Kids Tackle Computer Programming at the Great AZ Code Challenge

Written by Andrew Matranga on July 21, 2017

This weekend Infusionsoft in Chandler Arizona will be hosting The Great AZ <Code> Challenge, a two-day technology event where kids from all over Arizona will be building video games, apps or websites, meeting new people, competing for prizes, and learning about how coding can help them get jobs, start businesses, and make a “dent in the universe.”

The Great AZ <Code> Challenge design team built a custom shaped die cut sticker, which was the perfect choice for our Spartanics laser die cut machine. The edges of the sticker feature multiple angles and paths, and as you’ll see above, there’s a tech-based theme and a fun mascot, plus standout event branding in the top left of the sticker. A simple two-tone, green-and-white color choice helps make for a sticker that pops no matter where it slaps. They use the same design on their website, but you’ll notice that it’s in purple online.

This event is open to kids from all over Arizona. It will be all kinds of fun, and it doesn’t matter if attendees have been coding for years or they’re just getting started. There will be classes and mentors to help coders of all skill levels, plus workshops about how many opportunities you have when you know computer programming. Also, swag: there will be plenty of food, t-shirts and, of course, stickers.

After the coding is over, all of the kids will have a chance to present their project to their peers in a “show and tell” session. Expert judges will choose winning teams and award awesome prizes at the closing ceremony, which is open to families and the general public on Saturday evening.

Good luck to all of the participants and thanks to the organizers.

Check out this video from last year’s event:

Wapuu Down Under at WordCamp Brisbane and Patriotic Stickers heading to WordCamp Boston

Written by Andrew Matranga on July 20, 2017

We’ve got two wonderful destinations for sticker sheets this weekend, with WordCamp Brisbane and WordCamp Boston each receiving custom shaped peel offs that feature stunning full color graphics and localized designs.

For those new to custom web development platforms, WordPress is one of the top digital publishing tools on the internet. This open source software powers over 28% of the web. WordCamps contain lecture-style sessions, panels, and workshops about WordPress and the tech industry.

We’ve used WordPress for some time, and we’re proud sponsors of WordCamps all around the world. When the WordPress local community gets together, magic happens, whether people are learning about content management or networking at an After Party.

Let’s begin stateside and then head Down Under to talk all about custom sticker sheets. What’s always cool is how the designers at WordCamp incorporate their ideas into the overall website design and WordPress theming.

WordCamp Boston

Our friends in the Bay State welcome WordCamp Boston 2017 with a patriotic-themed sticker sheet, with five different peel offs in a red-and-white palette. There’s some appropriate colonial iconography like a furled WordPress flag and a ship’s steering wheel, all done up of course with WordPress logos. It’s a simple, yet effective, use of a sticker sheet, where the layout is economical and creative, and with great vector design and good aesthetic, this sheet will travel wide. The design team styled the website in a similar fashion, with an antique map and a muted earthy background that calls back to colonial times. Boston University will play host to this year’s event.

WordCamp Brisbane

The team at WordCamp Brisbane 2017 went with our clear product for their sheet that boasts four peels off, with four different Wapuu‘s. Two of these Wapuus are the same, both sporting a customary bush hat, with one in a full color treatment and in black and white. You’ll note that these are also kangaroo Wapuus, with a little joey WordPress logo peeking out of the pouch. The third Wapuu is the classic mascot in yellow and the blue WordPress ball. The fourth Wapuu is on the event branding, which features the Brisbane skyline. What’s super unique about this sticker sheet is that it’s printed on our clear sticker material–what you see there in the artwork above is how we display a proof for a clear sticker, with the clear background in blue.

You can see below how the stickers apply when they are not on the sheet itself. Pretty nice use of bold colors and simple lines. Kudos to the designers for embracing the clear product option!

They have a full slate of content for all attendees, a great location at QUT Garden Point Campus in the Cube Building, and a super cool element they brought in for this year: Badges, where sponsors (like us!) can display on their website or social profiles.

