Can you believe that we have been gone for 5 months already! What a trip!
Benjilynn and I have had an incredible time together, adventuring these 4 countries and I think we picked the perfect place to wind everything up. We have been quietly working on a couple different business ideas and we have been using our time in Da Nang, Vietnam to get a whole bunch of work done before we head home on April 1. The first business is a clothing company and it is coming together nicely. We started out with some of Benjilynn's designs and then we started our search for a manufacturer while we were in Thailand. This is when we learned there are many different decisions to be made when working with the fashion, clothing industry. After talking with different manufacturers we quickly decided that we will only work with companies who treat their employees fairly in good working conditions, safety was paramount and only second to "no children labourers". We wanted to see the facilities and meet the workers, mostly women, and then decide if we would work in the same conditions. We are happy to announce that we have found some very good partners to make our clothing and that it is possible to improve everyone's lives who you work with. The price is a little more than the typical "sweatshops" in Asia but the largest gap has been $2 per piece of clothing, it is amazing the difference that $2 can have. Worth every penny!
We started off with some basic designs and then we worked with our partners to build spec pieces before we placed our bulk orders. We were also fortunate that one of our suppliers had an existing line of designs that we also purchased from. This was a lot of fun and it was great to see Benjilynn getting excited about the possibilities while watching her use her business skills and experience in fashion and cosmotology to design and build these collections. We are not just traelling together, we are now business partners!
Benjilynn and I have had an incredible time together, adventuring these 4 countries and I think we picked the perfect place to wind everything up. We have been quietly working on a couple different business ideas and we have been using our time in Da Nang, Vietnam to get a whole bunch of work done before we head home on April 1. The first business is a clothing company and it is coming together nicely. We started out with some of Benjilynn's designs and then we started our search for a manufacturer while we were in Thailand. This is when we learned there are many different decisions to be made when working with the fashion, clothing industry. After talking with different manufacturers we quickly decided that we will only work with companies who treat their employees fairly in good working conditions, safety was paramount and only second to "no children labourers". We wanted to see the facilities and meet the workers, mostly women, and then decide if we would work in the same conditions. We are happy to announce that we have found some very good partners to make our clothing and that it is possible to improve everyone's lives who you work with. The price is a little more than the typical "sweatshops" in Asia but the largest gap has been $2 per piece of clothing, it is amazing the difference that $2 can have. Worth every penny!
We started off with some basic designs and then we worked with our partners to build spec pieces before we placed our bulk orders. We were also fortunate that one of our suppliers had an existing line of designs that we also purchased from. This was a lot of fun and it was great to see Benjilynn getting excited about the possibilities while watching her use her business skills and experience in fashion and cosmotology to design and build these collections. We are not just traelling together, we are now business partners!
What a blast! We now have samples of most of our collection and we have hired a model to help us showcase the clothing for the website. Benjilynn has been working on the actual clothing, hiring a model and coordinating the outfits, photo-shoots and poses I have been building the website, registering domains, taking pictures of pretty girls and creating our first "start-up" online business. Some of you may have noticed that we are also learning how to use social media... Yup, we are on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, LinkedIn, and obviously our super duper Blog. Wow, what a learning experience this has been.
I have to tell you that it feels pretty good to get the "work" juices flowing again while looking at business in a completely different context. I have also had the priveledge of being approached by 2 printing companies who are interested in hiring me for the summer to work as a consultant in their facilities and sales teams and this prompted me to reach out to a couple more to test the level of interest. This is definitely a consideration although I am not sure if I am ready to jump back into the "suit" because I may need to get a haircut and then I may lose all my new found powers! We should have no trouble keeping ourselves busy this summer and hopefully make a couple bucks to help us finance the next leg of our trip. We will be planning the next trip this summer with a projected departure date of early September. We are already excited! Hahaha.
I don't want you to think that it has been all work and no play as we are staying in a beautiful beach-front resort and our apartment overlooks this pool, pretty nice place for morning coffee and building a website!
There is another pool as well, this one is on the beach beside the restaurant and bar. Beautiful!
We also love the sunrise and beach here. So now you can see that it is not all work although when we launch the website I am sure you will be pretty impressed with us.
We will update the blog at least one more time while we are in Vietnam and we will also be sure to share the link to our new business Champa Clothing at www.champaclothing.com as we are going to keep it locked until it is complete and ready to launch. Our target date is April 4! Can you believe it??? So much fun!
Well, time to sign off and dream about coming home and seeing Carson, Shelby, Emily, Cortney, Matt and baby Ivory!
Oh yeah, almot forgot... another selfie for SK