[Marketing] Online Sugar Labs shop

[Sean DALY]

Hi Bernie

Please read through this thread if you could:
http://lists.sugarlabs.org/archive/marketing/2009-May/001108.html

Merchandise or "swag" is our next big marketing effort and certainly
needs to be in place for the Blueberry launch.

In my view we need to be sure T-shirts etc. are availble around the
world, which probably means offering a catalog through several
suppliers, Cafepress, Spreadshirt and so on.

To get started I think we can skip a fancy shop-in-the-shop, if our
stuff is well-tagged people will find it. Later, we will find a
volunteer to focus on shop-in-the-shop.

Our merchandise has to be absolutely fantastic, and in line with our
marketing visuals (simple, colorful) and strategy, in particular
communication of "Sugar Labs" instead of "Sugar" ("Sugar on a Stick"
as an exception will work from a marketing standpoint if we reach
consensus on what it means).

The Marketing team has to review what goes up for sale, to insure it's
in line with our guidelines. The Firefox model is a good inspiration
for this, swag is absolutely vital for marketing.

I myself don't care about profits yet, breaking even will already be
fine since we will have a far greater return in marketing impressions
if we can move a lot of swag, Of course, if swag generates income for
Sugar Labs, all the better.


What I would like to do is:
* benchmark the five or six suppliers I had identified in May, with
others I may have missed
* taking into account large orders e.g. 100-200 shirts vs.
individually printed (may be more interesting to preorder blocs)
* pick two or three suppliers to get started with (we probably can't
go wrong with cafepress and spreadshirt and one other who will ship
where the first two won't)
* develop the visuals. this may become an endless discussion on the
lists. Aside from the 12 logos on white plus black (24 shirts to start
with, not bad) I feel we could do star-marketing of Activities by
picking say the eToys icon over the Sugar Labs logo, or the TurtleArt
logo, or Browse, etc. Ultimately we could offer almost any Activity
icon over our logo
* Sugar on a Stick could also be in the catalog, but later might be
better (to accompany the Blueberry launch for instance)

Would you like to work on this?

thanks

Sean



On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 5:57 AM, Bernie Innocenti <bernie at codewiz.org> wrote:
> I created an online shop for Sugar Labs with Cafe Press:
>
>  http://shop.cafepress.com/sugarlabs
>
> A percentage of the price for all products will be sent to the Software
> Freedom Conservancy as a donation for Sugar Labs.
>
> I created a few demo products, but I definitely lack the time and
> expertise to create a good line.  Would someone want to take over from
> where I left.
>
> A downside is that there seems to be no way to co-own a shop or add
> helpers.  I'd have to share my admin account with anyone who wants to
> help, and trust them not to redirect the money elsewhere.  For this
> reason, I can only take people I know personally.
>
> Howver, I /think/ anyone could still create product designs that could
> later be added to the shop.
>
> --
>   // Bernie Innocenti - http://codewiz.org/
>  \X/  Sugar Labs       - http://sugarlabs.org/
>
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