Post by Jonathan Mejia on Feb 25, 2014 1:45:27 GMT -5
INFORMATION ABOUT WHERE I PLAN ON GETTING SHIRTS FROM IF THIS HAPPENS
I've been thinking a lot about this T-Shirt thing since it was brought up. I have gone to the American Apparel site, and it seems easy to order large quantities of custom shirts, so that the forum can resell to members. They take at least two weeks to deliver to me, and then I will sell them on the forum through my paypal account. I really like this company because they make shirts of great quality, they come in a variety of colours, and they are AMERICAN made, my home country!
WHAT SIZES/COLOR SHOULD I ORDER?
With that in mind, let us talk a bit about sizing. WHAT'S EVERYONES SIZE? on the Am Apparel sight you can order shirts from XS S M L XL XXL XXXL.
Maybe I might start another thread with a poll so people can add their shirt sizes, and fuze this thread with that one?
I know I am a large/medium (yeah, my weight is in transition).
At first I was hoping to order 25 shirts in the same color and a variety of sizes, and if they sell well, I will order more, and perhaps in another color. Let me know what you guys think.
ARTWORK
LOVE the ideas presented so far in terms of artwork.
DirtyDivisions Your artwork is awesome, but as many people said, making it more readable would help greatly! The ideas presented would all work very well. I especially like H2O idea of using different pitcher shapes, and your idea about perhaps including a fly.
Am App shirts can be made with designs on BOTH sides. was thinking about the artwork on the front, and url on the back.
H2O Can't wait to see your design too!
rhizomatous I don't know who made that particular shirt, but if you are part of the CCPS perhaps you can ask the members/leaders about it. All designs should be considered, and will probably eventually get voted on by the people in the forum.
Keep up the good work, and lets get the ideas flowing.
MONETIZATION/FORUM ADVERTISING
Monetizing the forum was always a big issue for me. I wanted it to be free for everyone, but that means paying for things like server space and such. The ads pay for everything, as proboards lets me run the forums for free, so long as they get the money from the ads. I have often considered adding different types of monetization techniques to the forum to be able to pay to get rid of advertisements.
I have thought about using VigLink, a company that changes keywords into relevant links. Like if someone wrote google, Viglink changes the word into a link for the google site. Same with amazon and ebay. I was considering this in the past as a way to POSSIBLY get rid of advertisements, assuming I make enough through that service to pay for the server space on proboards.
There has been lots of talk about making donations to Meadowview or the NASC. Both which are awesome ideas. What I did not want to do was to make the forum seem like a cheap marketing ploy to make money. There are some things that can be added to the forums, which do cost money (like getting rid of ads), but I wanted everyone to be a part of this conversation. I was also waiting till the forum received over 100k page views a month. Think this is ridiculously high? Think again, we are halfway there!
When I started this forum I really wanted it to be about the plants and the community. So whatever you guys decide as a collective is what will be done. I have decided that starting next month, I will be letting everyone know how the forum is doing from a growth/visitor standpoint. I can generate a very interesting graph of the activity on the forum. The graph for February will be released first week in March to everyone. Open and transparent.
With the idea of openness and transparency, I also want to let it be known, that if you guys did decide that profits need to go to some other organization, any donations made to them from the profits of the shirts will be publicized on the forum, with screenshots of the transactions. Again, openness and transparency.
But I think this is an important discussion we all should be having on the forum. Advertising the forum, What are goals are as a community (other than just building a community and sharing information/plants), Who should we give profits to (perhaps this can change monthly?), Should we be working towards a greater "noble cause"?. We have a marketplace that has worked very well, and to be honest I was very anxious about putting that on the forum when it started. I didn't want to deal with complaints about people not meeting their end of the bargain, or posting plants they don't own to steal money. That is why in that section I posted a RULES thread that clearly states:
I hesitated putting the board here, but we are all adults. I am not responsible for lost plants, or people who didn't transfer money via paypal for a trade.
But to be honest, that is one of the most successful sections of the forum.
I have been very hesitant about joining VigLink (which I haven't yet, but am still debating), and now with these t-shirts as well, it is new and exciting, but I don't want anyone to think this forum was made to make money, or for it to somehow cheapen the feel of our awesome community. Hence, if it is going to happen, it will happen with openness and transparency.
Lets continue this discussion! I want to know what everyone thinks about everything above! This is a discussion we have needed to have for some time now.