New Website Design With Wordpress = Small Business Win

It took me an entire day, but yesterday I finally got our new website up and running!

It's so nice :)  I'm very happy that it is able to fully support my Etsy shop home in the "Shop Online" section as well as display pictures of my work in a way that doesn't require me to build a listing for each one. 

PLUS the best part....

..... not as expensive as Volusion.

My website was actually pretty cheap and fairly easy to build. My first website was with Volusion.com - now that company is great for those who are really into having a storefront based entirely on their website. It honestly was just too much for my little boutique's needs.

With the new site, I started with HostGator.com - a simple, cheap hosting site with a pretty easy to understand C-Panel (that's where you build your stuff)! It was super easy to buy the domain www.wildflowersandlace.com for one year and buy the hosting services for three years at only $3.96 per month.  I was able to pay for it all up front too, so that relieves me of a monthly bill coming to my inbox.

Next step: Install Wordpress so that I can select from thousands of free themes and easily build my website from a visual point of view instead of trying to learn all of the code and tech talk. Here's how user friendly the dashboard is.

 You can easily add new web pages, customize your overall appearance, add pictures and more.  I went with a free theme named "Arcade" and love it. It's not very well integrated with social media, though, which is a definite con. However, I wasn't ready to pay for their full version just yet. Maybe in the future I will, but until then this will do just fine.

You are also able to add these neat little forms in certain pages - I wanted a form for my clients to fill out in order to submit a final approval on their proofs as well as a form for potential clients to fill out in order to contact us with information about their event.

The plugin FormGet helped me add in some online forms with a very basic drag and drop system. I could customize my questions, make answers required or not, and then when a client fills the form out, a neat little email pops up in my inbox telling me that, hey, you have a new lead!

Wordpress is completely free to install, the theme was completely free, so the total cost of my website for three entire years is:

($3.96 x 36) + ($12.95 x 3) = $181.41

Hosting        +  Domain Name = Website Cost

That breaks down to just roughly $5.00 per month... for a website.

As opposed to Volusion, which was charging me $20 per month... for more than I needed.

Don't get me wrong - Volusion is a very powerful online retail tool that has AMAZING features.... it was just too much for my shop.  With this, I am able to still sell online while linking to my Etsy shop, link to my social media sites, blog, showcase my previous work, collect new inquiries online, and organize my final proof approvals all within an attractive website for much less.

I call that a SMALL BUSINESS WIN if I ever saw one.

Wedding Wire Rated!

Exciting! We've gotten amazing reviews and can't wait to add more - please don't forget to review your vendors.. it's a huge source of pride and knowledge for us.

We're excited to have won 5 stars every time, and can't wait to keep it up!

Top Wedding Invitation Trends of 2014

Thanks to ElegantWeddingInvites.com for this insightful article! We love hearing about the latest wedding stationery trends - time to craft up some new design suites!


No. 1 Lace, Damask and Pearls
A classic that never fades is lace, damask and pearls, which will continuously popular and one of the hottest wedding invitations in the year 2014. For more lace wedding invitations, please click here.

No. 2 Floral
Floral wedding invitations have always been hot but in 2014 they’ll be even bigger, from traditional blooms to shabby chic patterns.

As low as $0.94,Click to See the Details of the Invitation above

No. 3 Vintage
You’ll see vintage luxury inspired by the Art Deco era – like Great Gatsby.

No. 4 Hint of Sparkle
Whether it’s a small paillette or a frame decorated in sequins, these styles will be big bonus to your perfect wedding invitations.

No. 5 Stripes & Chevron
The color navy blue is one of the hottest wedding colors next year and some of the weddings are nautical theme. Stripes and chevron can best describe the nautical and work with the color blue.

As low as $0.94,Click to See the Details of the Invitation above

As low as $0.94,Click to See the Details of the Invitation above

No. 6 Burlap
Like it or not, burlap will increasingly work its way, but in different ways, like a burlap rope or decorated by burlap.

 

As low as $0.94,Click to See the Details of the Invitation above, left one,right one

No. 7 Color Matters More

Hot wedding colors for 2014 include coral, turquoise, peach, gray and my favorite, navy blue, all of which can be mixed with a variety of secondary colors to create a beautiful effect.

Back Up and Running

For a period of time here with my new job jobs, I thought I would not have the resources available to continue with my shop!!

Luckily, some sense was talked into me by my husband and my new director... you have the option to hire someone to help you keep it going without incurring too much cost. So, believe it or not, we've grown to a team of THREE instead of just us two. Never imagined that would happen!

Introducing Julie Faulkner, my sister and now, the person who has enabled me to keep my doors open! She will be handling a lot of the assembly, so please give her a warm welcome to the team!

We're excited to have you on board!!

Peony - Flower of the Year

According to the wedding planner to the stars, Mindy Weiss, the Peony is the "flower of the year" for weddings and has been for two years straight now. This romantic flower is one of my favorites and I absolutely love how many color variations there are!

Anyway, I love them so much that I fashioned one of my invitation suites around them. The Coral Peony is my most popular suite on Pinterest and has been re-pinned everywhere! I just love the color combination and think it is a very soft, feminine wedding invitation.

