Another great company from Cleveland, Ohio! Sthress Clothing resides in the northeastern part of Ohio along Jakprints and of course PureButtons! I’ve decided to show off the new Strhess Clothing button packs. Take a look for yourself.
The first thing I tell all my designers and/or interns is to run out and have both RGB and CMYK tattooed on each wrist for quick, fool-proof referencing. Serious, no just kidding, but our friend and fellow designer Andy Huff happens to have this sweet ink which makes for a blog-style perfect joke.
Jeff, how are you today?
I’m not bad.. could be better. It just got done raining here all morning.
Tell me about yourself.
I’m 5’11” average build, brown hair… Is that how you answer this question? (Great interview so far).
What is your typical day like?
It varies, but most of the time it is very hectic. A lot of emails, phone calls, etc. But, I try to be as personable with my employees as I can be. I want this to be as fun and laid back of a company as possible. Sometimes, we stop working a little early and play some Guitar Hero. (If we have time)
How did you start Pure Buttons?
By accident. In all honesty, it was a “pure” coincidence and is a really long story. I will try to condense it as much as possible. I had started a clothing line when I was in high school. A client of mine purchased band t-shirts from me and asked me if I knew a place where they could get buttons cheap. I decided to get a machine and make them myself, to make a few extra bucks. I had been taking classes for web design and development, and figured I would put them to good use and make a website to sell custom buttons. Next thing you know, a few large clients ordered, and it just exploded from there.
Why buttons?
Everyone loves buttons, so why not. It was a niche, cheap band buttons. That was how we started. We try to keep the same backbone that we started on, cheap, amazing buttons for everyone. Everyone loves ‘em and we figure they will love them more once they get a PUREbutton, especially at our cheap rates.
Just a random question, dealing with buttons all day long, do you every dream or have nightmares about buttons?
No, not yet. I hope I never do.
Well, you really seem to enjoy it, what do you love the most about it?
I love being able to provide a service people find useful and affordable. That in itself is rewarding.
What do you dislike about it?
Tough question, I’d have to say, the stress. Sometimes it just eats away at you after a while but, eventually you learn how to manage it. (So I hear).
In a few years, where do you see yourself and Pure Buttons?
Me Personally:
Working at my home office in the next year and coming into the office randomly throughout the week to check up on production. As for now, I’ll continue to pass out at my desk on extremely long days.
For the Company:
I see us as the top custom button provider. With only being in the business for 3 years we’ve slowly begun taking the top rank. It’s just a matter of time before it happens.
As the brains behind the company, why do you offer such an excellent product for so cheap? I mean, if you charged what your competition charged, you could probably make double.
This is a question I get asked all the time. I just put the customer in mind before we figure any pricing structure. Why pay more for something when you don’t have to? I say that to myself all the time. Money isn’t the answer to everything. With that in mind, having the cheapest prices and best quality is more rewarding then anything else. I know our customers feel the same way.
If you had to sum up Pure Buttons in a sentence or two, what would it be?
Custom Promotional Pinback Buttons (thanks google)
If there was one thing you could have done differently with your company, what would that be?
I wish we would have figured out our innovative ways of production 3 years ago. We finally have our new production facility tweaked and ready to handle anything anyone throws at us. With the least amount of staff.
What is something that most people don’t know about you?
I’m 21 years old. People tend to think I’m 30+ years old. I’d like to save those thoughts for another 10 years.
Do you have any words of advice for anyone interested in starting their own company?
The single most important advice I could say would be to start using QuickBooks immediately. Start your book keeping off on the right track. This way you’ll stay more organized with your finances and you’ll stay away from the financial surprises. (Or at least encounter them less). I can vouch for this personally as will most other small business owners out there.
I would also recommend setting up your business the legal way. Meaning, get a sole prop, an LLC or S-Corp. and pay taxes! I’ve heard horror stories of companies starting off on the wrong foot and it only bites them in the butt later on.
This post will be the final edition of our promotional buttons series. Everyone loves buttons, no doubt about it. This post will help you get the most out of those promotional buttons that everyone loves. First thing, think about who you are targeting. This is a very important step, that many look over and don’t give enough credit to. You need to put yourself in their position. In you ideal customer, what do they like? How much money do they make? What gets them excited? These are all very important questions, that you must consider before you start designing.
