Fashion Color Trends & Tools - The Pantone Color App..

 

 

According to Fashion Industry Leaders.. these are the hottest fashion colors for women for Spring/Summer 2012.. ( shown left)  The Good News? Of course, the color of the year-  tangerine is front and center- the lime essence look ( top left column color) and the pink in the left column, are all new colors I have seen in industry catalogs for Spring/Summer.

The Men's Collection of hot colors ( shown below right) also is represented well in industry catalogs and color choices. In our business, you don't just have to be creative- you also have to be confident that you are knowledgeable and you need to be specific when it comes to creative campaign content and color. 

 

 Pantone has created a super cool tool- the Pantone App, available in your Itunes and now at the Android App Store. For just a few bucks, the Pantone App gives you access to the Pantone library, build your own Pantone color or helps you match an client's favorite color to the existing Pantone library. You can email the color, Pantone number and information from within the app- to your favorite vendor. 

Now for an apparel decorator, this means instead of talking " blue" we are closer to talking in the same language. The Pantone/Embroidery Thread Color Match concept isn't perfect, and still requires sew-out approval- but it gets us very, very close - much, much faster!

Tools you can use! 

4 Easy Steps to Spark , Engage & Grow Your Business

It’s exciting and fresh,- and your enthusiasm can be contagious. As you educate your customer, You smile, you are focused, the positive and upbeat nature in your voice commands attention, it’s tone compelling as you explain the popularity and success with new technology mixing with promotional apparel. QR codes/ tags, laser etch visibility or the fashion appeal of applique. 

 New ideas can spark conversation. New ideas give you a reason to call that out of reach prospect, touch base with your customer- ENGAGE.  

Everyone is looking to grow their business. These 4 easy steps move you forward. 

1. Attract: Attract new prospects. 
2. Convert: Convert prospects into clients.
3. Expand: Expanding existing business.
4. Execute: Execute sales/fill orders. 

Positive, successful new trends and ideas attract attention. Giving prospects a new interactive use for promotional apparel and QR codes/tags is a great attention getting tool.

Using laser applique as a way to stand out in the call for embroidered apparel program bids is another way.  

Being the first to combine an attractive, value priced apparel product with the right decoration process and client is yet another way. You can use all of these ideas to get inspired by attending our Open House event Trends & Technology, Wed. June 15th. Drop by eu inc. between 9-11 to get informed, get inspired. 

Visit our EU Inc Open House Page for more info. Hope to see you there!

 

 

 

How to Sell Laser Applique and Make Great $$$

We have a growing number of distributors who are selling laser appliqued apparel- and their customers are loving the unique, new look . These same customers are taking healthy re-orders too and because we don’t want YOU missing out..Here are some tips to help you get started.

1. Selling something something new and unique gives you a reason to start a new conversation. Pick up the phone and call that old client who may have taken his apparel program somewhere else. Chances are he hasn’t seen this process yet, and you can be the first to introduce it. 

1. Look for for new prospects. Remember when you first got in the business? Every restaurant you dined in seemed like a new sales opportunity? That is how fresh and exciting laser applique is- because most companies have never seen their logo decorated this way. You have an exclusive to sell, a new technique they have never seen. 
2. Look at logo’s all around you. Laser applique lets you use radically different textures of fabric to illustrate a logo. There are new prospects all around you that you can approach simply by showing them their logo in a way that has never been seen before. Look for these types of logo’s to get you started selling applique.  

    Logo’s with symbols. Any type of symbol, combined with lettering ( or not) can be       a good fit with laser applique. ( ie; The Mac Apple)  

    Word Art logo’s. Highly stylized lettering can be a great fit with applique. 

    Logo’s with a vintage, or retail appeal. 

    Logo’s with simple art element’s combined. 

    Logo's that communicate a cutting edge, hip, youthful or fashion type  feel.

   Complex logo’s that would typically require a large volume of embroidery stitches
   ( Because applique uses stitched down pieces of fabric pieces to cover large areas    with fewer stitches) 

    Dare to be different. Bidding on a new client? Make a statement by submitting     a sample of their logo using laser decoration. You will stand out , be memorable     and more than likely be the only distributor offering this process. 

 

 

The Time Suck of Social Media, Why It's Worth it and How to Start

Most sales people understand the appeal of social media from a basic networking perspective, but what small business owners really want to know is does it drive business? Is it worth the time suck it seems to be? And finally how do I get started?  

