Merry Christmas December 22, 2015 08:00

Isaiah 9:6

 From our families to yours: we hope you have a very Merry Christmas!

Just some quick announcements... (don't want to take up too much of your time, cause you should be celebrating and spending time with your family)

1. Our 2016 Planners and our 2016 Typeface Calendar are now 20% off. (Yes, we are serious!) Prices as marked, no discount code necessary. 
2. If you live or work in Raleigh and want to check out our planners in person (and save on shipping) head over to So & So Books on Person Street, or Gather next to 212 E. Franklin Street. We are excited to be featured in both stores!
3. We just added a "Featured" page to our website. It shows up at the top of our webpage, or in our menu on your mobile device. This page will be updated frequently with where to find us or our products outside of our website. IE: events where you can meet us in person, shops where you can find our products, and places out in the world wide web where we are featured.
4. Speaking of features.. Knox from @knoxthedox featured us yesterday on Instagram! Looks like he uses our planner to keep track of all his girls. (By the way if you don't already follow this adorable dachshund from Raleigh, you should! #supportlocal.)

We hope you have a chance to slow down and enjoy time off work and time with your family to celebrate the reason for the season! We plan to do just that, we'll see you next week.

-Becky and Mary Beth

Christmas Giveaway!!! December 15, 2015 07:44 14 Comments

***GIVEAWAY GIVEAWAY GIVEAWAY***

Can you tell we're excited about this one?  Christmas is just around the corner, and we're going to hook one lucky winner up with a pretty great gift - wrap it up and give it away, or keep it for yourself (we won't tell, we promise).  The winner will be sent: a 2016 Typeface Calendar, a 2016 Planner, and a pack of Gold Christmas Tree Paper Clips to use with your planner - a prize valued at over $60!  So, get your typing fingers ready and start entering!  

Use the Rafflecopter widget below to submit your entries.

Here are the official rules:

• You must comment on this blog post to be entered.  Tell us: what you are hoping is under the tree for you this Christmas?
• You can get one additional entry by signing up for our newsletter.
• For even more additional entries, use your social media:
• Instagram - follow us on Instagram and tag three friends on the photo associated with this giveaway
• Facebook - share the photo associated with this giveaway on your Timeline
• Twitter - follow us on twitter and tweet about this giveaway
• Entries are valid through Saturday, December 19 at 11:59pm, EST
• One winner will be drawn at random and notified Sunday
• US residents valid only (sorry about this one - hopefully changing soon!)

GOOD LUCK!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Holiday Gift Guide December 10, 2015 08:00 1 Comment

Are you guys in the Holiday Spirit yet?  With only 15 days left until Christmas, we certainly are!  We're both wrapping up our shopping and thought we would share some of our favorite products that we use frequently for gift giving.  We try to shop local and small businesses before fighting crowds at big box stores, and hope you all will consider doing the same.  Enjoy!

1. Let's get this one out of the way first: we think our products are pretty great (especially the 2016 Planner), so we encourage you to check out the UPstudio shop!  Did you notice that we have a new product?  Gold Arrow Paper Clips are now available as a great way to highlight items or keep a place in your planner.
2. Little Grey Line* - Jessica Johnson Moore is one talented lady with a sewing machine.  She converts mens dress shirts into dresses for girls, and the products are both stunning and sentimental.  
3. Studio KMO - Karen O'Leary's beautiful hand cut maps are truly like nothing else you have seen.  The quality of her work is evident in each small shape precisely removed with an X-ACTO blade.
4. Holly Aiken* - Holly is well known around Raleigh (and most of NC) for her handcrafted bags and accessories.  We particularly love that you can pick your own colors for a customized product.  Look at her shop year round for special products relating to Raleigh events (like the Wide Open Bluegrass Festival held in the fall!)
5. Off the Cuff* - Together with her husband, Madi Johnson creates beautiful cuff links that are perfect for any occasion.  They are completely customizable, and here's the best part: a portion of each sale goes to charity.
6. Spark Metal Studio* - Kathleen Dautel is an architect turned metalsmith whose love of design reads clearly in her jewelry.  With stainless steel and epoxy resin materials, her modern jewelry is perfect for anyone.
7. Tierra Sol Studio* - Who has time to keep plants alive during the hectic Christmas season? We don't. That is why this beautiful cactus by husband and wife team, Seana and Yair is perfect. We can't get enough of all of their cacti and terrariums.
8. Afternoon Owl Designs* - We have an obsession with infinity scarves: the cozier the better. These crocheted beauties by Rebecca of Afternoon Owl Designs definitely fit the bill. 
9. Lauren Pottery* - Lauren creates beautiful handmade pottery items for your home. Our personal favorite is the North Carolina heart ornament - a great small gift for anyone on your list.

photos courtesy of websites linked above

A few extra notes: we didn't realize this as we were compiling the list, but this is quite a collection of powerful women.  We have the utmost respect for each and every one of them (and their husbands!)  An asterisk (*) denotes a company that is local to the Triangle (Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill area).

Happy Shopping!

Dress Your Tech December 3, 2015 08:00

You may not have ever heard of DESIGNLOVEFEST, but I follow her blog pretty religiously.  It is a great mix of just about everything. It inspires me to be more creative on a daily basis.

One highlight is the "Dress Your Tech" section where once a week or every other week she features amazing desktop backgrounds. Not sure if you're in the same boat as me, but I hate the standard backgrounds on my computer, and I feel like I can never find the perfect picture to use that I won't get tired of in about five minutes (sorry hubby and son). The collection on DESIGNLOVEFEST is perfect for me; simple and creative, with a ton to choose from so I can change it every day if I tire of it. Most of the images offered are designed by pretty famous people specifically for DESIGNLOVEFEST. The best part: they are all FREE!

Here is one of my favorites, it is vintage DESIGNLOVEFEST from 2013:

Link to Download

This is my current desktop background, in case you're wondering:

Link to Download

I might be moving on to this fun guy next:

Link to Download

Or maybe this one?

 Link to Download

For those of you who want something a little more colorful and fun, maybe this one?

Link to Download

There are tons of options, and your tastes might not line up exactly with mine, so go check it out for yourself.  You just might find something perfect! 

We hope to see you all this weekend (and next weekend, and the following weekend!)

--Mary Beth and Becky

Thankfulness and a Free Download November 26, 2015 08:38

It's that time of year again: time for cooler weather, college football rivalry week, and eating as much turkey and pumpkin pie as you possibly can.  It's also time to take a few minutes to think about what you are truly thankful for.  We recommend that you do this more often than once a year, but when a day is dedicated to it and you're off from work (we hope you are!), then you should make the effort to do it.  To get you in the spirit, here is a list of a few of the things we're thankful for at UPstudio:

• Turkey
• Family
• Trader Joe's Cranberry Sauce
• Friends
• Hart of Dixie
• Hot Chocolate
• #shopsmall (Small Business Saturday)
• The reason for the season!
• Our Favorite Customers (we're looking at you)
• Free Downloads

Wait - you're thankful for free downloads too?  Well then you're in luck - there is a brand new free download on the UPstudio website today!  If you've been wanting some hands on experience with the 2016 UPstudio Planner layout, then download this Weekly Layout for free!  We're personally using these to finish out the year for 2015 before using the 2016 UPstudio Planner full time.  This is a great way to figure out the best way that the design can work for you and give it a test run before committing to purchase.  We hope you'll take advantage of this, but there's no rush, it'll stay on the site.

