Do What You Love, Love What You Do!

Hi Ladies! Welcome to University of MOM™! At UMOM™ you’ll find everything you need to make your American Dream come true NOW! I believe that life is too short to spend it working for someone else, making them rich, when all the while you have everything you need to make your American Dream a reality! All you need is education, communication and motivation!

I’m a Mom of 3 great kids, twin 18 month olds and a chatty 5 year old. So my entries will be as brief as possible with a ton of information packed in. No time for chit chat here just the facts, the tools and the power for you to make 2012 the year you make your American Dream happen!

So join me here several times a week. We’ll discuss every aspect of business for women including…

  • Concept
    • Is your idea feasible, what to do first, what to do next?
  • Production
    • What to consider, sourcing, cost-cutting ideas
  • Your Product/Your Story
    • Publicity! No one can tell your story better than you. We’ll focus on what makes you and your product unique and establish a publicity plan for you.
  • Marketing
    • Inexpensive ways to market you and your product, resources and tools for getting the word out.
  • Intellectual Property
    • Trademarks, Patents, nondisclosure statements and work for hire agreements.
  • Licensing
    • What is it, how can it benefit you, how you can use it to make more money! Why sometimes it’s the best way to go!
  • Social Marketing
    • Specific, targeted tools and resources for you to build your brand through this inexpensive, powerful way to make money online.

We’ll cover all this and always include in-depth, clear checklists, schedules, and strategies for you a busy Mom to follow.

So if you are a Mom with an idea, a concept, a dream to see your creation on store shelves, for sale on the internet or in your own store, make University of MOM™ your stop for education, communication and motivation.

You can. You will make your American Dream come true! I know you can do it. I did it and now I want to do what you love and love what you do!

I started Bee-Tees® in 2009 with t-shirts that teach character. I designed Bee-Tees® as a way to help me begin conversations with my then 2-year-old daughter Lena about kindness, honesty and friendliness. We were having issues at school with sharing our toys and I needed to find a way to let her know that “beeing fair” means sharing her toys and giving everyone a turn. Bee-Tees® was a perfect way to have a teachable moment in the morning about what her shirt said and then she’d look down at her shirt during the day and remember Mommy talking about “beeing kind” to her friends. The concept caught on and before long Bee-Tees were on sale in boutiques and stores around the Southeast.

Bee-Tees display in all 592 locations of Cracker Barrel Old Country Store!

Then one day Bee-Tees® caught the eye of Cracker Barrel Old Country Store® buyers and a large display of Bee-Tees® tees, hats and stationary went up in all of their stores in 2010!  This was phenomenal experience. But keep in mind, meeting someone from Cracker Barrel® might have been a lucky break, but when that opportunity knocked I opened the door, I was prepared and I was ready. I learned so much about business, marketing, retailing, financing, networking, publicity, social marketing, licensing, patents, trademarks and business development! And since our debut in Cracker Barre®l I’ve received literally hundreds of emails from women with wonderful ideas that want to know how to get their product onto the national stage.

I’m going to show you how to be prepared, to be ready and to take advantage of all the opportunities that you will now have open to you!

University of MOM owner Melissa Patton with daughter Lena

So follow this blog, follow us on Twitter, “LIKE” us on Facebook. If you want to make your American Dream come true you can’t miss University of MOM™.com!

Pinterest 101

Pinterest 101.

How an Alaskan Mom Brings Millions to Her Carpentry Blog

How an Alaskan Mom Brings Millions to Her Carpentry Blog | Social Media Examiner.

What the #@&! Do I Say on Twitter?

What the #@&! Do I Say on Twitter?.

University of Mom on Your-Carolina on 12/30/11

University of Mom | Your-Carolina – Local Entertainment for Greenville, Spartanburg, Anderson S.C. and Asheville N.C..

I had a blast on “Your Carolina” this morning! What a great way to introduce University of Mom!

If Moms Can’t Find It, They Invent It – NYTimes.com

If Moms Can’t Find It, They Invent It – NYTimes.com.

Shark Tank Tips

Shark Tank Tips.

How do I know if there’s a real need for my product or service?

Barbara Corcoran: Make a list of every product out there already answering the need and be super critical as to whether yours is a better mousetrap. Also ask your family, friends and enemies if they would buy it and what they would readily pay.

Daymond John: Put it for sale on the internet and see if people who do not know you purchase it!

Kevin Harrington: It’s important to test before you invest to see if there is a need for your product or service. I use catalogues, shopping channels and internet websites to do this.

Robert Herjavec: Ask the only people who matter – paying customers – emphasis on the word paying. RIM (the makers of Blackberry ) never develop a new product until they have a client who will pay for it.

Shark Tank Tips

Shark Tank Tips.

What do you think are the traits of a great entrepreneur?

Barbara Corcoran: Every great entrepreneur is passionate about being successful. They are not just passionate about their business idea, but have enough passion to weather all the obstacles and see things through to the finish line. When Erin Whalen of Grease Monkey Wipes (season 1) confidently said to fellow shark Robert Herjavec and me, “I promise if you partner with me I will not let you down! I will make this work, I promise!” she had enough passion in her plea to send legions of soldiers right off a cliff. Robert and I believed her and handed her our cash! Every great entrepreneur is extremely pushy. Cactus Jack, the wild inventor of the Body Jac exercise machine (season 1), was a natural born salesman. He was unbelievably annoying but proved a superstar dealmaker. I’ve learned that all great entrepreneurs are pushy people and they always deliver.

Daymond John: 1) Being driven; 2) Always educating themselves; 3) Doing something they love; 4) Willing to take advice; and 4) Resourceful.

Kevin Harrington: Entrepreneurs must have 1) a vision of the future; 2) the drive for the day-to-day, to work unending hours; 3) the ability to handle adversity without letting it shut you down; and 4) the desire to never give up.

