marzipan monday :: fin+roe letterpress lovelies

with my mom's birthday coming up at the end of this week, i thought i'd take the opportunity to feature some of our great snarky & sassy letterpress birthday cards from fin+roe.



the greatest things about these cards are the unexpected greetings found inside. here are just a few....hopefully one tickles your fancy.

happy birthday :: i'd love to celebrate with you but i'm pretty sure there's an early bird buffet you want to get to.

happy birthday :: on the upside, grey goes with everything.

happy birthday :: in lieu of singing "happy birthday" we opted for a rousing chorus of "the final countdown"

happy, happy, birthday! :: congrats! you're one year closer to yelling at kids to get off your lawn.

birthday wishes :: mine include a pool boy, unlimited funds, and a guest house full of shoes. how about you?

download :: father's day card

it may be a little late to order your father's day cards online, but how about downloading your very own customizable card right here, right now!



i've designed a downloadable father's day card for you that allows you to customize the text to say anything you'd like! here's the front!



and here's what the whole thing looks like when laid flat.

all you need to do is go to this link and click on "download". (you'll have to sign up for a free account if you don't already have one) open up your file in adobe acrobat reader (which is free if you don't have it), and click on the text to edit it. type in anything you'd like and then print it off on your home printer! cut it out, fold it in half and you're all set!

marzipan monday :: father's day cards

father's day is coming up this weekend. we have a bunch of great cards (including an option for step-fathers). time's running out, but if you order today, we'll be sure to get them out to you in time for the weekend!



these are just a few examples of what we have. check out the father's day section for all our available options!

marzipan monday :: print in store program

i mentioned an exciting new project i'm involved in back in april. the print in store program from a fresh bunch was launched at the national stationery show last month and was a huge success. i thought i'd share just a couple of my designs that will be included in the launch of this program in just a few short days!

marzipan monday :: stationery show 2010

last week i was away at the national stationery show for a few days. i can't really remember which number this is for me. i think it's somewhere around #7 or so. this year was different for me than in the past. because of all the changes i've made in my business over the past year, i didn't actually have anything to display in a booth of my own. now that my greeting cards are with a distributor and my fin+roe line is available through the english paper company as citrus & clover, i'm no longer in charge of sales of any of my products! i thought it would be a relief, which it was partly, but it's also a little nerve wracking to hand everything over! luckily i think i'm in pretty good hands in both scenarios!



this was my pretty little corner of the whitney english booth where citrus & clover made it's official debut. i love the framed magnet displays where all of the printed samples were hung.



and here's the album itself. i'm so excited to get it into retailers hands and get their feedback.



i spent much of my time at the show with my friends from a fresh bunch. (please excuse the horrible shots, i was working with limited camera capabilities & bad, bad lighting!) our booth was put together in less than a week which just blows my mind! jenny from hen and barley press was a miracle worker!





a fresh bunch had an amazing response to a great new program we're offering called the print in store program. this program allows retailers to print our great designs right in their store. immediate gratification. above are a few shots of some of the different designs we had on display for the retailers to see in person. below, are some of the designs i'm going to be offering.







i have to say that it was one of my most exciting shows ever! even though i didn't have a booth of my very own, i had many extraordinary things happening all at the same time. i'm so excited to see what the rest of the year has to offer! i have a feeling it's going to be a big year for changes in my company!

alive

sorry i've disappeared. i'm in new york at the national stationery show and was too busy to write a post letting you all know i'd be gone for a few days! i'm coming back tomorrow, but it might take a few days to get back into the swing of things! see you all soon!

marzipan monday :: website revamp

it's been awhile since i revamped my website. i figured since i have made so many changes as of late, that my website needed to reflect that. now my homepage features all three of my brands with links to information about each. (including a new page for citrus & clover!)



you can find all the stores in which our products are sold in the u.s., links to online retailers, and, if you're a retailer, you can download our current fin+roe and marzipan inc. catalogs!

and, a big shout out to my friend hailey who helped me come up with my fabulous tagline on our new homepage.

marzipan monday :: exciting new designs

i'm so excited to reveal our brand new designs! we've been working so hard over here on our new citrus&clover line (site coming soon!) for the english paper company that i haven't had much time to talk about what i've been working on for marzipan inc. here are our brand new products that are on their way to our distributor as you read this! soon to be in a store near you!



this release has a little bit of everything. a little bit of birthday, wedding, baby, and everyday.



also, 6 fabulous new holiday cards!



retailers can contact our distributor at sales@collagegreetings.com or 866.763.3861 to place an order to schedule an appointment with a local rep.

our cards are also available through our online retailer shades of violet.

marzipan monday :: evolution of a logo

logos are one of my favorite things to design so i was so excited when hannah from yes you maigh asked me to help her design a new logo for her blog/shop! i thought it might be interesting to do an evolution of a logo post here to show you how we went from concept to final product.

i know hannah's work and read her blog so i thought it would be a fun project to collaborate on. her only real requirement was that it be in black and white. her first thought was to include some bricks and/or another graphic element with her name. although i don't know hannah personally i feel like i get her sense of humor and quirkiness. so, for round one, i whipped up some concepts using the brick and also using the "greater than" symbol playing off the idea that her shop is greater than anything else around it.