Big Thank You to All Organizers

As with all WordCamps, these events are 100% volunteer powered, which is of the main reasons we’ve sponsored for so long. So shoutout to the teams in Brisbane and Boston. Thank you for all that you’ve done for your community in advance of this weekend.

Enter Leviathan: Artwork in Many Forms & Promoted with Custom Stickers

Written by Jesse Freitas on July 19, 2017

Enter Leviathan, a place that celebrates artwork in many forms including tattoos, album covers, murals and even their logo printed as a custom sticker to promote their shop.

Leviathan was created by Ben Theisen and Christel Perkins. It’s a Denver based tattoo shop housing four artists that create incredible artwork. They are about way more than tattoos though as their focus is to encourage art in any form or expression. Leviathan recently hosted their first makers night called The Creatory hosted in the tattoo studio. People gathered to create using any medium from drawing, painting, building, tinkering, sewing and more.

When you Enter Leviathan it’s all about art and they know the importance of getting their artwork out in the world. They printed up some awesome custom logo stickers with us to help spread the word about Leviathan. This portable billboard of their business is now leaving events and their shop so people recognize their name and know where to come for various pieces of art or tattoos.

We always get super excited to see businesses like Enter Leviathan getting so many people into artwork and we know their stickers are going to help them along their journey. Cheers to great art in all it’s forms.

Custom Labels just Got FASTER

Written by Jesse Freitas on July 18, 2017

Launching a new product and forgot that final touch? We’ve got your back. We are excited to announce that our Custom Labels just got a faster turnaround time. Our Glossy White Labels and Matte Labels are now available with a one day turnaround time.

What does turnaround time mean? If you submit an order for either of these label products, the production time starts ticking once you approve your artwork proof. If it’s approved by 12pm MT your labels will be printed and shipped the next business day.

Our goal is to make it easy to get custom stickers and labels fast. To make this happen we had to get some new printing and finishing equipment for our production facility here in Longmont, Colorado. Here is a timelapse video of our new HP printer being installed and running.

Meet Travis: Part of the StickerGiant Art Team, Designer and Skateboarder

Written by Jesse Freitas on July 17, 2017

Meet Travis, one of our members of the Art Team here at StickerGiant. He works with the team on setting up all the artwork we receive into proofs that go out for approval before an order gets printed. Travis and his team touch over 1,500 pieces of art in a given week and his focus is on making sure your art is printed as high quality as possible.

My name is Travis Towe and this is my Sticker Story.

What do you do?

I am a production artist at StickerGiant and what I do is that I prep the art and make it perfect for the customer. It’s really cool cause there’s a lot of unique stuff comes through all the time. That’s what is really cool about the job is that you see a lot of cool stickers, a lot of cool labels and you get to work with them and it’s just a really awesome job.

What’s your story?

I’ve been with StickerGiant for a little over a year and a half. I came in when they were over in Hygiene before we moved here to Longmont. My background is… I’m from Seneca, South Carolina it’s where all my family is, upper state South Carolina, and I moved to Charleston , I moved to Atlanta. Atlanta’s where I went to the art Institute. And then I moved here, currently living in Boulder. Um… I’ve been involved with lot of skate shops here in Colorado. Started working with Brother’s Boards long time ago when I first moved here, later Satellite Boardshop, and I started a company called All Heart Skateboards for a moment. And uh… from there I’m just working at StickerGiant and just doing freelance graphic design and do a lot of graphics, board graphics, for satellite and also a lot of stuff that’s going to be coming out soon.

What’s your favorite part about the role?

My favorite part of my job is that I get to see a lot of cool designs come through. I get to hang out with a lot of creative people and work with really great employees. Uh, we all support each other and it’s just really awesome to be a part of really great team here at StickerGiant.

Tell us more.

We’re planning years out to just grow and just be consistent on what we do to bring the best product to the customer and that’s what I’m really excited about & being part of.