Look out for some sales coming up too - UPstudio is celebrating Small Business Saturday through Cyber Monday with 15% off everything in the store!  Use code THANKFUL at checkout. (11/28 12:00am to 11/30 at 11:59pm)

Planner Versatility November 19, 2015 09:10

We've had some really great response to the new items that were released in our shop on Tuesday, and we couldn't be happier that you guys are happy.  We thought that we'd delve in a little bit more about the Planner and some of the ways that you can use it.  We steered away from having a lot of headings or layouts that told the user exactly how they had to use it - you may remember from our previous blog posts, that we gave a lot of information about keeping it as versatile as possible for as many people as possible, and showed some suggestions for how to use the weekly layout page in a few different ways.  

Another aspect of versatility with the Planner is the blank pages at the front and back - we really debated about whether to have specific lists of what to do on each page, but we learned from our Focus Group that there were a lot of preferences depending on the person, so we went back to our main goal of versatility.  To keep it simple and open for use, we left them blank so that you, the user, could figure the very best way it would benefit you.  The options are really endless, but here are a few ways that we thought might be useful:

• Passwords and Logins
• Important Phone Numbers
• Medical Information
• Books to Read
• Movies to Watch
• Restaurants to Try
• Birthday and Anniversary Lists
• Gift Ideas
• Personal Lists
• Sketches

Like we said, the options are truly endless.  AND there are places like this built in all over the Planner: at the end of every month are blank graph pages for various lists (you can even write your grocery list and tear it right out), at the bottom of each weekly layout there are blank spaces for lists in addition to the designated weekly planning columns and rows.  With so many options - the Planner is really customizable!  How do you plan to use yours?  We'd love to know!

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon. 

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use, or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via email, click here.)

New Accessories in the Shop November 18, 2015 07:56

Yesterday we blew everyone up by e-mail and tons of social media posts announcing that our 2016 Planners were available for purchase. We apologize if we bombarded you, but we are really excited! Who am I kidding, we aren't sorry! We have worked really hard and are very proud of our finished product. So, we shouted it from the rooftops yesterday 'social media style'.

What we didn't talk too much about yesterday was that in addition to our planners we added five new products to our shop as well.

Do you need a way to mark your place in your planner? We typically do! We have four different fun options for you. They all work great as bookmarks, but the options are endless. Pricing includes a whole pack of clips!

We also added our Mantra Pencil Set. We shared some of the behind the scenes details on the blog a few weeks back. Includes four pencils with fun phrases that everyone can relate to.

Don't forget, in celebration of our planner launch, everything on our website ships for free this week! Place your order before 11:59pm on 11/22 using FREESHIP at checkout.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon. 

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use, or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via email, click here.)

Why Our Planner Isn't $9.99 at Target November 16, 2015 19:51

If you haven't heard by now, we launched our 2016 planners on the website today! We are really excited because we have been developing these for a year, and we can finally share them with you now.  It's been quite the learning process, but our end product is one that we're really proud of. 

You can purchase your planner today by clicking here!! If you snag one this week, shipping is on us. Actually, in celebration, let's make it so that everything in our shop ships for free! Really - who doesn't love a good discount?  Enter FREESHIP at checkout (lasts until 11:59 EST on 11/22). 

So, why is our planner not $9.99 at Target, you ask?

First off, let's just be realistic.  We are two people, not a big company. Being a startup, we don't pull as much weight as the big wigs out there, and smaller quantities lead to higher prices. But, we didn't want that to stop us from providing a quality product. Because we are not a large company, we've been able to pour a lot of love, time, and effort into every little detail instead of making quick, profit-driven decisions. We are very happy with our finished product and know you will be too!

(To read more about the development process of our planner, check out our five part series, Planning a Planner, where we discuss how the idea was formed, how we made key decisions with the help of a focus group, and the final layout of the planner.)

Here are a handful of other reasons we think our planner is amazing (and worth more than $9.99):

1. Our planner is locally printed and bound in North Carolina. 
2. Our custom covers were letterpressed stateside by The Laughing Owl Press (they did an amazing job, per usual). 
3. Our planner includes a double sided folder. (We personally use it for invitations, coupons, and receipts, but the options are endless.)
4. Our planner pages measure 6" W x 9" H so that you can fold an 8.5"x11" size sheet of paper and stick it in your folder or in between pages without bending the corners.
5. We chose 70lb text paper for our planner. We did a lot of tests with different types of pens, pencils, and sharpies to choose a paper type that has minimal bleed through without making the planner too thick.
6. We developed the best layout ever (in our eyes, and hopefully yours too). One of our main goals was versatility. We wanted every space to be useful, but for you to be able to set the purpose, so there's a lot of freedom in use. We feel like we achieved that goal in our weekly layouts (click here for more details and sample), by having 5 blank pages at the end of every month for you to use however you like, and by providing pages at the beginning and end of the planner to track things throughout the year. 
7. Our planner has tabs to mark the months. The tabs have a mylar coating for extra durability. Directly following each tab is a goal sheet for the month and a two page month layout prior to the week layouts.

(For close up of images, shop our planner!)

If we still haven't sold you and you have more questions, comment below, or shoot us an e-mail at hello@upstudionc.com, we'd love to share more details!

--Mary Beth and Becky

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon. 

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use, or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via email, click here.)

The Lost Art of Letter Writing November 12, 2015 08:00

Here at UPstudio, we're big believers in the hand-written note.  There is nothing more special than receiving fun mail (read: not bills, advertisements, or coupons for window washing).  Sure an email or a text message are nice, but they don't feel as personal, or as permanent.  I have a collection of letters from my husband from when we were long-distance dating that I'll keep forever.  They're that much more special to me because I know he made the effort to sit down with paper and pen and write something out to me.  We still talked on the phone every day, but getting something physical in the mail always made my day.

  Letters saved from my husband while long distance dating

My grandmother who lives in Virginia just turned 90.  She is hard of hearing so we've never been able to talk on the phone.  Instead, both my sister and I write a letter to her each week.  Usually on Sunday night, I'll take out a note card and write to her about the previous week, and what's coming up next week.  A lot of times I'll try to ask her something about her past, how she felt about something going on in the world, what her favorite book is, etc.  She loves to receive mail and will send back letters and newspaper clippings that she thinks I'll enjoy (minus that one about wrinkles, what was up with that, grandma?! #selfconciousnow)  

Imagine a scenario like this:  You've been dating someone for a while and feelings have grown stronger.  Suddenly, your boyfriend sends you this text message:  "I luv u".  You respond with "I luv u 2".  How sweet.  In order to cherish this forever, you take a screen shot of it and it becomes the background on your phone.  Scenario #2: you thoughtfully pick out a gift for a friend or family member that you spent weeks looking for.  It is sent to them, and you're excited to hear their reaction.  You receive an email that reads "Thanks for the gift".  See what I mean?  Nothing can replace the simple act of writing a letter, mistakes and all, and sending it to someone that you care about.

