our son playing with broken bottles and rusty car parts wishing there were a place he could go and have fun. Then, like the old used-car salesmen of the 70s, we jump in and paint a wonderful picture of the Arkansas Diamond Mine Adventure, but it only exists in our imagination. If it is to be a reality, we need people to help us.
We know that established businesses that provide poor customer service are going to hear about it, and see it, on YouTube. We immediately think of the video of the FedEx package deliverer who threw a computer monitor over a customer's fence in December. That video was viewed eight million times. A singer named Dave Carroll produced a music video, about United Airlines breaking his expensive Taylor guitar, that has been viewed 11 million times.
This kind of thing has birthed a new industry: customer complaining. We don't own an Apple iPhone, but we've read that there is now a ComplainApp for customers to broadly voice their displeasure with a company. Of course other entrepreneurs have seized the opportunity to offer software and other services to help companies better track their delivery folks and improve their customer service.
If you have a suggestion on how we could take advantage of this new media even before we have our family recreation obstacle and ropes course built, we would love to hear it.
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