There are a few more wedding trends I'm excited about this year as well!

Neutral color palettes - not sure why, but I sure do like the palettes of grey, brown, blush pinks, etc. They just exude elegance to me, if you do it right.

Gleaming wedding invitations - I love adding a little bit of shine to my invitations. Whether it is through heat embossing, ribbon, or the paper itself, I think a little bit of glitter and gleam is a fantastic highlight on an invitation.

Going natural - The "going green" thing has been embraced thoroughly, and rightfully so. I am looking forward to creating an invitation suite centered around being all-natural. The use of recycled papers lends a unique touch to a suite and several of those papers are actually quite cool to work with!

Supplier Review: Paper and More

As a paper product retailer, I have a vast array of quality papers to choose from in my designs. There are imported papers, home-grown papers, recycled, organic.... this paper world is honestly more interesting than people would think and the list of choices goes on and on. With so many different paper and card stock choices, there are a number of wholesalers that I have attempted to work with as well.

When I first started, I found what I thought to be a fantastic pairing for my company - Clampitt Paper Company. They had a HUGE variety to choose from, seemed like they worked really well with their clients, and even offered to give me two massive boxes of paper samples to show my future customers. I met with one of their representatives and he was wonderful. Very knowledgeable, friendly, and open to helping me as much as he could. So, it was looking positive. However, when I priced out materials for one of my big orders at the time, the competitive pricing he told me about was less than that. I found that I could order online for significantly less money than if I ordered with them, even though we were supposed to be partners. So, I kept them in mind but eventually found that the company that beat their prices and shipping costs that one time, kept the trend going. That company is Paper and More and honestly, I have not been able to beat their prices anywhere I've looked.

Quality. That's something every bride looks for in her invitation design. The creativity of the design does absolutely nothing for you when you have poorly made paper. So, quality is my very first criterion on which to judge a paper supplier. Paper and More does an impressive job of offering papers that very closely match the quality of some of the brand name papers such as Cordenons, Curious, Gmund (a few of my favorites by the way). They offer several different weights, textures, and I have never had a problem running through my top-feed printer.

Product Offering. Paper and More is continuously improving their product offering, bringing several new colors, textures, and paper types to their market. Most of the time, if I need a color matched, I have no problem finding it on Paperandmore.com. I'm fairly certain that if I can't find it and let them know, they will work on bringing it to the table in the future. Flat, metallic, wood-grain embossed, metallic embossed, velvety smooth.... seriously, these guys offer a huge variety! I have run into a color matching problem one time, though, with a color of pocket folder called "Botanic" by Curious that Cardsandpockets.com offered. While I was able to match the color, the difference in cost was monumental.

Pricing. Never have I matched their competitive pricing... I have searched all over the web, delved into local paper suppliers, and seriously have not been able to find better pricing. Here is a quick breakdown for a few of the other main paper suppliers I've seen pop up in my searches.

For this example, we will compare the pricing of a plain, ivory pocket fold invitation shell, as shown here:

Paper and More has this listed at about $0.81 per shell (after shipping)

LCI Papers: $1.03 per shell (after shipping)

Cards and Pockets: $1.24 per shell (after shipping)

Any other paper supplier that I've come across just doesn't offer the pre-made pocket fold. I have found this to be a huge time saver and much more professional looking than anything I could have made myself. Paper and More has been the true champion in the price arena. 

Customer Service. If you are a repeat customer, they'll upgrade your shipping for free no occasion, out of the blue. If you need something cut, they'll cut it for you. If you need samples, they have them. Their paper comes in a timely fashion, orders are processed the same day of ordering, and everything is packaged superbly to ward off rain and dysfunctional postal men who might throw your box around and bend the paper you've tried so hard to keep perfect. 

Bottom line, when your customers demand perfection, Paper and More can offer you a perfect raw material for a hard to beat price. I would recommend them to ANYONE who needs paper for any kind of occasion. Of course I look forward to the day when a bride demands Curious Skin envelopes at $84.99 per 50, but until then, I'll stick to the $13.99/50 quality envelopes this company offers. 

Fleur de Lis Fever

Apparently people have fleur de lis fever this wedding season! I've gotten so many inquiries about my signature series Delphinium Suite and other custom orders in featuring this lovely symbol. Most recently, we are designing a suite with a couple who are showcasing the Mardi Gras colors with the fleur de lis. It should definitely be a special invitation.

This symbol is a stylized lily flower - fleur for flower, lis for lily - associated mostly with the French monarchy from days of old. It has been around for so long, with similar symbols appearing in the ruins of several ancient civilizations including Babylon, Persia, Scythia and Egypt. Some people believe that when the French adopted the symbol as part of their royal emblem, it represented the conversion of the Franks to Christianity in the fifth century, with the three branches symbolizing the holy trinity.

There is still a lot of debate among historians about the true meaning and origins of this simple symbol, but for a long time, it has been associated with royalty and elegance. That must be why so many brides just love this symbol - it captures the elegance of their special day.