Robert Herjavec: Many – but most important is the ability to be relentless as the sand shifts around you. I always say “quick is good – relentless is better.”

Shark Tank Tips

Shark Tank Tips.

1. What makes a good business idea great?

Barbara Corcoran: If your business idea clearly answers a need in the marketplace, it’s probably a good idea. If the need is already being met by well-entrenched competitors, it can still be a good idea if it’s a new, cheaper or more clever way of doing it.

Daymond John: Something that solves a problem (i.e., helps you do something faster), satisfies a need (i.e., makes an existing product cheaper), or improves quality of life (i.e., medical devices ).

Kevin Harrington: A good business idea is a product or service that solves a problem that is not already being solved in the marketplace. The product or service should be unique enough that it’s not something already readily available.

Robert Herjavec: There are lots of good ideas but most great business are built on better execution of an existing idea. I am not a big believer in create a better idea and the world beats a path to your door.

How Diet Coke and American Express Helped A Mom Bring Her Product To Market

People ask me all the time about how did a small town Mom with no apparel experience manage to get her little t-shirt line Bee-Tees® into a national retailer like Cracker Barrel Old Country Store?

It was a long and winding road as you can imagine. But there was one significant thing that happened involving my caffeinated beverage of choice, Diet Coke, and the subsequent usage of American Express that left a permanent impression and was instrumental in building my relationship with the buyers at the national restaurant and gift giant.

In July 2009 I was attending the Atlanta Gift Mart, known as AmericasMart, as an exhibiting vendor. For those of you not familiar with the Mart, there are three buildings, 15 floors each packed with every kind of gift item, apparel item, home décor item and whole bunch of other items that you couldn’t even dream of. I mean thousands of acres of merchandise for store owners and buyers to choose from. There are hundreds of thousands of people who come to the “Market” from all over the world to buy merchandise for their stores. These are Mom and Pops all the way to large retail chains. The place is simply overwhelming!

But this is the place that I knew I could go to get Bee-Tees® noticed by buyers. I had no idea how to put together a booth (as I had never done anything like this before) but I did the best I could with my knowledge of graphics and trying to tell my story.

The show opened on Friday at 9 am. It lasts until 6. Anyone who has ever worked a trade show booth knows how exhausting this can be. I have the utmost respect for those of you who do this for a living! I don’t do standing or concrete very well. But I had a good day that day; I opened several new accounts and had a blast telling the Bee-Tees® story. And little did I know it would turn out to be great practice for what the next day would bring.

Let me preface that Saturday by telling you that I had received a text on Friday from a licensee that we had began to work with a few months prior. I had sought out this licensee as they had a relationship with Cracker Barrel and I hoped they could have an opportunity to pitch Bee-Tees® to them. I knew that their salesmen was going to Cracker Barrel sometime soon and they would let me know of any interest that the buyers had in my little t-shirt line. The text I received on Friday was that Cracker Barrel was not interested in Bee-Tees! LI was devastated! This was the account that, quite frankly, I felt was a ringer for our message. I mean it’s wholesome, simple and all-American! I couldn’t believe that they turned it down!! But I was there, on the largest stage in the apparel industry and was going to give it my best shot.

On Saturday I had a great morning of sales and my sister had come down to Atlanta to help me out. She is a librarian by trade, so talking to folks is not her favorite thing but I really think she secretly enjoyed it! She allowed me to take short potty breaks and go for quick bite of lunch. So I hurried off to grab a sandwich and gather my thoughts. I came to the food court in building 3, it was nuts! People were everywhere! And I stood in line for about 20 minutes to grab a burrito. I searched for a place to sit and relax for just 10 or 15 minutes. This would be a welcome vacation from standing on concrete for hours on end! I spotted several tables where there was only one person eating. So I asked if I could join one of them at the table. She politely agreed and we struck up a conversation. You know “How are you?”, “Are you having a good show?”, that sort of thing. I then asked where she was from. She spoke with a beautiful accent which I thought was British, but come to find out she was from South Africa and is in the US working for a company called Cracker Barrel Old Country Store! I could not believe my ears! Was I on Candid Camera? I thought, “You must be kidding me?” Hundreds of thousands of people here and I sit down at lunch with this lovely woman who works for my target retailer. God was smiling on me that day!

The question is what would I do with this opportunity that God and fate and had handed me on a silver platter? I’ll tell you what I did…I did what no one would ever do except me… I spilled my Diet Coke all over her gorgeous WHITE linen pantsuit! Yep! I did it!

Without having to relive every embarrassing moment of the interaction, let’s just suffice it say that I left an impression on this sweet woman!

The good news is that the incident didn’t happen until after I had a chance to pitch her on Bee-Tees® (which I had down perfectly from all the practice) and convince her to come to my booth.

Even while trying to wipe Diet Coke from her fancy shoes she couldn’t contain her enthusiasm for Bee-Tees®! I could see it all over her face.

While trying to clean herself she asked me to send her some samples. The rest of the show was a blur as I considered what to send and how many and anything else that could make an impression.

I was so excited and embarrassed that I could not even sleep that night! My brain was a flurry trying to figure out how to capitalize on the most fortunate but embarrassing thing that had every happened to me!

When I returned home I gathered my samples and marketing materials along with a very apologetic letter and an American Express gift card specifically for her dry cleaning bill. I sent this off to Nashville thinking I would never hear from this wonderful lady again.

But to my surprise, she called me immediately when she received the package and thanked me for thinking of her enough to have her suit cleaned! The rest of what happened to Bee-Tees® from this experience will be revealed in future posts. But suffice it say to that the worst thing that you can think of happening might actually be the best thing that could ever happen.

The key is you have to be prepared when things don’t go as you plan, which is of course what happens most of the time!