We encourage you to take the time to write notes when you want to thank someone, tell them something important, or just make a person smile. It might not be practical to send a letter every time, but on the times that it is, make it count.  Especially in this technology-centric world that we live in, take a minute to slow down, write something out, and send it.  I guarantee you that the person on the receiving end will appreciate it more than you know.

Now think about this scenario: you're warm and dry at home as the fall temperatures set in, cozy by a fire with a warm drink in your hands.  Scenario #2:  You're away at war for months at a time, with little to no contact with your friends and family.  The mail is handed out, but you receive none.  On the days that you do get mail, you feel that much more comforted and appreciated.

 Yesterday was Veteran's Day, and we are humbled by the sacrifices that our military has made for us.  This blog post isn't an official letter, but it is certainly one way that we are proud to say thank you to the brave men and women who protect this country.  Thank you to those who have served, or who are currently serving.  Instead of taking just one day to honor and thank our military, we encourage you to consider sending a note of appreciation throughout the year.  There are many ways that you can do this, but one way that we have been a part of is through Soldier's Angels.  They offer different platforms of volunteering, but we especially like the Letter Writing Team.  In this team, you can choose how many letters to write and how often.  You are sent a name and address, and then write a letter to a soldier.  I've done this for several years and don't always get a response, but when I do, it is very obvious how much the letter that was sent is appreciated.  Bonus: it makes you feel just as good to send the letter as it does for them to receive it.  

We believe in letter writing and thanking our military so much, that we're offering to send you a complimentary Everyday Card and envelope so that you can pass it along to a soldier or a veteran.  Just send an email to hello@upstudionc.com with your name and address and we'll send one along.  Join us in helping to make someone's day!

 American Flag on Fayetteville Street in downtown Raleigh

STYLED November 5, 2015 08:00

So, before we get to the blog post for today. We wanted to let you all know that we will be participating in the Raleigh Makers Market this Saturday from 10am-2pm. Come out and shop local or just come and hang out. You'll find us in the breezeway by Benelux Coffee in Cameron Village. Hope to see you Saturday! (We'll have one of our planners with us for you to check out and flip through!)

Now.. onto the blog post.. 

So a few months back we talked about people that inspire us in a blog post. Emily Henderson made our very short list. She is so relatable and REAL. Did I mention she is superwoman? Three weeks ago her book hit the shelves, two weeks ago she had a baby, Elliot, and one week ago she was back at the flea market with a stroller in tow. 

Instagram pictures to prove it:

I don't think I left my house with my baby for weeks. I definitely didn't didn't go to flea markets and smile and appear to have showered after one week. See what I mean, SUPERWOMAN!

I did however 11 weeks after my baby was born treat myself to a "you're going back to work and won't be able to get pedicures during the day" pedicure. The icing on the cake was that I picked up Emily Henderson's new book, Styled: Secrets for Arranging Rooms, from Tabletops to Bookshelves on my way there. I'm usually not one to buy what I would consider "coffee table books". But I want to do my part to contribute to Emily Henderson's continued success! Also, after my purchase, I would say this is more of a "reference book" and I would highly recommend it!

The book is broken down into three sections: 1. The Stylist's Toolkit, 2. Style Secrets for Every Room, and 3. The Stylist's Notebook. I won't spill all the beans, but I'll tease you with a couple of my favorite parts.

For those of you that don't read introductions to books, my favorite line: "The best way to style your room is to have an idea of what you're going for. And how do you know what you want? You steal. Grab ideas from anywhere, magazines, TV, or books, and try them out in your space." Made me feel better about my decorating technique, stealing.

In the first section there is a style quiz, or style diagnostic. It helps your categorize your style. But she urges you to not let it box you in, use it as a starting point for discovering more! I (Mary Beth) scored a whopping 96 points. So I would fall into the category of... Modern Glam.

(Yes, that is my ongoing pedicure in the background. I'm sure the old ladies on either side of me were completely confused by my actions.)

I thought for sure I'd be in the 110 to 119 range and fall into the rustic category, but I guess not in Emily Henderson's world. I won't lie, I do love brass everything, so I probably would fit in with the modern glam folks perfectly. However I wouldn't say that I like "bling anywhere and everywhere."

Becky also took the quiz, and she fell into the category of "Zen", which she didn't expect either. The cool part about that is at the end of the quiz Emily presents the "style wheel" which helps you choose looks that mingle well together, simply by finding a style's opposite. So, you find your style on the wheel and the one across from it, is its complement. Modern Glam and Zen are complements. Again, another reason why we are such great partners in business and crime.

The second section of the book is broken down by room. Emily gives lots of pointers and suggestions in order to make your space amazing. I love all the descriptions for the spaces she uses. Like for a living room: "This space is like your home's business card, so make it memorable." She uses some amazing spaces as examples to help teach. This kitchen and bedroom really caught my eye:

In the last section she shares some of her secrets and references. She has a a list of must read websites for inspiration, a list of places to shop, a way to decide whether to DIY or hire someone, and plenty more. One of my favorites is a two page list of paint colors. Hunting down the perfect paint color literally takes forever, mostly because there are so many options! I'd rather have a short list to choose from, from someone that I know I like their style.

So, in short, I'd recommend it! If you'd like to freshen up your house and make it feel more personalized and inviting, or just more homey, check it out. (You can also feel like you contributed to Emily's continued success right along with me!)

Q&A Part II October 29, 2015 08:00 2 Comments

Well, another Thursday has rolled around and we bet you're anxiously waiting to hear about our planner release, and the couple of other products that are rolling out soon.  Honestly we'd love to give you all of that information, but at least for now it'll have to remain a secret.  We've got a couple of behind the scenes things going on that are pushing this back, but we are beyond ready to get these babies out to the public.

In the meantime, we'll distract you with more useless facts about ourselves.  Drumroll please:

Becky: Amy Adams. Some very nice people told me I reminded them of her, which I am happy to have them think.

Becky: I've had some crazy jobs. My first job was when I was 15, working at a donut factory- to make some extra dough- ok I couldn't help myself on that one. (That job sounds much more glamorous than it was, trust me. Hairnets are not cool.) I also worked at Nauticus, leading shows like Shark Feed and Shark Touch (like shark week all year long). Before getting architecture internships in college I worked at a trucking company, routing 18-wheelers, and sat next to a woman named Tiajuana, whose husband, Mr. Bear used to bring in blonde brownies for month end. You can't make this stuff up.

Becky: Having a baby, becoming a licensed architect, running a half marathon, hiking a glacier, getting my 2 year old ready for school every morning (can I get an amen from some other toddler moms out there?)

Becky: Red. 100%.

Becky: How do you throw a space party? You planet!

Becky: Shake Shack fries and a chocolate milkshake at the JFK airport. That's healthy, right?

Becky: Iceland was amazing and I'm ready to go back!

