Yesterday, I told you about a special milestone in the history of Kristie’s Kreations. We officially turned 9 years old on February 13th!

I also told you that I would give a little history about Kristie’s Kreations so here it is………..

When Kristie's Kreations was started, I was still a special education teacher.
Although I loved working with the kids, I also knew that I wanted to do something more. I also knew that I wanted to stay home when I started a family. In order to do this, I would have to find sometime else to do because I am not one to stay home all the time! It is also very important to me that my children spend time with other kids and not just me!

One day, a lady came into the school that I was teaching at and sold shirts to all of the teachers. These shirts were embroidered with their names on it. I was amazed at how many shirts the lady sold. It was NOT because she was a great at sales but simply because the teachers ate up the fact that they could get a ‘teachery’ shirt that had their name on it! I knew that this was something that I could do!!

It was then that I decided to start my own business. I began researching different embroidery machines and what it would require for me to start my own business
On February 13th, we purchased our first embroidery machine and digitizing program.

If you look at our first machine, you would probably say it was a sewing machine, not an embroidery machine. You would be partially correct. It is a sewing machine that also does embroidery. We attended training sessions for both the machine as well as the digitizing software.

I started out slow selling one shirt here and another shirt there. We started getting busy then by selling to my own school as well as others in the township. In fact, we got so busy, we had to purchase a second sewing/embroidery machine.

Quickly requests started coming in for hats and jacket back designs. These were things that we could not do on our two little machines. Not only that, but it was very time consuming to sew out a simple left chest design on a shirt. A little over a year from starting Kristie’s Kreations we purchased a large commercial embroidery machine!

Two and a half years after starting Kristie’s Kreations, I stopped teaching and focused solely on my business and my new family.

Over the years we started receiving requests for screen printing as well as promotional products. In order for our customers to only have to go to one person for all of their branding needs, we began offering these services as well.

It has been very fun to learn all of the aspects of owning a business and meeting so many wonderful people along the way! I have made many life long friends too!

Labels: digitizing, Embroidery, History, Kristie's Kreations, Promotional Products, Screen Print

Well, back to the limits of embroidery. . .  . One of the problems that I come across frequently is a previously developed logo that is just not embroiderable as is.  This can be for multiple reasons but for this post the reason will be the fonts in the logo.

When we are setting up (digitizing) a logo that will be embroidered on a shirt, we have many things to remember and take into account.  These factors include, but are not limited to, the size of the person who will be wearing the shirt, what material it will be going on, the look of the logo and then its overall size.

Some logos given to us are perfectly fine as they are and look great when we embroider it.  Others have to have changes made to them.  Have you ever noticed that a logo someone is wearing on the left chest of their shirt may be different than the logo displayed on their website or on their business card?

The reason for this is probably because of the font.  Maybe there was a lot of little words below the main part of the logo.  Was the font was too small even to read on the business card?  Or could it be because there was shading in the logo?

We find that typically the reason is simply because the font is very small.  When this happens we have to speak with our customer about how their logo will look.  We have to find out if they are willing to change their logo a little bit.  This usually means taking some parts of the logo/wording off.  Is there a part that is not really that important that it be with the logo?  Can it be placed in another location on the shirt such as the sleeve or the back?

You may say, "But that is my logo, why can't it be included when you embroider it?"  The thing that you have to think about is that we have a certain area in which we have to put the stitches for the logo.  There are just certain physical limitations when you are dealing with material, needle and thread.  A stitch requires that the needle, with the embroidery thread in the eye of the needle, penetrate the material twice to develop the stitch.  There is only so much physical space for the needle to go into on the material where we want the logo to be placed.

With the fonts we try not to make a font less than 6mm tall or 1/4".  For the reason above as well as it just will not look good.  We do not want to make the logo too large on the shirt.  we try to make them look good on the average size of a shirt.  Have you ever seen a small women with a logo that looks like it takes over her shoulder?  That logo is just too big and does not look right on her!  Why didn't they think about this when they developed the logo or is this the way she wants to look?

Have you ever seen me wear my logo?  The wording at the bottom of the K's is really the maximum width that you want a logo to be.  I do this for two reasons.  One being that it is small lettering so it does not look that bad at that size.  The second reason is so that I have an example of the maximum width of a logo.

So, did you learn a little bit more about fonts and the limits to embroidery?  Now you know why a logo might look a little different on their shirt than their business card they are handing to you.

If you see that lady with her logo taking over her shirt or shoulder, and are confortable saying it, tell her how it looks and that you know someone that can make it look better on her!:)

Labels: digitizing, Embroidery, font, Kristie's Kreations, Logo, logos

I know that I have been talking a lot lately about making your logo not shout out at others.  This is great for some but others really want their logo to stand out.  Still others do not change the look of their logo in any way.  In fact, they make sure that the clothing or item that their logo is going on will not clash with their logo or that it is not the same color as their logo.  They are very particular in deciding which item to purchase because they want the logo to stand out. Either of these choices are fine.  My job is to not only help you decide what to put your logo on and how to do it but to also make sure that it looks GREAT either way you decide.

The way that this is done has to do with the digitizing.  You may be saying "the what?" and if you do not know what digitizing is that is OK.  An easy description that you might have heard me say before is creating the stitches for your logo.  This is a detailed process and can be a very time consuming.  It may take us an hour to create a logo or days to create a logo.  I am very particular about the way that a logo looks when it is sewn out.  This has taken us years to accomplish the look and desire that we want.

When we first started Kristie's Kreations in 2001 we began digitizing and have continued to do it ourselves ever since.  I have to admit, Mark is really the one that does the digitizing.  It is very similar to Auto Cad and since Mark has an engineering degree, he has experience with it.  The digitizing did not come easy but it was much easier for him than myself.  We have both had the training but it has been much more difficult for me to pick up.

The set-up of a logo consists of spending time on the computer with the embroidery program as well as sewing out samples on the embroidery machine.  We may sew out a sample of a logo two times or 10 times before we show it to our customer.  I make sure that I am happy with the logo before I show it to you.  Even if I am happy with it does not mean that you will be happy with it.  If you are not happy, that is OK.  We will change it until you are happy!

The digitizing is just another limit to embroidery like I mentioned last week.  There are many factors to remember when setting up a logo.

Another thing that I hear often is how unhappy a customer is with their logo.  They had another company embroider their logo for them and they are just not happy.  Ninety-nine percent of the time this is because of the way that the logo was digitized.  A pure example of this is on our Testimonials Page as well as shown here.

[caption id="attachment_155" align="alignleft" width="231" caption="Competition sample"][/caption]

This particular customer called us on a Thursday.  They were very unhappy with the logo that someone else had done for them.  They asked if I could do a better job.  The problem was that they needed the shirts Friday for a walk that weekend.  We were able to digitize the logo so that it popped and then embroider it on the shirts for them so that they could wear them to the walk!  They were very happy so we were happy!  Can you tell a difference?

Do you ever hear how unhappy someone is with their embroidered apparel?  Is so, please give them my name.  I am more than happy to help make them happy with their logoed apparel!

Labels: digitizing, Embroidery, Kristie's Kreations, Logo, logos