RecessionMan.com

Mark Lim - Hey! So I've started writing on my new site:

www.RecessionMan.com

Lately I've been fearing more and more that I'm becoming an adult so I'm trying to learn more about my finances and our Economy to prepare me to live in the real world. My goal with the website is to simplify complex ideas so that idiots like me can understand them :)

I hope you enjoy!

Hey! I'm in the Paper! :)

Here's an article about me in the paper:



Click it to see the full article! :)

Swap Meet and the Recession

Mark Lim - I went to the Santa Fe Springs Swap Meet this weekend and saw some awesome stuff for dirt cheap. I found dress shirts for $1 and blank hats for a great price.

Swap Meet Album here: Swap Meet Photos

I've been really worried about the failing economy and I want to start a new blog dedicated to helping people live cheaper using alternative ideas. I'm think an urban Survivorman living off of canned tuna and how to pop those un-popped kernels in your microwavable popcorn bag.


Ah, there we go! I just purchased RecessionMan.com. Maybe i'll try and shoot some videos of me trying to build McGuyver type objects to save money. This might be fun :) I'll try and work on it tomorrow!

Be Rich! Be Happy!

(I've also updated my food site at www.OhSoFat.com so go check it out!)

Screen Printing The Penguin Shirt Video!

Mark Lim - I've been having trouble drawing lately. I think I'm getting super rusty at it. When I was in school I spent my entire day doodling pretending to listen to the teacher but now I'm not forced into a situation where I have to draw and I feel like I'm kind of losing my touch.

I think this is something I'm going to have to work on every single day because I'm a little scared right now that I've forgotten how to do it. I tried to draw some tropical fish last night to make into a shirt but it looked horrible. I've just got to be more diligent about my art and to practice as much as I can.

Here's a video of myself printing my new Penguin Shirt:



I edited some old timey music and added a sepia tone because I was bored.

The economy is still horrible but sales started to pick up a bit on my Etsy site. I sold around 700 shirts there last year and it's been very good to me. I'm still trying to do a couple new designs this month to hopefully bump sales but I'm not exactly sure how things will turn out.

I know we're going to be in a slump for a couple years and there's just no way around it. I'm going to start thinking about other ways to make money in case our economy gets worse. I'm pretty good at coming up with solutions so I'm going to try and figure something out. I hope everyone is doing ok!

If you are interested in reading more of my work please check out my food blog at: OhSoFat.com which I just updated today too :)

Thanks!

All about DTG T-shirt Printers + Videos!

Mark Lim - I just came back from the Imprinted Sportswear Show at the Long Beach Convention Center and got to see some of the newest technology in T-shirt printing available. Unfortunately cameras were not allowed in the showroom this year so I wasn't able to take any pictures.

I did however learn a lot about DTG (Direct To Garment) printers that work like regular home ink jet printers but instead print straight on to fabric.


Here are 10 things I learned about DTG printers:

1) These machines are expensive. ($15,000-$50,000 )
2) There's a ton of prep work. Before you print you have to spray the shirt with adhesive and dry it in the heat press.
3) Printing on light shirts can be fast but printing on dark colored shirts takes about 5 minutes.
4) You can print over seams without any problems
5) The cost of printing on a white shirt can be from 50 cents to $1.00 just for ink
6) The cost of printing on a dark shirt can be from $1.75 to $2.50 just for ink
7) You can print shirts straight from Photoshop
8) You have to clean the printer heads once a day
9) You have to clean the entire printer once a month
10) The damn thing clogs

I was bored and decided to shoot a video of me making my Great Wave shirt to the tune of one of my favorite cartoons, Talespin.

I also shot a little video of my car :)

This week's sales haven't been too bad. I picked up some new customers but still need to get some wholesalers. I'm thinking about messaging people on Etsy and asking them to do dropshipping on my site: www.PoisonApple.com. Hopefully I'll be able to generate a little more sales while providing some help to other small companies.

I've also been updating my food blog here so go check it out! www.OhSoFat.com

Till next time!

New Penguins Shirt Design!

Mark Lim - I've been watching a lot of the Discovery channel and have come to the conclusion that Penguins are awesome. I decided to draw out a design of our flightless friends so I could make a shirt as a tribute to them.

The first step was to hand draw a couple penguins with pen and paper.


After that I rendered the image in Photoshop and Corel Draw so I can get the picture ready to be burned on the screens.

Here's a picture of the black ink screen with the Penguins:

Here's a picture of the screen with the orange highlights:

Here's a picture of the image after being printed on a couple shirts:

The final rendered image for my website! www.PoisonApple.com

Sales are still a little slow because of the economy, especially ebay, but I'm hoping by creating some more designs I will be able to get back to normal. I also plan to start advertising and finding people with T-shirt blogs so they could write about my stuff. :)

Wish me luck! Oh! Don't forget to check out my Food Blog at www.OhSoFat.com!

Oh, Economy. Why Have you Forsaken me?

Mark Lim - If I'm going to be honest with myself I have to take the blame for the slowing of sales this month. I just haven't been working to my full potential. Yes, the economy is bad and thousands of people are loosing their jobs but I haven't been busting my ass to make up for it.

When you own your own business you have to set some rules for yourself. Sleeping in till 2pm isn't exactly the best way to run a company. I didn't realize this till I had to do my taxes and see how much less money I've made in the last couple months. I'm still able to pay my, rent, car, phone, food, etc. but I haven't been able to save any money lately.

Here's the lesson for today: Watching Tivoed Family Guy episodes will not make you any money. Get back to work, Slacker.

I spent the last 16 hours revamping my website (www.PoisonApple.com) and fixing all the pages and buttons to make it easier for my customers to buy shirts. It's something I should have done 4 months ago but have been making lame excuses not to do it.

I have however been making some YouTube videos of myself screen printing hoping that it will get me some hits on my website.





The Long Beach ISS convetion is this month and I'm looking to purchase a Direct To Garment printer:


They run about $12,000 - $25,000 depending on the brand. I'm still trying to decide if this is something worth purchasing in such a bad economy. I know I can sell T-shirts but I don't know if I can sell enough to cover the cost.

This machine will let me expand to do custom work since it operates just like a computer printer but instead of paper it prints on garments. I will be able to take other people's custom orders and print them out a shirt without having to do all the nasty work and pay the steep set up fee for screen printing.

I guess it all boils down to if I want to work or not. I know it'll bring me lots of extra income but that also means giving up a bigger chunk of my life. It also might be the catalyst I need to push myself to get to the next level.

Anyway, things are still going good, not great, but enough for me not to go insane. I'm going to force myself to not just set big goals but to also set little goals to help my confidence.

I hope everyone is doing well with work. It's Friday night and I'm going to spend it redeeming myself from months of being a dork :)