Chicken Pot Pie October 22, 2015 07:58

Let's go on a tangent today... 1. to distract us from the fact that we still don't have our planners in hand, 2. we still don't have a final release date (things out of our control, sorry), and 3. we can't start using our beautiful planner until January, ugh! 

Our tangent... Chicken Pot Pie (and The Pioneer Woman)

Have any of you guys every heard of The Pioneer Woman, real name Ree Drummond? I won't lie, I started reading her blog forever ago and really love her recipes and cool stories about her life. She gives good recipe descriptions and pictures, makes things super easy. Her blog also makes me secretly wish I lived on a ranch sometimes, other times it makes me thankful that I can get to downtown Raleigh in less than 5 minutes and to enjoy some culture and amazing restaurants. About 5 years ago, I think, she started a cooking show, which I thought I was going to love, but I really didn't. I can't put a finger on what rubbed me the wrong way, but I decided I'd just stick to her blog and cookbooks. For Christmas last year I got her first cook book, The Pioneer Woman Cooks. It is pretty similar to reading her blog because the recipes are laid out the same way and she throws in a few pictures and  stories of her family. One reason I wanted it is because it includes my favorite recipe of hers, Lasagna. It is SO GOOD, starts on page 184.

To tie in The Pioneer Woman and our story... 

It is starting to get cooler outside, which means that colds and sicknesses are on their way. Nothing makes you feel better than some warm home cooked comfort food. We met the other day to discuss some UPstudio stuff, a little under the weather and enjoyed some chicken pot pie. It was pretty amazing and comforting. The recipe is in Ree's first cookbook, starting on page 126. Chicken Pot Pie recipe and the Perfect Pie Crust recipe for your viewing pleasure. (But seriously, who has time to make a pie crust, just buy one from the store, no judgement here.)

You should check out more of her recipes, everything I've tried making so far has been amazing.

Hope you have a great end of your week and a great weekend! (Crossing our fingers that none of you come down with one of those pesky colds going around!)

Potpourri October 15, 2015 08:05

This post is going to be like the Jeopardy category, potpourri: a little bit of everything. (Don't try to deny watching Jeopardy. It's all about that Teen Challenge to make you feel good about yourself.) So without further ado, here's a list of Very Important UPstudio Things:

1) Let's talk planner release, shall we? Planners will be available for purchase in November!! Date is looking like the 2nd, so get excited!

2) We have a winner for our first giveaway: Congratulations to Chelsea Gutierrez. We will be in touch to send you your Mantra Pencil Set.

3) Red skittles are so much better than grape.

4) This has been some perfect Raleigh weather, am I right?

5) UPstudio has not just one but three new products coming out in November! Ooohhhh now you're interested, aren't you?? We can't reveal all our secrets at once but keep an eye out.

6) Everyone on Nashville is so dramatic, but that makes the show that much better.

7) The Trader Joe's pumpkin trees are so festive and so stinking cute. It also means that I have over 20 pumpkins at my house.

8) What kind of giveaway are you hoping for next?

Mantra Pencil Set Giveaway October 8, 2015 08:00 10 Comments

So, today we are going to change the conversation from what goes into developing a planner for a bit. I'm sure after our five part series you are ready for a little break. (But if you aren't and want to reread all of them because you are really excited about the big release here are the links: I, II, III, IV, V)

Other than blog posts we have gone on a little bit of a promotional hiatus while we have been working on our planner. We feel like our website and store just aren't really complete yet without our big product. Once our planner is released and ready to purchase we will be in full "promotional" swing. That being said we have been working on our promotional plan for some time now. Part of our plan is applying to be part of local fairs and festivals. We've submitted a few applications. Once we are accepted and have the dates on our calendar you will be the first to know so that you can come out and support us (or just meet us in person, a friendly face is always nice).

Most applications for fairs and festivals want to see how you would put a booth together. Since we don't have any festivals under our belt yet, we had to create a booth from scratch. Once we started thinking of ideas we quickly realized that we didn't have enough stuff to fill a booth composed of a 6' table. So logically the next step was brainstorming some new products to help us out. We wanted items that complemented the products we already had and stayed true to our brand. 

The first product we decided on was a set of pencils with phrases that we identify with, mantras. First we had to determine if we could create the pencils ourselves or if we needed to find someone to make them for us. After researching foil presses and how much it costs to purchase one (pretty expensive risk) we decided finding a source to order from was the route to go. Once our source was secured the next obstacle was agreeing on just four phrases. We each created a list of ideas and combined them together. I kid you not, we had 72 phrases on that list. It was tough stuff dwindling the list down. We finally did, and landed on these four:

Rise and Grind
Working for the Weekend
Extra Sprinkles
I Double Dog Dare You

(Behind the scenes commentary: The daily grind is brutal but we all must face it in the morning. Who isn't working for the weekend, really? Sprinkles are by far the best ice cream topping, and they can't have those disgusting chocolate black ones combined in the mix. (Ok ok, so maybe we don't have to agree on everything.) Who doesn't think of A Christmas Story when you are thinking about a dare, we didn't go all in and call it a "triple", sorry.)

Choosing pencil colors was a whole different story, we decided on those in about 2 minutes. Check out the final products:

We plan to sell the pencils in our online shop as a set of 4 as our "Mantra Pencil Set". At the fairs and festivals we will sell them as a set, but will potentially have the option to purchase them individually. What do you think?

We have more products that we created for our booth and store still up our sleeve (as you can see from the picture above). We'll be sharing them shortly, just hold your horses. We can't share all the good news at once!

Here is a sneak peak at our booth we put together:

**GIVEAWAY**

If you'd like to win a "Mantra Pencil Set" before you can buy them enter the giveaway below by using the Rafflecopter giveaway icon. If it doesn't load properly click here to enter. Giveaway ends at 11:59 pm on October 14th. The winner will be notified and announced in next Thursday's blog post. (Unfortunately, this giveaway is only valid for US residents.  We hope to be able to expand our capabilities in the near future!)

Planning a Planner, Part V October 1, 2015 10:00

This week we're wrapping up the final installment of our Planning a Planner series.  To get the whole story from the beginning, check out Part I, Part II, Part III and Part IV.  We almost can't believe that all of our planning, designing, checking, back checking, changing, and printing is soon to be complete.  You know the feeling of being really really excited for something, but having to wait for it?  Like a really great vacation, or having a baby, or 5:00 on a Friday?  Well our really exciting thing is knocking on our door and we are so excited to be able to share it with you all.

Last week we showed a sneak peek of the weekly layout for the planner, and some of the changes that we made from our initial design to the final.  The differences described last week to the weekly layout were definitely the biggest changes we made, but we wanted to let you in on another secret:  the planner is full of spaces for jotting down notes, lists, goals, sketches, meeting minutes, daily thoughts, etc. Our focus group found these spaces to be essential for using the planner to do more than recording daily events.  The sizes of spaces vary and are tucked away on month and week layouts, but also are reserved on entire sheets at the end of each month.  I have a personal accolade for these extra spaces.  Have you ever tried to get a passport photo taken of a 2 year old?  If you haven't, let me tell you - it is one of the worst experiences in life.  We constantly needed to take breaks and 'reset' in order to stop crying (both of us) or to work up courage to be near the scary camera again.  During these breaks, my daughter would happily color on the blank pages of my planner.  (In the end, it took 3 different locations and 4 different photo sessions, but we finally got a photo that was acceptable.  Save yourself the trouble and take domestic vacations!)  In our final product, most of the 'extra' pages are graph paper which our focus group also overwhelmingly preferred.