there were several rounds of concepts in the process, but i'm going to stick to the path that got us to the end. after seeing the first round, hannah sent me some images that had inspired her of roughly drawn flowers/greenery. she thought it might be a nice contrast to the harsh bricks. i came up with 3 different floral looks and combined them with a couple brick options. the floral below was her favorite of the three.



after thinking about it for awhile, hannah decided that her first idea of bricks was really what she wanted to stick with and that while she liked the florals, she felt it was more of a seasonal look. so, after a couple font changes/options, the logos below are the final result that we came up with. she's currently using the compact version on her etsy site and the horizontal version on her blog.

marzipan monday :: citrus & clover

this week's posting is most likely going to be pretty light. i'm a busy little bee finishing up all of my files to hand over to the english company for my citrus+clover line. so, check in for the daily photos of the day, but other posts may be hard to come by! back to work for me!

my morning in review

this pretty sums up my morning so far. it's only 9:30 and it's been one thing after another. imagine this, but happening every 5 minutes while you're trying to work. yeah. that's my life.



in case you didn't notice, that's the cup way at the top of the photo....yeah, the one that spilled a full cup of milk all over the floor and then rolled a trail of milk all the way across the room and under the island. all thanks to the baby.

marzipan monday :: new design

i just sent off a print run of 18,000 card for marzipan inc. which includes 18 new designs! i'm so excited to see them printed. here's one of the new designs included in this run...a new thank you card.

marzipan monday :: new product

today has been a rough day so far. the time change has left both of my boys in a seriously foul mood. the baby came and sat on my lap this morning and said "i'm having a rough day", then he laid his head down on my desk.


since i haven't had any time to accomplish anything today with my cranky kids, i thought i'd feature one of the new items you'll find in our new citrus & clover album being sold through the english paper company! along with the regular sized calling cards we normally sell, we're adding a 3"x3" version. it's what i've been using for my own personal business and calling cards for awhile now and people seem really drawn to them, so i thought i'd add them as an option. the albums are available for pre-order now!

marzipan monday :: holiday sneak peek

here's a quick sneak peek of my holiday designs for marzipan inc. for this winter. i didn't realize i was on such a blue and brown kick until i put them all together!

letterpress giveaway!

in honor of our new letterpress release, we're having a giveaway! check out the details below:



win 5 letterpress cards of your choice!

here's what you need to do to win:

1. go to the fin+roe website and tell me which 5 cards from our letterpress line you would choose if you won. 

if you'd like to increase your chances of winning, you can do any or all of the following: (please enter a separate comment for each item you complete)

1. follow my blog. you can do this over in the right hand column. 
2. tweet or facebook about this giveaway.
3. blog about this giveaway.
4. become a fan of marzipan inc. on faebook. 
5. ask me a meaningful question on formspring. (asking me what my favorite color is will not work) 

that's 6 chances to win!

ok, i think that wraps it up! i'll leave this open until friday at noon (CST). good luck!

BIG, EXCITING changes for fin+roe!

i cannot begin to explain to you how excited i am to finally announce the following news. i've been tucking this information up my sleeve for almost 3 months now!

back in december i was offered the amazing opportunity to partner with the whitney english company for sales, marketing, customer service, fullfillment and accounting services for my fin+roe brand! i was honored to hear that a stationery veteran such as whitney thought my line was something she'd like to align with her own.

i've had really great feedback on my fin+roe line since it launched, but i just don't have the time it takes to grow it in the way i want to. this partnership will afford fin+roe so many opportunities in a way that i would not have been able to do on my own. now, i will be able to focus my attention solely on designing instead of sales, marketing, customer service, and accounting while the whitney english team takes care of those things for me!

of course, a few changes come with this partnership. the biggest change will be the brand under which fin+roe is sold wholesale. for those of you not in the stationery business, it might seem confusing to change the name of my company. let me try to explain. i will continue to sell the fin+roe line online through my site. nothing there will change. (including my new letterpress line) however, by doing this, i'm technically competing with our wholesale retailers who invest money in our brand in order to sell it. to ensure i do not directly compete with them, we're going to be selling wholesale under a different brand. so, here's the big brand reveal. fin+roe wholesale will now be sold under the name citrus+clover, and here's the lovely logo.



i'm so excited about this new opportunity. i have been feverishly working on getting my line complete so that the team at whitney english can have an album ready for release in time for the national stationery show this may. (or, maybe even sooner!) they'll be taking pre-orders for the updated album immediately. hopefully, this means that by the end of the year, you will see citrus+clover in a store near you!

if you're a retailer interested in pre-ordering the citrus+clover album, please contact the whitney english company at: 405.608.0061

if you're a current retailer of the fin+roe album, the whitney english team will be contacting you with the details on how to switch over to the new brand.

marzipan monday :: new letterpress cards from fin+roe

today is a very, very exciting day! the fact that i can finally make this announcement makes me giddy to say the least! so here you go, the big reveal....



our great fin+roe patterns are now available on letterpress greeting cards!
we've been feverishly working over the past 9 months to bring you an amazing line of letterpress cards based on our classic patterns from fin+roe. each card is greeted on both the outside AND the inside!

with simple, straight-forward greetings on the outside, you'll be taken off guard to find the sassy, snarky, & sweet greetings inside.

who says letterpress cards can't be beautiful and clever at the same time?

visit fin+roe to view the entire collection or to order some up today!
if you're a retailer who would like to carry this letterpress line in your store, please contact our distributor at 1.866.763.3861 to schedule an appointment with your local rep.