I have to give credit where credit is due.  I heard that greeting on HGTV (although I forget which one of their hosts said it) and thought it was hilarious!!  Happy Holidays to all!!

It has been way too long since my last post so I’ll have to do a couple for catch up.  First the biggest news by far here at RealKidz is that we closed our first round of funding!!  Wow!!  And we managed to do it in the worst markets in decades!  I can’t even express how thankful I am.  The angels who funded me are angels in every sense of the word.  (For anyone who doesn’t know, there are people out there called high networth individuals who are willing to take a HUGE risk and fund start ups and these people are called angel investors.)

 You might have noticed a few changes to the website.  There will be more of those as we put this money to use making the website easier for our customers and more useful on the backend for us at corporate.  There also will be more information coming out on the website about the exciting developments for our style consultant network.

We have brought on a professional direct selling firm to help us get EVERYTHING ready to go for our style consultants and WOW have they been amazing!!  We’ve got training materials, an AWESOME compensation structure, and a Pilot Program to get us ready for the official launch of the consultant network.

 One of the fun parts of running a fashion business is, of course, creating the fashion!!  We’re hard at work on the Spring 2009 line.  The colors will be bright and fun, the fabric is awesome and we’re working with a phenomenal manufacturer right here in Michigan.

 Well, like, Michael Feldman on NPR says, “That’s all the news that isn’t!”

I jsut wanted to share that we had another wonderful article about us come out this week.  This article was in the Grand Rapids Press and features one of our absolutely adorable customers.  It is so exciting to see that people are catching on to what we’re doing.  It’s even better to see the happiness we are able to bring our customers.  So go check it out at http://www.mlive.com/grpress/lifestyles/index.ssf/2008/10/clothing_company_offers_option_1.html.

It’s been an absolutely insane time for us her as we have been recieving in the new fall line of clothing and getting it ready to sell to you!!  We had a wonderful photo shoot right before Labor Day.  We have a new photographer who is helping us out.  You have to check her out!  Her website is www.marypottsphotography.com.  Mary is new to Depot Town and we’re excited to have her here on the street.  Mary is more than a photographer with a wonderful eye!  She is also an artist who creates these absolutely amazing mantage portraits.  It’s hard to explain but if you’re in the area you should stop by to see her work. 

 We had some new girls join us for the photo shoot.  They had fun and enjoyed trying on the different outfits.  It was great to see them bringing the clothing to life!

 We also spent Labor Day weekend moving our offices.  We are still in Depot Town but have moved around the corner.  Our landlord at the old place raised the rents in the entire building (between 40-60%).  If you’re wandering around Depot Town and see the two vacant spots there, well, that’s the reason.  We’re incredibly happy with our new space.  It’s smaller but it’s just wonderful!  We’re in the Ypsilanti Food Co-op building and we love our new community.

 Now that we’re basically settled we’re all about getting this line out to you.  As can happen with any new manufacturer, we had a few delays but we’re on track to get everything up and onto the website for sale within the next few days.  I can’t wait!!

 That’s the news for now. 

It’s been so crazy hectic I didn’t get around to sharing with you the awesome news that RealKidz was featured in Business Week in a great article on the lack of clothing availabe to plus-size children.  The article has a great picture of me and Gabi and starts out talking about RealKidz, then discusses the size of this market and how it’s just not being addressed, and finishes up with RealKidz again.  How exciting!!

Follow the link above to go see the article.

It’s been a great month for RealKidz!!  We’ve got our clothing in production and expect it to be shipping to our offices soon.  Yeah!!  I can’t wait for everyone to see our Inaugural Back-to-School Line! 

If you live in the area and love a fun time, you should bring your family to Ypsilanti’s Heritage Fesitval on August 15, 16, 17.  For more info go to http://www.ypsilantiheritagefestival.com/.  RealKidz will have a booth in the street out in front of our offices.  We’ll have the new line in and available for sale.  We’ll have girls modeling the clothing as well.  It’ll be a great time to come talk with myself and some of our style consultants.  Then when you’re done stroll down the street and into the park to see the many exhibitors, enjoy the festival food and activities. 

So come on down!  We’d love to meet you!!

It’s been an exciting time for RealKidz as we’ve put our Back to School line of clothing into production for fall.  It’s going to be an exciting line with some cute new fashions and a great color palette for fall.  Be sure to add your name to our mailing list if you’d like to be the first to find out when it’s available.

 I know we have a small line currently.  While our Back to School line isn’t going to be that much bigger, we’re offering more color choices some new styles and everything is mix-and-match which will increase the number of outfits you can make out of what we’re selling.  As a start up clothing company, we just aren’t able to offer much more at this time.  What will help us to be able to continue to add new sizes, styles and color choices is our customers’ continued support through their orders both online and through our style consultants.

 If you’d like to see the clothing in person, just call 877-806-REAL or email info@realkidzinc.com to get the information for a style consultant near you.  She can meet you at your house or a convenient location to show you the clothes and let your daughter try them on for size.  If there isn’t one near you, then you might want to think about becoming one yourself and sharing this awesome line of clothing with your friends, family and neighbors and making some additional money as well!!

 If you live in the Ypsilanti area or are going to be visiting the area, feel free to stop by our offices in Depot Town to see the clothing and shop our small selection of discounted seconds.  Just send an email or call, to make sure someone is at the office.