One of our biggest goals is versatility, so in areas where there could have been a title, nine times out of ten we would eliminate it.  We tried to keep things as fluid as possible so that this planner would work just as well for the stay at home mom juggling schedules as it would for the college student as it would for the person working multiple jobs.  

We debated the cover quite a bit.  Most planners out today are flashy or colorful or patterned, but we decided to take a simpler approach, going back to a couple of our core values of simplicity and versatility.  We wanted both men and women to be comfortable carrying this, and for it to be appropriate for client meetings or planning to throw a party.  We didn't want to go 100% plain, and so we enlisted the work of the fabulously talented Andrea and Joe of The Laughing Owl Press Company.  They letterpress printed our custom covers and they are really beautiful.  Without further ado, we present the first look at our 2016 planner covers!

 
 Image courtesy of The Laughing Owl Press Co

During this whole process, we realized just how picky we actually are.  We looked extensively at types of paper, thicknesses and weights, trying to balance having a durable paper that wouldn't make a 3" thick planner that weighed 10 pounds, but would be more than sufficient to not cause bleed through.  We reviewed binding options, colors and sizes.  We debated the paper type and style of the folder, the tabs, the printing on the tabs.  We reviewed proofs with a magnifying glass and spent too many hours with the printer discussing the perfect lineweight and the perfect grey for text.  We endured our husbands thinking we were insane for not approving something that was 99% perfect but not 100% perfect.  We worked a lot of late nights and probably thoroughly annoyed our ever patient printer by delaying our deadlines just to make sure that everything we were doing was exactly how we wanted it.  

We are excited.  We're excited to use these planners, share them with you, and see what you think of them.  We'll be updating our website just as soon as we can with all information regarding how you can order a planner of your own.  In the meantime, if you have any questions or just want to talk about planning or how you don't think we're crazy for wanting this to be the best it can be, we welcome your comments.

Planning a Planner, Part IV September 24, 2015 07:50

After some back and forth, tweaks, and revisions, we finally sent our final files to the printer last night for our planner! We are beyond excited! This means that we will be able to hold our brain child in our hands next week, and you will be able to check out our final design and purchase a planner in as soon as two weeks! Once we have a hard date for the big reveal, we will shout it from the rooftops, don't you worry.

Over the past three weeks we have being talking about the development process for our planner in our "Planning a Planner" series. Here are the links to Part I and Part II.  Last week in Part III we talked about our focus group. As mentioned last week at the end of the two month trial we asked our group to send back answers to a list of questions, either their actual planners or scans of some sample weeks, and any additional feedback. This information was invaluable. The feedback sparked many conversations between us about pros and cons of each of our layout decisions. We made many tweaks and changes, and are pretty happy with our final product. 

So, let's talk about some of our layout decisions and some of the changes we made; we'll focus on the week layout.

In our sample planner sent out to our focus group we included a page where we gave examples of how to use our layout:

With one of our main goals being versatility, we focused on making our layout as flexible and unconfining as possible. You can see that our initial layout had a large space at the top and then the bottom was broken into four separate sections. With this layout you can use all five sections for whatever works best in your life.

After receiving the feedback from our focus group and looking at the samples of how they used the week layouts we noticed a few common themes, the first being that no one seemed to know how to use the large space at the top. It was hit or miss as to whether it was utilized. Sometimes it was used for daily appointments, and sometimes it was used for lists that may or may not have to do with that particular day. We also noticed that four sections at the bottom Were too many and that only one person in the focus group actually utilized all four sections during the trial. 

In our 2016 planner we decided to include a similar page that talks about the benefits of our layout:

You can see some of the changes in response to the feedback. We added the time of day as a guide for the top section in case you wanted that section broken down with appointment times. We tried to make the times small and unassuming to maintain flexibility, so that if you decided to use the top section in a different way, the times wouldn't hinder you in doing so. We eliminated one of the sections at the bottom. We also made the top section along with the three bottom sections slightly smaller. By doing this we were able to add graph paper at the bottom as "free space" so that you can make lists or sketches, etc. that aren't tied to any specific day. The current month was added to the small months on the side, so you can now see three months at a glance. Overall the revisions were to eliminate space that was underutilized by our focus group and to create functional space that there seemed to be a need for. 

Prior to our meeting to go over the feedback from the focus group, we thought our initial layout was perfect! We were so proud of it. What were we thinking? Most of the trends we saw in the samples sent back to us were also present in our own planners. We feel way more confident about our new layout. But we are sure after we use it in 2016 we will find more room for growth! (We will definitely be soliciting feedback too, so feel free to contact us with any questions or comments after you purchase your planner!)

-- Mary Beth and Becky

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon. 

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use. Or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via email, click here.)

Planning a Planner, Part III September 17, 2015 08:00

Are you guys getting excited about the release of our planner?!  It's almost officially fall, which means it's almost time for stores to go crazy over Christmas and completely skip the other upcoming holidays, which means that it's close to time to get in gear and get a planner for 2016 (what else are you going to record all your good intentions for New Year's resolutions in?) Ok, so in the first blog post in this series, we talked about how we came up with our initial idea to create a planner, and in the second post, we went more in depth about the process of coming up with a layout.  Today, we're going to fill you guys in on the secret of how we made sure the public would fall in love with our planner as much as we had.  

To test our ideas, we put together a 2-month version of our planner and invited 16 people to participate in a focus group, using the planner for the full 2 months, and then providing feedback.  We thought long and hard about who should be included in the focus group.  We wanted to reach out to people that we knew, because we felt that we would have a better chance of getting feedback from people we could trust to give honest answers, whereas if we asked people that we didn't know, they could disappear and we couldn't hold them to anything.  But, that didn't stop us from considering everyone from a complete list of people that we knew.  We listed out every single female we knew (because in truth, women are the target audience for a planner, but more on this later).  We listed Facebook friends, Instagram followers, old high school friends we had lost touch with, college buddies, distant relatives, etc.  We sat down at Joule, one of our favorite spots in Raleigh, and went through every single person.  We noted if we knew if they currently used a planner, if they used an electronic calendar, their age, their location, their profession(s), their marital status, their number of children, and narrowed down our list to get a good cross section of different people.  At this point, word had also gotten out about our project and we had people approaching us to volunteer to use the planner, including 2 males.  We were ecstatic to have a male demographic in our focus group.  One of our main goals is versatility, so we wanted this planner to be equally as appealing to men as it is to women, even though we were aware that purchasers would be majority women.