The answers are yes, yes and keep reading, we'll show you how.

EU Inc. is a small company specializing in contract apparel decoration. We have a reputation for high quality embroidery and fast turnaround . We also have a new unique decoration process and pretty exclusive program ( laser etch and applique and the SanMar PSST free shipping decorator program) We also have extensive technical experience.

Here is our story. About 60 days ago we fully customized our euinc facebook page using Tabsite . Daily we post sales resources, tech tips, industry tools and news..( and on Fun Friday anything goes.. fishing pics, kid pics, recipes..). We use the page to stay in touch with clients and reach out to find new ones. And it's working. The reality is - as a small business owner you  think about business all the time.. things you should show clients, things you should tell them, tools to share etc.. this gives you a forum to do this quickly and efficiently and not just self promote.

The feedback from our clients has been positive, it's spurred new conversations and new business. We have received unsolicited new business leads via facebook and email. We are engaging our clients in a new and efficient way. We even get to show off our work, and the fact that we have a fun side when we are not pushing to meet deadlines. The presence of our fb page publicizes our openness to new ideas, new technology and new business, and this appeals to a certain demographic of new potential clients . The ROI? Absolutely awesome. 

Getting started with facebook is easy. The new business pages format allows you to interact more as a business. The digital photo album can feature your best work and be shared online. You can use tabsite or other apps to customize the appearance. A quick tip to get you started is to create an event as your personal profile announcing the new business page, thus notifying all your " friends". If you are a sales rep with a huge personal profile following of business contacts there is a now a facebook tool to convert your personal profile into a business page and begin with all of your friends as business page followers. This Download Socialmediaforbusiness will  give you a great visual to get you started in all things social media in one afternoon . You can read this Download Facebook page ebook2011 to see what works in the ways of all facebook business pages, and this to read true Twittertales  sales success stories evolved from Tweets. And to auto connect your facebook  page to a company blog , we like Typepad  for ease of use and getting started.

And finally to soak up some more social media strategy.., join  us tomorrow, April 6th . AZPPA is offering a free social media workshop  by Social Media Master, Dana Zezzo ( like that title, Dana?) . Dana will offer lots of great tips and tools and infectious inspiration to GET SOCIAL!  Don't miss it ! 

 Think smart. For more ideas on being a thought leader, social media and business 101, click here to visit Bruce's Business 101 Blog.. 

Easy Online Image Sharing and Bonus Celebrity Interview..

 

In this business, we move a lot of image files- in and out- to be digitized, approved, processed and even just to show off our work to friends and clients. Here are a couple top tech tools you can utilize, to make it even easier..

The most obvious- yet often overlooked; Facebook. Simply upload your photos or videos to Facebook.com and they will be available to everyone. Each photo can be shared with it's own url you can email, bookmark or post elsewhere. Look for this feature on the photo page. You can download high-res images , there is no storage limitation and the facebook app is widely used on smartphones. Check out our sample album , by clicking the button above. 

For easy viewing of your digitized design, see this free software tool you can download. 

To edit your images online, try Picnik.com. This free site has awesome simple tools for fixing , editing and resizing your pics. And now for that bonus celebrity interview.. Click here to see video by star reporter, daughter Olivia - all about EU Inc, a recent Fun Friday post to our Facebook Page. 

Think smart. For more ideas on being a thought leader, social media and business 101, click here to visit Bruce's Business 101 Blog..

Make It Easy, A Cool Tech Tool You Can Use

We want you to work smart.. It will save you time and money. We also want to be able to discuss your designs with you, in detail- and we want you to be able to view and discuss your digitized designs with your client.

Here is a cool tool you can use- and if you use a smart phone- you can be even cooler. Read on..

Imagine if you were having lunch with a client , and you were able to pull up his design exactly how it was embroidered last time. You could discuss color changes, and specifics with the image on screen as it was sewn. With Ambassador software you can save it as a jpeg, and view it on your smart phone over lunch, just try not to spill any salsa on the screen.. those smart phones are expensive.

At EU Inc. we are committed to tech tools and use the latest embroidery technology. The maker of our software, Pulse Microsystems offers Ambassador, an easy to use, free software just for you. Ambassador will allow you to view the digitized files, change colors, even resize and more.. ( if you really want to get more technical..) 

A great cool tool you can use. Think smart. For more ideas on being a thought leader, social media and business 101, click here to visit Bruce's Business 101 Blog..