Stay tuned for our announcement about when the Back to School line will be available for sale!! 

That’s what running a start up is all about, right?? I just have been talking to fellow entrepreneur friends who are going through the same kinds of issues I am…close to a big deal that can save the day and close to being out of business. How do we live like this??? Most people have some amount of respect for entrepreneurs but it takes living through this to really understand what it means to be able think on your feet, turn on a dime, and pray to the various gods of luck, commerce, and charity.

All that said, I would like to share that I am excited about where we are and scared to death at the same time. Getting up and going has been the typical roller coaster ride you would suspect of a start up.  We’re constantly working to move this boat forward sometimes with an oar and sometimes with the boost of a powerful engine.  We’re excited about our test market line and that it’s beginning to see some traction in the marketplace.  Meanwhile, we’ll keep working on adding new styles to the line. We plan to have the fun, trendy additions ready for the Christmas selling season in October.

We’re going ahead and getting ready for our style consultants to start selling as well. We’re working on getting to the point where we can implement the help of some wonderful business partners who will help us put the whole infrastructure in place.  In the meantime, we’re making sure that the ladies who become our leaders will be rewarded for the importance they will have to our fledgling company.

I have to give a shout out to my Director of Distribution Development, Laura Hamblin, who is one of the most dedicated and creative women I know. She has been a rock for me to lean on over these past few weeks as all the craziness has unfolded and I can’t even begin to descirbe what she has meant to me!!!

Finally, make sure you check out the online store with its phenomenal pictures and the new lower introductory pricing. If you live close to Ypsilanti, feel free to stop by the storefront in Depot Town to visit, see the clothing and take something home.

Well, thanks for joining me as I walk, live, breathe, and sleep on the razor’s edge.

Myra Klarman, our photographer, has done it again! You can check out her blog here. We had our photo shoot this past week and I think you’ll agree it’s a huge improvement to the website! We ended up only having two models. I had tried for more because I wanted a mix of younger and older models and a bit more multi-ethnic feel, but I had bad luck and timing conspire to whittle it down to just two at the end.

My hope and thought is that being able to see how the clothing fits on girls’ bodies will encourage people to place orders. The other challenge we’re having is that for some reason people haven’t been figuring out that they can click on the image with the categories to access more colors and a choice of graphic designs. We have tried to make that clearer through indicating the number of items available and putting text on the page that tells people they can click to find more.

In the meantime, we’re in the process of adjusting our fit to make the back to school line even better. Our designer, Adriana, is gearing up for our back to school production and with our new manufacturer we can count on high quality goods delivered on time and to our specifications. We are still manufacturing in the states, but will now be using a cut and sew operation out of Los Angeles.

We’re also gearing up to launch the style consultant network. We’re having a meeting at the end of June to talk with interested consultants in the area, explain the opportunity, and begin the process of identifying some our founder’s circle leaders.

There is a lot going on and there is also a lot of uncertainty due to the still unresolved funding issue. We have a partial commitment and are working to fill out the rest of what’s needed so that we can move forward with the intiatives that will put us in the marketplace in a strong way.

It’s been awhile since I last posted because things have been CRAZY!! I am wrapping up the deal on investment which means that I’ll be able to roll out the back to school line in August with improvements on the test market line and website. I’ll also be able to launch the style consultant network in late June. We’re putting everything in place to make sure we have a solid foundation for our consultants and great products for our kids!!

I’m busy dealing with all sort of things but I’m super excited about where this is all going. In the meantime, school is almost out for the kiddos so we’re doing all sorts of end of year school things. Ruben started baseball and I’m learning how to coach him with that. Gabi is learning tennis (and Ruben will too) so we’ll all get to go hit balls around together. My babysitter is going to be watching my kids over the summer and I’m SUPER excited about that as well. She’s just a God-send (in every way!!).

We’re doing a photo shoot this coming Wednesday so by the following Monday we’ll have pictures on the website of the girls in our clothing. How exciting! It was frustrating to not be able to get that done sooner but it’s worth the wait to be able to have Myra Klarman taking our pictures again. She’s such a talented and gifted photographer.

Have a great weekend!!

Well, it’s official!! We have launched the test market line of clothing for spring 2008. How exciting!! It’s been a long time coming but I’m so glad it’s finally here. I’m looking forward to receiving feedback so that we can continue to improve the product and meet our families’ needs. It hasn’t been without hiccups. I had to send back the crop pants to get them resewn correctly and it took longer for everything to arrive and for the website to finally make it through all the testing than I thought it would. But, in the end, we made it! Now we are working on adding shorts for the next run and beginning the process of creating the fit for our plus size girls to add to our fall line-up.

The next step is to get everything in place so that we can launch the network of style consultants. We’re excited to be working with a firm with many years of industry experience who will be helping us build a solid foundation for our consultants to build upon. My goal is to have enough put in place to enable our first consultants to come on board in June.

Meanwhile, I’m talking with one of the major hospitals in the area and hope to have a relationship formed to enable us to bring on professionals who deal with childhood health issues to partner with us as we mold the social network.

What an exciting time! Mix that in with my graduation, my daughter’s 11th birthday, and the real possibility of investment in the near future and you have a recipe for excitement (mixed in with a bit of stress induced insomnia).