We cut a LOT of people, including close friends (sorry guys - but you know we were being unbiased and choosing who we thought would give us the best variety of results!)  We reached out to our final list, and had a few people tell us no, they preferred their current method of organization and didn't want to veer from that (fair enough).  In the end, our focus group consisted of:

• the 2 of us - of course we were going to test our own product!
• 2 males, 1 with kids and a full time job, the other with a job in sales at a major downtown company
• a single (but going on lots of dates - i'm still looking at you, Zach Boychuck) full time engineer who does floral arrangements for weddings on the side
• a single full time architect in a serious relationship with lots of extra curriculars
• a full time employee with the City of Raleigh who runs a very successful photography business (and a husband) on the side
• a former Miss Virginia, now married with a full time job and side job
• a busy New York City architect balancing work and social life
• a full time college student 
• a married mom who works from home and blogs on the side
• a stay at home mom with triplets(!!!)
• a married teacher in Texas with a jewelry design business on the side, with a child in high school and another in college
• a working mom with 2 jobs, 1 husband, 3 dogs and 2 boys with plenty of extra curriculars
• a full time working mom of 4 grown children who have children of their own
• a married full time lobbyist with a baby on the way
• a busy wife with 2 jobs and in the midst of house hunting
• a full time nurse with a 2 year old who had just moved to Ohio with her husband
• a full time wife and web developer at a prestigious state university

All of these people agreed to use our planner for 2 months (May-June), although some expressed concern about going back to paper when they were currently using electronic calendars for all of their planning.  We wanted candid feedback from all of them, to see how/ if each person used the planner, and welcomed the fact that some used electronic calendars. We really wanted to see how our planner was accepted and used compared to each person's norm.  At the end of the 2 month trial, each person was to send back comments, answers to specific questions we had laid out about the design of the planner, and either the hard copy itself, or scans of month and week layouts, so we could see how each was used.  So, we packaged them all up, sent them out, then crossed our fingers!

We gave multiple suggestions and examples for how the planner could be used.  The layout is not typical, and so can be used any number of ways.  We checked in periodically and made ourselves available for questions or comments.  Roughly 3 months later, we had received back most of the question responses paired with scans or the physical planner.  We met and for hours and looked at each planner, how it was used, if certain portions of it were used, if spaces we had created appeared to be undersized or extraneous, and what consistencies we found from person to person.  We went in to this meeting after having used the planner ourselves as well, and truthfully, we both loved it.  We weren't sure how we could make it any better or what changes would really be beneficial.  I'm 100% sure that we were too invested in it to be able to step back and see the flaws, and so the focus group responses were absolutely invaluable.  We made a ton of changes, and we are pretty excited about where we landed.  Next week, we'll give you a sneak peek at what's in store for the UPstudio 2016 planner!!!

Planning a Planner, Part II September 10, 2015 07:50

In our last blog post, we went in depth on how we came up with the idea to create a planner, and why we felt validated in making our decision to do so.  Today we're going to talk more about how we came up with our initial pass at a layout.  The first thing that we did was individually make lists of what we felt were the most important things to consider for the planner.  We had meetings to discuss these and make priority lists.  Our goals were: classic design, affordable, simple, appealing to people with different lifestyles.  

From there, we knew we needed to start making some design decisions, so we did what any typical Type A person would do, and scoured information from all the existing planners that we could find.  We evaluated all of the past planners that we still owned (see last week's blog post) and did as much online research as we could to evaluate how each was used, what their functions were, and how we felt about them.  We even went to department stores and looked at everything that was available for purchase there.  We compared prices, layouts, binding, sheet size, orientation, etc.  We knew how we felt about most things and we agreed on almost everything (we really are a good team).  We had ideas for layouts and implemented a few designs.  We met again, discussed the layout, made changes, lather, rinse, repeat.

(Meeting minutes from one of our first planner meetings. Includes some goals, some branding ideas, and our first combined list of likes and dislikes from our planner research.)

We felt really comfortable with the direction we were headed, and were excited with decisions we were making.  But, we also knew that we needed more than just our own opinions if we really wanted to say that this was designed for people in all walks of life.  In order to design something that was going to work for all types of people, we needed to talk to all types of people.  More than that, we needed to understand how they used a planner, and what their preferences were for use. The best way to test our planner and see how it worked for multiple people would be to create a focus group who could use it for a couple of months, and give us honest feedback on how it was working.  Next week, we'll talk about how we chose our focus group members, who they were, and what they thought.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

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Planning a Planner, Part I September 3, 2015 08:00

We're not afraid to admit it: here at UPstudio we love a good planner.  We also love to make lists, be organized and to look at everything written out at the end of the day to see what we accomplished, and what's still in store for tomorrow.  We've both used a planner of some sort for the majority of our lives (Mary Beth still owns all of hers!) so it's natural that we'd have a conversation with each other about them.  It was the end of 2014, and we were comparing our newest planners:  I had a more traditional one with a monthly calendar and spaces for daily agendas, and Mary Beth was using one where you can write in a specific date, and use as much space as you need day by day.  We were talking about what we liked and didn't like, and what we would change about them.  It was later that day when we had the realization that we could create our own planner to suit our needs, and could change all of the things that weren't quite working for us.  We thought about it a little more and had the idea to design something that could work for more people, and then attempt to sell them.  Starting a business was exciting to think about, but then quickly became overwhelming.  Our husbands brought up some good points and asked us thoughtful questions about our ideas:  Who even uses a hard copy planner anymore?  How can you create a market for something that is only needed once a year?  Is there really a need for this product?

 Mary Beth's stack of old planners

We thought about these things individually, then talked about them together.  In the end, we still thought we had a pretty solid idea.  It was risky - a planner is typically needed only once a year, so repeat buys are few and far between in a year, but we felt strongly enough about what we wanted to do to pursue it.  We know plenty of people who use daily or weekly planners, and we both use them ourselves.  

Technology plays a huge role in the world today, and can absolutely take the place of a traditional pen and paper calendar.  There are many people who use only their cell phone or computer to keep track of schedules, or may use a hybrid system of these plus some sort of paper copy.  Maybe we're old school, but there's just something that's nice about writing things out yourself.  Writing things down can help the writer to remember them better.  With a hard copy planner, it is very easy to look at everything at once instead of clicking on multiple things to get different overviews or specifics on your calendar.  Our planner also incorporates ample room for list making, note taking, drawing, etc.  Just like sending real mail is a little more meaningful than sending an email, we believe that using a paper and pen planner is more meaningful than just using technology.

 Becky's iPhone calendar

There are tons of planners that already exist today.  Is ours really any better?  This question is extremely subjective, but of course we think ours is the best!  In reality, there are some great planners that already exist.  In future posts, we'll go more in depth as to what makes ours different and stand out from the rest, but for now, we'll just say that there are definitely differences. What we consistently found about the great versions were that their cost was out of our price range.  We wanted to create something that could compete on an equal playing field with some of these other great planners, but that would be more affordable for the every day person.  Some of the comparisons that we were looking at are upwards of $50-$70!  We have worked very closely with our printers to do everything we could to cut cost without cutting quality.

So the decision was made: we were going to start a business!  We knew we had A LOT of work ahead of us, and wanted to make really smart decisions.  We needed to create goals and really define what we wanted our end result to be.  In our next blog post, we'll talk more about our initial goals and our first shot at design.  Stay tuned!

