We need models. Okay, what we really mean is that we need people… like the kind who wear our tees, or better yet, the kind who are excited about our new Blank tees. Are you a human between sizes XS and 5X and not too shy in front of a camera? If so, we want to hear from you. That’s parents, students, business owners, activists, athletes, adventurers, homebodies, grandmas, entire product teams, and, well, you get the picture.
We’re gearing up for our next #BlankbyCB photoshoot, and we’re looking for CB fans of every shape, size, and ethnicity. The only catch is that you have to be located in (or willing to travel to) Pittsburgh. What’s in it for you? Well that’d be the satisfaction of showing everyone that Blank fits people. Lots of people. Okay, we’ll give you a couple Blank tees to keep for yourself and some killer snacks too. Sound like a plan? Great. Then email us at blank@cottonbureau.com with your contact info and shirt size, and we’ll be in touch.
Oh, and even if you’re not in Pittsburgh right now, but might visit some day, email us! Michelle is keeping a list, and she’d love to put you on it. 📝
We’ll just cut to the chase here. We are a few thousand dollars away from reaching our 100% cotton olive stretch goal at $96k. We have 3 hours left to do it. If we reach it, we’ll cut the $12k minimum for our next stretch goal.
That’s right, you’re getting a extra color for only $4k!
And this time we’re going with the CB office favorite, 100% cotton natural.
Time waits for no Kickstarter, and since Blank tees won’t be available to non-backers for a bit, we wanna make sure everyone gets in before it’s too late. Unlocking a fifth stretch color and getting us to $100k sounds so much better than $96k, right?!
So now that you’ve wasted a minute of Kickstarter time reading this update, it’s time to get out there and tell everyone. See you at $100k!
That means we want you to tell your timeline, favorite forum, and family about our Kickstarter. We know we’ve asked you before, but this time it’s different. Here’s how:
Let’s make today the largest share day of our campaign.
We set some lofty goals for Blank, and with your help, we’ve been crushing them. With exactly one week left in our Kickstarter, we’re in the home stretch. We’ve trained for this. We’re hydrated, we had some of that weird gel in a packet, so let’s finish strong together. We know you only have so much time to dedicate to Blank, but many of you have mentioned how this is just as much your campaign as it is ours. We agree! So let’s help each other out.
Here’s what we’re thinking:
For one day only, we shout about Blank, using every network we’ve got.
We’re thrilled with all the support so far—seriously, you’re amazing—but everyone knows that teamwork makes the dream work. So let’s rally around the #BlankbyCB tag together and spread the word in these last few days.
You don’t have to stand on the street with a #BlankbyCB sandwich board (don’t let us stop you tho…), but we are asking you to tell your friends and followers. You can even tell us! We’d love to share your Blank videos, tweets, and posts wherever we can. Send us a clip of your thoughts or post a picture in your Blank tester shirt. We’ll make some room on our Instagram or Facebook page. Basically, take a couple of seconds to just Blank it, because there’s strength in numbers.
So why now?
Most successful Kickstarter campaigns are either fully funded or pretty darn close in the first couple days. Then, they lose steam.
We hit our funding goal in 27 hours (woohoo!). It’s been almost three weeks though, and we don’t wanna be like those other Kickstarters. We’re building something special here, and there are some solid benefits of, uh, let’s say ‘reaching Blank’s full potential.
This is your last chance to be first in line for a Blank tee, so if you know someone who wants one, tell them to back us. After this it’s gonna be a lot of cutting, sewing, and fulfillment, and once all that is done, our backers get first dibs. That means some wait time until Blank shirts are widely available.
We’ve got more colors… lot’s of ‘em. There are cotton colors, tri-blend colors, bright colors, dark colors—a whole darn spectrum to explore. We’ve sampled them, named them, and want to order them. All we need now is for them to be unlocked. So if you’re waiting on your favorite color, or you know someone waiting for Blank to be available on CB, helping us reach our goals will let us bring more color to your life.
Your support has been tremendous. It’s beyond any thanks we can give. FOMO is real, so let’s show everyone else what they’re in danger of missing out on. The best way we can do that is by working together. It only takes a couple of seconds of your time today to just Blank it with the #BlankbyCB tag. We’ll see you on the internet.
