Last month was big for Mandatory Fun:
I received a 1,250 sticker order in support of a special event for Firsties… and that one order did a couple things:
- Taught me how to get the most out of my setup
- Put this project in the black
That’s right, your boy’s bootstrapped project is now cash flow positive and “the Board” is very happy about this development.
I’d like to give a special thanks to both the Military Officer Association of America (MOAA) and the USAFA Association of Graduates (AOG) for putting their faith in this small but mighty operation, because in the end the MOAA gave away these stickers to Firsties during a “Firstie Departure” event… and I think that’s super cool.
All right, so here’s a breakdown from April and my takeaways:
Operations
- 1 new sticker dropped on the website
- 1 promo posted on Instagram
So, I spent the first half of the month printing and cutting 1,250 stickers.
Let’s be real.
It turns out that the Sticker Packs that I mentioned just throwing up on a whim last month – were an amazing idea, because it made it easy for the MOAA to order an assortment of stickers.
Who knew?
But getting 1,250 stickers out the door was somewhat of a herculean effort for me, and I did not spend any time really at all creating and promoting new designs that you see on the site.
Except for the one…
My big production related takeaway this month was all around operational flow. It took a bit of time to “optimize” production for large runs and my biggest lessons learned were:
- It takes about two hours to produce 140 stickers
- In a single threaded operation (1 printer / 1 cutter) always keep the cutter cutting
- Give complete focus to each task
There are three points of failure once a sheet is printed:
- Laminating the stickers
- Lining up the sticker sheet onto the cutting mat
- Loading the cutting mat into the cutter
It turns out that if you’re NOT dialed in on those three tasks, in the moment as you do each of them, you can very easily mess up a batch of stickers.
No big deal, unless you care about efficiency.
So by the last run, I felt like a pro and was able to completely live in the moment. It was a beautiful day outside, I was playing some absolute choons in the background, and it was a joyful experience.
The last big takeaway this month was that I taught myself how to shrink wrap, and I’m considering adding that as a special skill on my LinkedIn account…
Marketing
Instagram
The Instagram account gained 299 followers and lost 60 followers – netting 239 new followers.
And there were two cool things that happened this past month on Instagram:
Thing 1 – I made a connection with a 2010 grad who is building an Instagram account that gives a behind the scenes look of the Zoo to high school students thinking about attending.
The account is friendly.good.good and I sent Megan some stickers that she was able to put around the new Madera Cyber Innovation Center for cadets to find, which I thought was great.
Thing 2 – I saw a meme on a cadet run meme account that really made me laugh. So I reached out to the account and made some spirit stickers for them to give out as they see fit.
Sharing it here because the experience actually helped me develop a new sticker concept – and I used that “order” to teach myself how to shrink wrap.
Plus the idea of digital memes turning into a physical good is interesting to me.
The communications were a bit touch and go and then it dawned on me that it was probably weird for me to slide in their DMs, like a narc… so we figured it out by keeping things anonymous.
I have no idea who the person or people running the account is/are and they likely still have no idea who I am…
It’s cool, we’re cool.
Revenue
TL;DR: Here are the stats last month – and you can see a cumulative total on the About page if you care to…
I think that my biggest revenue related takeaway this month revolved around sticker size.
The more stickers I can fit on a page, the fewer pages I need to print to fulfill orders. So I spent some time coming up with an idea for 1 inch by 3 inch stickers.
The “No Step” sticker was my first test case and with minimal promotion I was able to sell a few.
This is leading me to think that having a variety of sticker sizes and price points, along with the sticker packs is how Mandatory Fun likely needs to evolve.
Something else that I keep validating is that new sticker designs are currently the best and only way to generate sales.
At some point, now that this project is in the black, I will push ads to find out if that is a viable way to grow sales…
But in the meantime, I know that the site probably needs another 25 new stickers and additional sticker packs so that there is enough to look at and always something new coming up.
So I need to set a goal to get back in design mode, in some way, as I work to balance family, other projects, and another Minnesota Timberwolves playoff run in May. We’ll see how it goes…
That’s it for this month.
If you’re read this far, you’re a real one. Thank you.