Sticker Stories Podcast Episode #2: Founder Stories with John Fischer

Written by Andrew Matranga on July 14, 2017

Sticker-Stories-Podcast-071417-Founders-Stories-Stickers

Welcome to the second episode of Sticker Stories, our podcast. This week’s show is all about entrepreneurship, focusing on Founder’s Stories, and we have an extra-special visitor on the show to tell us his story.

Our guest will be John Fischer, the StickerGiant himself, and he will share with us the early days of this business and how it’s become the company it is today. At the end of this post, we’ll provide resources for budding entrepreneurs, and we’ll preview some of the awesome entrepreneurial activity that we support worldwide–it’s going to be a full show. You can watch or listen below.

Here’s the SoundCloud to listen and follow along.

As we were saying, the theme of the Show is Founder’s Stories and Entrepreneurship. We’ll get our boss up here in just a second, but first we want to do our top of mind segment.

In today’s Top of Mind: Bikes! Tour de France is in full swing, currently racing across the Pyrenees Mountains of Southwestern France. It’s Bastille Day, which marks a turning point in the French Revolution and brings out all of France in a celebration not unlike our Fourth of July. And in a true show of patriotism and grit, a Frenchman won the stage of the day. Speaking of shirts, Andrew is in the yellow jersey of the new look for StickerGiant, and Hamish is resplendent in blue. We wrote a blog post all about our new design on StickerGiant.com, which you should check out.

John Fischer’s Founder’s Story

We did a fun Q&A with John Fischer where we talked about the How and Why of StickerGiant, and he talked us through the starting of the business in his basement, the move to Hygiene, the institution of Open Book Finance and then the growth and move into Longmont. He gave some great tips about how to start a founder’s network to learn from others, and how to look at finance in a holistic way. John referenced the Great Game of Business, Zing Train and Ownership Thinking as three books that helped guide his founder’s journey to creating StickerGiant’s model of the Great Game of Business.

John also teased a future episode where he mentioned Traction by Gino Wickman and the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS) that is driving the scale of StickerGiant’s business. He shared some stories that actually brought tears to his eyes as he remembered the first check signing day when he transitioned to Open Book Finance, and how the burden of running a company was a shared experience.

Startup Week and Weekend – Entrepreneurship

We like to put our money where our mouth is, so we’re both sponsored Longmont Startup Week that’s taking place the week of July 24-28, and we’re also participating as panelists and speakers. We printed up a fun sticker sheet for the event, plus the Wannapraneur beer sticker, so we’re all over this event for sure. And that’s the advice John have in his sit down with us: build your network so you can learn and grow. We are proud to work with Techstars, Startup Week and Startup Weekend to help get these stickers out to the world, and also support new and young businesses as they grow and scale.

Longmont Startup Week Events

Founder John Fischer has a fireside chat on Wednesday 7/26 at 3pm about StickerGiant’s 12 laws of Business.
On Wednesday, July 26th at 1pm, Andrew has a talk about Cannabis Journalism and America’s New Normal
On Thursday, July 27th at 11am, our marketing manager Jesse is on a panel called Business Success or Failure is Going Digital.

Sticker Highlight: Startup Week Stickers

Wannapreneuer collaboration beer die cut sticker to honor the local breweries that worked together for this special brew. The breweries include 300 Suns, Oskar Blues, Left Hand Brewery, Open Door Brewery, Skeye Brewing, Shoes & Brews, Wibby Brewing, The Pumphouse, Grossen Bart, and Bootstrap Brewing. St. Vrain Cidery is part of the collaboration, however due to liquor licensing, is not able to serve The Wannapreneur. Check out this blend if you’re traveling through Longmont during the week.

Resources for starting a business

That was it for our second episode of Sticker Stories. You can find us on the iTunes Store, Google Play, SoundCloud, Vimeo and YouTube. Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next month for episode three when we talk about acquiring customers. See you at 10am MST on the second Friday of August.