Now, that we have established and have clear understanding of what our ideal customer might be interested in, lets start desigining. It does not matter too much what you design, as long as it is something that will appeal to your ideal customer, you are golden. However, there are some things to keep in mind. Buttons are small, so you promotional buttons main goal, should be to grab attention. Once attention has been grabbed, it needs to convey a message. A good message is something that will puzzle your customer, or be witty enough that they will want to ask quesitons. In our earlier post, some good examples of promotional buttons, you can see some great examples.
Everyone loves buttons indeed, so why not make your promotional buttons a success. It all starts will a well thought out design.
With any business, we have encountered some bizarre moments. So, we put together a list of some of the most interesting. We will not mention any names and we apologize if we offend anyone. Because we value customer service, this is only intended to demonstrate how we take care of every customer.
One that our office was most intrigued about, we received a call from a gentleman who was very impressed with his buttons and our turn around time. He asked if he could have our physical address, because he wanted to order us pizza. Our senior designer, Joe, who took the call, was needless to say a little taken back, but eventually gave the gentleman the address. This could have easily turned into a scene from a cheesy horror movie. Sure enough, one day a pizza guy came up the shop with about 5 large pizzas with all sorts of toppings. If you are the guy who bought us pizza, our hat goes off to you, thank you sir.
A Purebuttons employee took a call from someone who was upset with their button order, because they were too noisy. This employee, was sure they meant the artwork was too loud, or what have you. Nope, to clarify their position, they explained to us, “When they are in the bag, they are too noisy. I mean like decibel noisy.” We ended up satisfying their complaints the best we could. Note: If you are going stealth, do not carry a bag of buttons.
The final case, that makes the PureButtons list, is an individual called us and left a voice mail. When we called him back, he answered the phone and asked us to hold while he pulled up our record. Instead of putting the phone on mute or on hold, he either just set it down or didn’t care that we were still there. This individual was clearing his throat and grunting about 25 times while we were on “hold”, and was yelling obscenities about where he put our information.
The best way to deal with situations like this, is to remember to treat every customer like it is your last.
Would you like 40 bucks? I know around the shop, we were all wondering what we had to do to get $40. These promotional buttons were successful because the color grabbed your attention and the text is BIG and BOLD!
Unfortunately (for us Ohio State fans), the Florida Gators did beat Ohio State in the BCS National Championship. These buttons were printed before the game to promote team spirit. They were successful, because there was a lot of them, they have a catchy slogan, and grab attention. These are a great example of sports buttons. On a side note, had Teddy Ginn not gotten hurt, we would have won (just kidding, they beat us fair and square).
Dude, where is the party? What party? Who’s going? What are you talking about? If these are the first thoughts that came to your mind after seeing these promotional buttons, enough said. These buttons peak you interests, and grab your attention.
Definitely, one thing that helps promotional buttons and sports buttons, is their ability to grab attention.
As the orders flow in for our square buttons, I thought it might be nice to start showcasing some. To help spark the design process for you. These buttons make for great promotional items! I look forward to seeing what you can come up with! I’ll keep posting more photos as time rolls on. In the mean time please enjoy the photos below.
Simple Black and White Buttons make a nice elegant touch.
Another simple yet elegant design.
More photos coming next week. Keep posted!
Thanks - PureButtons
As always, another great email from a happy customer. This puts a smile on my face every time I get an email back from a client. Especially when they go out of there way to let us know how great of a job we did.
| “Just wanted to commend you on your quick service and quality of your products! you are very dependable, and I’ll continue to go to you! (^_^)” |
Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us! I look forward to posting more of these soon.
Just finished up this order today and wanted to share it with everyone. It’s looking like I can have some examples up a couple times a week. So keep posted and check back often.
Like what you see? You can purchase them here over @ there store.
You may be saying to yourself “who would get a 3″ button? Those things are HUGE!” Indeed they are but, these buttons have been extremely popular which is why I’ve decided to show some examples of our recent 3″ button orders from this week. Please view the photos below. I hope you enjoy and we look forward to manufacturing your next custom button order!
Shown with solid colors and crisp clean print.
Example photo of solid colors.
3″ button shown with a full color print. Notice the great detail.
If you are interested in purchasing some 3″ buttons please contact us.