By the Numbers August 27, 2015 08:00 2 Comments

Today is exactly one month since we launched our website. We are fascinated at how quickly website traffic can pick up... or slow down, and how far word of mouth can travel.  It's amazing how much information we can get from a behind the scenes view from our website host, shopify.  Before we get into the numbers, a big thank you to everyone who has helped spread the word about UPstudio.  So far, we have only been marketing through social media and word of mouth, so all of our new likes, clicks, views, tweets, etc. are generated from people talking about UPstudio or sharing our posts and products with friends.  Ok, now on to the good stuff:  who doesn't love a good set of statistics?

Statistics for our Website:

Clearly our website launch day was the most popular for numbers of views:

People from literally all over the world have found our website:

Here's a look at our top products sold, and which ones have been viewed the most:

Some Statistics from our Facebook Page:

Wait, you haven't liked our Facebook page yet?  Go fix that right now!

The most popular Facebook post was about our podcast with The Morning Stir:

There must have been something magical about August 15:

More Facebook fun facts:  Posts have reached people in 15 states and 43 countries!

Twitter Stats:

We have 16 followers (which is kind of embarrassing, so go follow us now), including Carolina Hurricane Zach Boychuk.  We're curious to know Zach:  Are you in the market for a planner to keep your hockey schedule straight?  Do you have a lot of correspondents to keep up with and are looking for great everyday cards to drop in the mail?  Or do you just like supporting a Raleigh business?  While we're at it, what's your girlfriend status?  (Asking for a friend.  No seriously.  We are happily married, but we have totally cute friends.)

Most Liked Instagram Photo:

Other Cool Facts:

Shopify lets us know how we're doing compared to other stores that launched the same day as ours.  We're not at the very top, but we're higher than most!

Ok, that's a lot of images for one blog post.  What else do you guys want to know?  More dish on Hurricanes players?  More statistics?  Leave us a comment below (we're looking at you, Zach).

-- Mary Beth and Becky

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon.

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use. Or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via click here.)

A Little Inspiration August 20, 2015 08:00

A little inspiration... but first, a little background.  As you may or may not know, UPstudio is not our full time job.  We both work for the same company during the day, Becky as an architect, and Mary Beth as a structural engineer.  Did you know that out of all registered architects associated with the American Institute of Architects, only 17% are women, and out of all licensed Structural Engineers, once again, only 17% are women.  Not to get all 'Sheryl Sandberg' on you, but I think that's pretty significant and says something about the two of us.  We've worked hard to accomplish where we are in our careers, and that's on top of being wives and mothers, which are full time jobs in themselves.  It's easy to get bogged down in everything on our already full plates, so why would we ever want to start our own side business?

The answer to that is tough to define.  Here are a few reasons: we wanted a new challenge, we wanted to see what it would be like to work for ourselves, we wanted to create quality products that would be versatile enough to be great for us but also be fit for people in all walks of life, and finally, we've been inspired by others who make us believe that we can do it.

There are too many people in the design world to give credit to as inspiration, so for today we'll just mention a few.  Charles and Ray Eames broke the mold during their time by designing quality furniture that was affordable to the masses.  Not only did they manufacture furniture, but they designed graphic textiles, built houses, created films, developed company logos, etc.  We love their theory of 'the best for the most for the least', and as we develop products at UPstudio, that is in the forefront of our mind:  how can we create the best product that would be functional and pleasing to the most people, and sell if for the least amount.  Their influence and strong sense of design is still apparent in homes all over the world (including Becky's!) with their Herman Miller line of furniture.  You may see a nod toward them and mid century modern design in some of our products, including the sunburst everyday cards.  As for the best inspiration when we start to feel doubts about ourselves and our abilities, Charles is quoted, 'I don’t believe in this “gifted few” concept, just in people doing things they are really interested in doing. They have a way of getting good at whatever it is.' 

 image from amazon.com

Another inspiration is modern day designer Emily Henderson.  Emily is a stylist and TV host (you may have seen her on HGTV), with a love for shopping thrift stores and flea markets for vintage finds (also a love of Mary Beth's).  She's quirky and fun and isn't afraid to share how she balances her home life with her career.  She's a mom of a toddler with another on the way and she still is perfectly adorable for every instagram photo.  She is REAL.  She inspires us to know that there is a time for work and a time for play, and to enjoy both to their full extent.  We relate to her love of vintage flair, which you can see in our staging of product photos on our website.  

image from stylebyemilyhenderson.com

Now it's your turn - we would love to know who inspires you!  Share your thoughts and comments below.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon.

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use. Or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via e-mail use this link.)

Final Installment on The Morning Stir August 19, 2015 08:28

On this rainy Raleigh morning we are enjoying our morning coffee inside while listening to the third and final installment of our discussion with Cristina Wilson from The Morning Stir podcast. We conclude our conversation talking about the origin of our branding, risks we've taken, and some goals for the future. Thank you so much for listening in and hearing more about our story thus far. 

Part I: UPstudio: The Origin Story

Part II: UPstudio: Surprising Changes From The Focus Group

Part III: UPstudio: What's the Biggest Risk You've Take so Far?

The Morning Stir on social media: Facebook, Instagram (#themorningstir), Twitter (#themorningstir).

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use. Or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via e-mail use this link.)

The Morning Stir Podcast August 17, 2015 08:30

Over the weekend we set down with Cristina Wilson from The Morning Stir podcast and shared a little about how we got started, what sparked some of our ideas, and some of what we have learned thus far. 

The first segment went live today. You can listen to it here.

The second installment will go live tomorrow, you can listen to it now by clicking here.

The Morning Stir on social media: Facebook, Instagram (#themorningstir), Twitter (#themorningstir).

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use. Or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via e-mail follow this link.)

Q&A with Mary Beth and Becky August 13, 2015 08:00

We've shared a little about ourselves on our About Us page and our FAQ page. But we thought we'd get a little more personal with a Q&A session:

Becky: Born in New Bern, NC but lived in the Hampton Roads area of VA for over 20 years.  I miss the beach but not the tunnel traffic.  (And white sauce!  Only Hampton Roads has this liquid gold)

Becky: What MB said.  Where my husband and my daughter are... that is home to me.

Becky:  Tricky question for me.  I'm bad at decision making.  Orange and maroon in the fall, but otherwise I like yellow.

Becky: Taco salad!  Always my birthday meal request.

Becky: Reading (for education and guilty pleasures both!) and watching college football.

Becky: Fingernail clipping at work!

Any other questions you'd like to ask us? If so, comment below.. 

Don't forget to sign up for our Newsletter to stay in the know regarding things on the horizon.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

(You can follow this link to add our blog to almost any reader that you use. Or you can click on the RSS icon at the bottom of the page, found in the "Follow Us" section. If you'd like to receive our posts via e-mail follow this link.)

Everyday Cards - Variety Pack August 6, 2015 08:00

The UPstudio website has been live for over a week, and we're already hitting milestones!  We've made our first sales (thanks Mom and Dad), we have over 100 followers on Facebook, and we're getting really good feedback.  Some of the feedback has come in the form of questions and requests.  We are happy to answer any questions you might have about our company.  You might be able to find some answers from our FAQ page, but if not - ask us!  Contact us via email at hello@upstudionc.com, or through the contact page on the website.  Or - leave a comment on any one of our blog posts. 

