Winter Craft Giveaway

WOW. . .

For all my followers with children take a look at this winter craft giveaway.

Our other big giveaway for the month (make sure to enter our iPhone 4 S giveaway if you haven’t already) is our Winter Craft Giveaway! We decided to put together a craft giveaway for all those families who will have kids on winter break with nothing to do. You can put them to work making wrapping paper, ornaments, snowflakes, gift tags, etc with all these great supplies. Seriously, these packages are huge! And we’re going to pick 3 winners!

Check out what you’ll get in your package if you win -

1 – Mead Academie Drawing Pads
2 – Mead Academie Book of Colors
3 – Carter Red Stamp Pad
4 – Carter Blue Stamp Pad
5 – Carter Black Stamp Pad
6 – Bic Squeezable Wite-Out

1 – Paper Mate Sharpwriter Pencils
2 – Sharpie Calligraphy Markers
3 – Bic Mark-it Permanent Markers
4 – Pilot Precise Grip Extra Fine Rollerball Pens
5 – Pentel Color Pen Sets
6 – Col-Erase Colored Pencils
7 – Pentel Hi-Polymer Block Eraser
8 – Elmers Paint Pens

1 – Reindeer Duck Tape
2 – Candy Cane Duck Tape
3 – Acco Rubber Band Ball
4 – Swingline Hole Punch
5 – Stanley Bostitch Hot Glue Gun
6 – Duck Double Stick Tape
7 – Duck Poster Putty

1 – Bostitch Small Stapler and Bostitch Mini Staplers
2 – Avery Glue Sticks
3 – Avery Iron-on T-Shirt Transfers
4 – Avery Shipping Tags
5 – Avery See-Through Removable Dots
6 – Acco Brass File Fasteners
7 – Acco Regal Clips
8 – Avery Marks-A-Lot Black Permanent Markers
9 – Pilot Medium Point Silver Marker
10 – Pilot Gold Marker
11 – Avery Foil Stars
12 – Trodat Smiley Stamp and Trodat Star Stamp
13 – Pentel Fabric Pastel Dye Sticks
14 – Pentel Oil Pastels
15 – Sanford Red and Blue Pencils

(New items added!)
1 – Westcott Titanium Razor Paper Cutter
2 – Westcott Kids 5″ Blunt Soft Handle Scissors with Microban Protection
3 – Westcott Kids 5″ Blunt Scissors with Microban Protection
4 – Westcott Stainless Steel Childrens Safety Scissors
5 – Westcott Jeweltone Plastic Ruler

(Please note: Each package will be different. There are a few items that will only be in 1 or 2 of the packages)

Ready to win?

Leave a comment on this post telling us about your favorite winter/holiday craft project to do with your kids (or grandkids or nieces and nephews, etc)

Get extra entries by:
1. Subscribing to this blog via Email or RSS – 3 extra entries!
2. Following @shoplet on Twitter and tweeting about this giveaway with #wintercraftgiveaway
3. Linking Shoplet on Facebook
4. Writing about this giveaway on your blog (include a pic from this post in your post) for 2 extra entries!

We will pic 3 winners using random.org on Monday, December 12th! Good luck and Happy Holidays!

P.S. I will be posting different craft ideas to use the items in the giveaway packages on the blog this week.

eye got a feeling. . .

Today upon arriving at work I stopped at the box outside to get the daily stack of mail before settling into my computer and sorting through the mass amounts of emails waiting for me. It’s unusual these days to have anything but bills, junk or someone else’s mail placed in my box mistakenly. Almost all of our customers are billed to their credit cards taking away the urgency of waiting for checks to arrive.

As I reached for the stack one envelope seemed to jump from the pile. A gray almost stone colored envelope that I quickly identified as one that I had probably sold. The return address confirmed my notion and indeed it came from a customer of mine.

Still, my heart felt the emotion of having received something outside the mundane routine of daily mail. To think someone cared enough to think of me washed over me with a wave of joy. Ok, maybe not in those exact terms but I must admit it was a pretty cool feeling.

Savoring the moment I sat down to immediately type this blog. I have yet to open this grand item caring almost less about what it contains but rather enjoying the current emotions just receiving it have brought me.

I share this with you in the hopes you might understand the importance of how this simple gesture on the senders part has come to brighten my day. I’d like you to imagine how incorporating this into your business and personal life may change the dimension of what you do.

Today, right now, find any type of greeting or note card you have around the office or home. Take two minutes and fill it out with a simple hello if nothing else. Address it to the first person that comes to mind. Get it stamped and in the mail box before your postal carrier arrives.

Right you’re probably thinking I don’t need to send a card, I understand the point he’s making. Actually you’d be wrong. What I want you to experience is how it feels when you send that greeting card to someone. Then, only then will you truly understand the simplicity of how all this works. When you’re done please email to let me know how you felt. Include your name and address and I promise to drop a card in the mail to you sometime in the near future. I’d do it today but would rather catch you off guard like I was today. daniel@izongreetings.com

remember me?

Here we are; t-minus 31 days and counting till the New Year. Lately I have heard too many stories about what 2009 is going to bring. Everyone keeps saying how next year things will be different, how we’re expected to turn this thing around like nothing has happened.

Well folks, I’m here to tell you that in one short month if you are still in business now you may not make it until the ball drops. In the next fours weeks you could find your loyal customers lost forever. Like you, each of them is witnessing countless businesses closing up. Major chains going out of business and huge companies letting thousands of employees go.

I have a simple solution that is proven time and time again to work no matter what line of work you are in. The effort and commitment have to be yours though. Try to think of what sending out resumes is like, or trying to explain your situation at the unemployment office or worse…okay, I won’t go there.

Dan's 3 step approach:

1. Reach out a single customer each day letting them know you’re alive and still in business. Make a call, a quick email or my favorite, send a greeting card.

2. Next, find a past customer and touch them in the same way.

3. For each holiday card you get in the mail either at home or at work take the time and immediately respond in the same fashion. Remember, you may not sell to family members but they sure sell you.

Does all this seem like a lot of work? It is, at first. I said it was simple not easy. I guarantee that with this effort you will have reached out to almost 100 people who will remember you come January 1^st.

As for me, I am alive and still doing business. Feel free to respond to me today as your first day kicks off to making it great in 2008.