We were so excited to be featured this morning on the radio station Mix 100.7 WMTX-FM.  The station is based in Tampa, Florida and we were part of a weekly segment called  Beauty School Wednesday also featuring Jackie Silver from Aging Backwards.  Each week Jackie presents a variety of beauty products to Nancy and Chris from 100.7 and they discuss their unique features. 

You can imagine me and Krystal sitting in our respective homes this morning on the edge of our seats (we knew we were being featured) waiting to see what would be said (gulp) on the air.  Well…we couldn’t have asked for a more enthusiastic endorsement of our headband products from Nancy, Chris, and Jackie.  They thought the Headbands and Nuneez were adorable and a great idea.   So, suffice to say, it was a great start to the day!

Of course as a designer and manufacturer of specific products, you are always going to be your own biggest fan.  But, I have to say, it was nice receiving that kind of  public endorsement.  With all of the challenges of a new business, things like this are simply great motivation to keep producing…and we we will!

Not that I ever thought I would describe myself as this, but I guess that now I am technically a fashion designer.  As of late, whenever I register Top Appeal with a boutique, blog, message board or the like, I’m always asked to describe what I do.  I think I have written “fashion designer” to describe myself at least 10 times in the last 2 weeks!  Oh, how we evolve.

So, I guess as a fashion designer I have to not only put forth my own ideas of what I believe to be fashionable, but I need to stay on top of what the “real” fashion experts think as well.  To that end, the Washington Post recently launched a high end fashion magazine called “Fashion Washington.”  I think the magazine is exciting because it is focused on Washington, D.C., where our company is based, and also because it recognizes the cutting edge fashion contributions made by D.C. boutiques and designers.   Check it out when you get a chance.  A lot is happening here.

http://fashionwashington.com/index.html

Look out New York City and LA, here D.C. comes!!!

I may be the only person with a PDA type phone that still misses their Franklin Planner.  I know the world of technology is supposed to be easier, but there was something about just grabbing my planner and flipping to the Month at a Glance page, or looking at my prioritized task list for the day that just seemed, so, well…easy…as opposed to fumbling with my thumbs on my IPhone trying to get it to recognize the right letter that I want it to recognize as I complete my task list, or calendar entry.  But, I digress.

This week was actually pretty exciting for us.  We continued with the normal components of our routine including still trying to develop/tweek the website and make various sales calls.  I got an appointment with a local boutique for next week, and some local newspaper leads.  But probably the most exciting was the community partnership that we just set up with the Luke C. Moore Academy in Washington, DC.  In a nutshell, LCM is a “second chance” high school for inner city kids that perhaps didn’t have it so easy in life and had to drop out or were kicked out of high school.  Through a curriculum that focuses on strong academics as well as professional and cultural enrichment, LCM seeks to lift their kids up and give them a second chance to graduate from high school and achieve professional growth and success.

Top Appeal was fortunate enough to establish a partnership with LCM that will be implemented in early 2009 to allow our company to engage select youth to be a part of the Top Appeal Product Development Team.  These LCM youth will not only perform market and consumer research for us, but we also hope that they will be instrumental in making recommendations for our upcoming product line designs.   In turn, they will also be able to gain professional experience as far as the marketing components involved in starting and running a new business.  We hope to encourage other small businesses to also seek out similar opportunities to engage community organizations serving at risk youth.  After all (and although somewhat hokey, its true) they are the future of this country.