Last night, we put our Blank Kickstarter to bed at the very reasonable time of 8PM. It has been an amazing 28 days, and we’re blown away by the tremendous support we’ve received. Thank you for making our dream of good fitting, ethically made, size inclusive shirts a reality.
Take a bow, everyone.
Our final tally? $94,628.
That’s right, we were fully funded almost twice over. In fact, we were fully funded in just 27 hours, with $19,000 pledged in the first hour alone.
Clearly, you all care about high quality shirts.
And so do your friends, because 10% of the money pledged came via Twitter links, meaning your tweets and shares had a huge impact. Thanks for telling your crew, particularly on September 7, when you answered the call to “Just Blank it” and blast our campaign far and wide, making that day our biggest share day of the campaign (besides our first and last day) and raising $2,389.
You all also really like videos, because our video was played 16,162 times, which works out to seeing our smiling faces every. single. day. for 44 years. Though we don’t recommend that. Please.
So, what did everyone get? Our reports show that 37% of you opted for a single tee to get familiar with Blank. Two of you went all in and backed the Graphic Tee Pack with 50 tees printed with a custom logo. Your teams are going to look so fresh!
While we blew through our Early Bird rewards in 3 hours (seriously, yinz are amazing), and single shirt purchases were the most popular, the average backer pledged $61.92, somewhere between a single tee and the Long Weekend package of three. So let’s say the average person is getting two and a half tees, give or take a sleeve or two.
Cool. Now what? We’re going to Disney World. And maybe taking a nap. Just kidding. We’re off to make the shirts!
In fact, we’ve been hard at work this whole time, but there’s a lot of cutting, sewing, and shipping that has to happen, and because you helped us hit three of our stretch goals, we’re making room for tri-blend navy, tri-blend red, and tri-blend light blue.
We’re not going to be one of those Kickstarters that goes silent after hitting our goal, either. We’ll be posting updates on Kickstarter and on all of our social media channels to keep you updated on the process.
After all, we’re partners.
Be on the lookout for our backer survey email from Kickstarter We’ll be contacting each of our backers through Kickstarter to get the details of their orders. If you backed us, make sure you:
– check those Spam and Update folders – have up-to-date payment info in Kickstarter – respond to the survey as soon as possible, and definitely before next Friday, September 22
It’s really important that we get your completed survey back as soon as possible, because that means production can start sooner, which means you’ll get your tee(s) sooner!!
What else? In a few days, Blank will have a new permanent home on the Cotton Bureau site. We’ll be taking pre-orders for Blank shirts there in due course, so if you missed the Kickstarter, you’ll have a chance to get your mitts on one. Our Kickstarter backers, however, will be getting theirs first, because that’s just fair.
Thanks a million We’ve said it a bunch of times, but we need to say it once more. Thank you. We’re honored to have your support for Blank, and we’re committed to delivering the best product possible. Cheers!
Elvis has left the Kickstarter! The Blank campaign is over and 197% funded! Y’all brought the noise and helped us finish strong at almost $95k! And we mean that. Your tweeting, posting, and sharing accounted for a significant chunk of our funding success.
Alright, where are the tissues?
We started Blank a year ago, but kind of wanted to make our own shirts for years, and today we finished our Kickstarter. If you’re reading this, chances are good that you’ve been with us since the beginning. There are no words to express how much we appreciate you. You don’t just make coming to work possible, you make it fun. You’ve literally created jobs with your support. It’s something we can never repay. The closest we can hope to come is by giving you a well fitting t-shirt that makes you feel good. It sounds so empty when companies say how important their customers are to them. Hopefully that’s not the case with us, because we don’t think of you as customers, we think of you as partners. We see all the names and faces that support us, and we think about how our decisions affect you. We talk about you (in a good way) in our Slack conversations, meetings, and sleep (okay not sleep).
Okay, let us collect ourselves and tell you what happens next…
Every backer will be emailed a Kickstarter survey tomorrow. You’ll select your final product(s) through that survey. That means you’ll be picking between women’s/men’s, size, and color for the shirt(s) you backed. More on that tomorrow.
Thank you for your incredibly generous support. Next up: actual wearable Blank t-shirts!
