This week was dedicated as Computer-aided design week. Legendary Whitetails strives at bringing on new and unique ideas to share with the hunting world each year. It all starts with an idea in your head. You then have to somehow figure out how to get that idea from your head to paper. Creating a CAD is the best way to show your idea and expedite the process of creating the product you want.
Although we have already finalized a lot of your ideas, we still need to finish up a lot of our new products. We are coming up on some big deadlines for our fall creative. What I mean by fall creative is our September Catalog drop. For example in 2009 Legendary whitetails had 4 catalog drops from September - December. What you may not know is that there was only 2 creatives. So, want was actually inside the catalog only changed once, since we only did 2 creatives. Having multiple creatives allows us to change out products that we may sell out of earlier than expected, allow us to move products to better selling spots in the catalog, add new products, ect.
All the products I am working on now would ideally be for the 1st creative which we plan to have in home September 4th. The preliminarily numbers for our fall campaign (Sept 1 - Jan 31st) is to mail 3 million catalogs. In the big scheme of things we are still a small company. 3 million catalogs is a very accomplished number though, and we are very proud we can comfortably mail that many catalogs. I heard from a vendor this week that a company that was been around for over a 100 years was only mailing out 100,000 catalogs this year. This goes to show that different companies have different ways of making their company successful, but it also shows that for Legendary Whitetails, a niche company, to be at 3 million in 11 years we must be doing something right.
Product is King in our world. We definitely do not have a shortage of ideas. The hard part is just picking the ideas you think will be best for the company. What products fit best to who we are. What will the consumer like. What how can we give the consumer the best price for the quality of product we are offering.
You may ask what is this CAD you speak of? Well the main reason for the CAD is the lay everything out for the factory to easily understand what is happening. For an example of what a CAD might look like see below:
This will show you every little detail. From the neck label that needs to be used, the size of the designs, to the zipper style. A lot of details that many people probably would never even think about. But, it is my job to make sure that all those details are accomplish and make the garment look extraordinary. These CADs also make it easy for the factory to see what the finished product should look like. You will also be able to take the individual pieces of art of the CAD and use them for the development of the product. For example if this was a first time factory that was creating a woven label. They have all the information and art needed to create that woven label. Size, color, and art. Makes life easy for us and the manufacturer. It also it a great tool for organizing. Creating 3 ring binders with all the products is very helpful. I can then keep track of what products look like, inventory, projections, sizing, returns, placement. All things I will get into a later date.
CAD week was a success this week, but I have a feeling I am in for some long nights this coming week. We are looking at back to back CAD weeks. It is really fun seeing what you created in your head come to real life.
"Think big thoughts but relish small pleasures."
Mitch Huffman
Legendary Whitetails
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