I recently had an interesting conversation with promotional products master and skilled interviewer Mark Graham in concert with industry consultant and expert blogger extroidinaire Marshall Atkinson on episode 104 of the Promokitchen Podcast. We covered so much ground from my history, to embroidery, to eCommerce, to design that it’s hard to adequately summarize or categorize the post.

These two offered focused questions that drilled down to important information for promotional products distributors and decorators alike, so I’m hopeful that my answers that can help you in your business. If you have 44 minutes to spare, I’d love for you to give it a listen. I’ve listed some bullet points below the player that hint at all you’ll hear.

• How I started working in embroidery
• Definition of Embroidery Digitizing
• What’s the difference between good and great digitizing?
• How can great digitizing make a difference in your end product and profit?
• The importance of building relationships with your digitizers
• Holistic Design
• What’s the hardest and easiest thing to embroider?
• Is digitizing as a craft under siege by cheap digitizers?
• How can you save money over time using quality files?
• The value of consultation and design thinking
• Why should I write, share, and teach?
• Sharing the work you want to do, in the communities of people you want to reach
• Writing for your audience
• Networking in and out of your industry
• What do you wish salespeople and distributors knew about embroidery, and what would help them sell more?
• Creating apparel packages; coordinating holistically designed pieces into a package rather than placing the same art on every item.
• The importance of the feel and ‘hand’ of an embroidery design
• Being social and caring as the backbone of social media.
• The importance of texture in embroidery
• Can auto-digitizing replace human digitizers? What will endanger our work?
• How medieval and retro design influences my work, and how that came to pass
• What are the benefits of sharing?
• Why I think it’s important to share, teach, ask questions, and show your work. Why should we be so vulnerable?
• “Risk caring about the work you do and the people for whom you do it.”

If you have a minute or 44, I can tell you more about how great embroidery is. 😉