A few people have told us the same thing: they can't decide which of the everyday cards they like best (the struggle is real - we go back and forth too).  To solve this problem we're introducing a variety pack of everyday cards!  This set will have one of each of the designs with one choice of envelope color.  Having just four in a pack will allow a couple of things: you can easily check out all designs and narrow down which one is your favorite, or, you can buy multiple packs and switch up your envelope color.

What do you think?  Do you already have a favorite design?  We'd love to hear your thoughts!

-- Mary Beth and Becky

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Paper Weights and Printing Behind the Scenes July 31, 2015 11:04

By day we are an architect and an engineer. So we are comfortable in the design world. But when it comes to our new endeavor (UPstudio) there are many hats that we have had to put on that we aren't so comfortable with yet. We've had to be business ladies, marketing ladies, researchers, website developers, the list goes on and on. We have learned so much already and we continue to be educated every day by all of the people helping us along the way (and by google).

Since our first three products (calendar, everyday cards, and the planner) are paper products the first thing we had to be educated on was paper and printing. 

We won't bore you with all the information we have learned, but we did want to talk about the two big things in regards to paper and printing that drove our decisions: 1: Paper Weight and 2: Digital Versus Offset Printing.

Paper Weight:

We learned that are many ways to measure the weight of paper. The most common way is the U.S. Basis Weight. This was a little hard for us to wrap our head around at the beginning because the same paper can yield different values based on the “Basis Weight” applied while manufacturing the paper. The most common are Bond, Text, Book, Cover, Index and Tag. Higher values don’t always equate to heavier/thicker print media. For example, a sheet of 100lb Text paper is actually much thinner than an 80lb Cover stock. We learned Cover stock was our best option because it is the thickness and would give us the most durable products. We decided on 160 lb cover stock for our Everyday Cards and 130 lb cover stock for our Calendars after looking over tons of samples. The “Basis Weight” is defined as the weight of 500 sheets of paper in its basic unit uncut size. An uncut sheet of Cover paper is 20 x 26 inches. So our 160 lb cover stock really means that 500 sheets sizing 20" x 26" weighs 160 lb.

(Are we boring you yet? If so, feel free to scroll down to the cool behind the scenes pictures of our offset printing!)

Digital Versus Offset Printing:

The two most common commercial printing technologies are digital printing and offset printing. Offset involves a mechanical process of applying layers of ink to paper with a series of rollers. The printing plate (containing your design) is mounted on a roller. Ink and water are applied to the printing plate. The ink binds to the part of the plate that contains design elements; the water is applied to the white space portion of the paper. Oil is mixed with the ink to ensure that the ink and water repel each other and there is no smearing or blotchiness on the finished product. The plate cylinder transfers, or offsets, the design onto a rubber blanket roller, which in turn transfers the design onto the paper. When doing multiple colors, each roller would have it's own specified ink – Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black — or CMYK. As each of these rollers pass over the page, they transfer ink and build layers of colors, resulting in complete images and text on the page. 

Digital printing eliminates the numerous steps involved in the offset printing process, such as creating films and plates for ink rollers. Most digital presses today apply ink in a single pass from a single ink head, similar to common inkjet printers found in homes and offices.

There are many pros and cons of both technologies. The three biggest differences that applied to us were:

1. When printing large areas of one color on a digital printer the ink has a sheen to it even if you print it on smooth matte paper. That wasn't really the look we were going for with our large black printed areas. We really wanted a matte finish.
2. Most digital printers can only handle cover weight up to 120 lb, some up to 130 lb. 
3. Offset printing is usually more expensive by a considerable amount. (Makes sense right based on the process descriptions above.)

So, based on all our research we felt like the parts of our product that were printed in mostly black should be printed offset so that we would get the matte finish we desired.  Everything over 130 lb weight also had to be printed as offset. This meant our only option for the Everyday Cards was offset printing. But for the Calendars we decided to print the back offset and the front digital, to save some money. This drove the choice for the 130 lb paper, because that was the max the digital printer could take. 

We researched and vetted all of the local small format printers we could find in Raleigh in search of the best price and the best customer service. In the end we went with Commercial Printing Powered by AlphaGraphics. They actually do their offset printing in house and they were nice enough to send us some pictures of our Everyday Cards and Calendars being printed.

The plates made for the offset printing:

Some offset process photos:

Final sheets prior to cropping (look just like the plates):

Again, we just hit some of the key points today, but if you are thinking about getting into paper products or are just curious about other aspects feel free to comment below with questions or shoot us an e-mail. We are no experts, but are more than willing to share the knowledge we have.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

BIG REVEAL! July 27, 2015 08:05

Its been really hard not to share sneak peeks, but now it is time for the big reveal of our first two products... a calendar and a collection of everyday cards!

Our calendar is a small unbound monthly calendar, measuring 5"x7". You can use it to show off at your desk or stick in your notebook. It is pretty yet still functional. We wanted to design a simple graphic that played with typography and varies from month to month. Check out more sample months here.

The everyday card collection actually includes four different card designs, so can we count this as five products? That makes us feel way more accomplished!

Use an everyday card for any occasion. Write a thank you, send some snail mail to your grandma to make her smile, etc. All cards are sold in sets of six and include six envelopes. You can choose from five different color options. Click on the picture above to check out our designs and see the envelope color options. Narrowing our collection down to four options was not an easy task. We had exactly a bigillion ideas but in the end these were our big winners. We hope you like them!

--Mary Beth and Becky

Website Launch July 27, 2015 08:00

We are super excited to launch our brand new website! We have been working hard behind the scenes for the big reveal:

So make sure to go and check it out (and maybe buy a few things while you are there). But most importantly, we have been looking at the website for weeks and sometimes when you look at something every day you overlook small things. So let us know if you find any errors or miss-links. We aren't website developers (even though after weeks of work we feel like it).

Leave a comment, let us know what you think, or let us know we misspelled something ridiculous.

-- Mary Beth and Becky

Who Are We? June 11, 2015 16:05

Hi,

We are Mary Beth and Becky. Engineer and architect by day, type A list lovers and planners by night (ok, and by day. all day, every day). We work and live in Raleigh, North Carolina. 

December 2014 we were showing off our new planners for the upcoming year and quickly realized that we both struggle every year with finding one that has everything that we want. We hated that we always had to sacrifice something. This founded UPstudio. Since then we have been working diligently to create a planner that incorporates everything we desire (we aren't too selfish, we also solicited a lot of input from family, friends, and a focus group). Our goal is to create a planner that is affordable, attractive, versatile, and fit for people in all walks of life. 

Throughout this process we realized that we had a lot of other great ideas to offer outside of just planners. So, we decided to not limit ourselves. Currently we have a collection of every day cards and a calendar, but we have tons of new ideas in the works that we are really excited about.

Our planner will be available this fall for purchase with the calendar starting January 2016.

You can follow us on our journey by following our blog, signing up for our newsletter, or checking out our social media (Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram).