Melbourne graphic designer spruces up the souvenir market
AS part of Business Daily’s ongoing series on entrepreneurs, we look at a Melbourne woman’s quintessential keepsakes for visitors to our great state.
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MILANA Wallace was motivated to start a business celebrating Melbourne landmarks and objects when she couldn’t find suitable gifts and souvenirs for friends.
“I had lived overseas and I liked to send a little gift to friends but I struggled to find something that I liked,” she said. “I didn’t like the fact that most of the things were made in China.”
The graphic designer’s first product was a series of cards with images of Luna Park, Dimmey’s, Phillip Island penguins and the like.
Towards the end of 2015 she did a deal with a distributor who printed and distributed while she retained the intellectual property rights and received a share of the profits.
She built on the range and started doorknocking shops for potential stockists.
A helpful turning point came when a father in one of the sporting teams her daughter played in asked her about what she wanted to achieve in the business.
“I think at the start I flailed around a bit but he got me to ask myself some questions,” she said.
She started to focus her attention on her market and her products, price points and how she would reach her audience.
After graduating with a degree in graphic design from Swinburne University, she worked for a number of design companies.
“I did a lot of design work for corporates, so my work tends to be clean, considered and precise,” she said.
Moving to Ringwood to be closer to her husband’s work, Ms Wallace tired of the daily commute to the city.
She indulged her hobby of painting, but began to consider how to grow her passion into a small business.
“I did not want to work for other people anymore. I always have wanted to do something for myself,” she said.
She decided to call her business Mopsy. As a child her nickname was Mopsy — a nod to her mop of curly hair.
She also loved the Peter Rabbit tales by Beatrix Potter, in which Mopsy was a character. The aim of Mopsy was to create a small business that would keep her occupied into her retirement.
Early sales were through Etsy but she knocked on doors and some niche stockists began taking on the product.
Melbournalia in the city, which stocks an eclectic range of locally made goods, has taken on some products.
Ms Wallace said her prints tended to sell better online because gift shops did not usually have the room to present them.
She deliberately designed her prints to fit into standard Ikea frames.
Colourful prints were changed to black and white to fit the Melbourne aesthetic.
She has about 20 stockists and would like to double that to 40.
Online accounts for about 15 per cent of her business but she preferred a wholesale model.
However, she said her website could be better optimised to capture people looking for her style of work. She said social media, particularly Instagram, had been a good way to reach potential customers.
“Over the past eight months I have invested a lot of time. The conversion is quite good,” she said. Ms Wallace is experimenting with hashtags and trying to work out what works and what does not.
Her range, from Bush Buddies to Soup of the Day, are pitched at a giftware, souvenir, interior design and kids’ decor market. The products include magnets, prints, tea towels, decals and stickers.
A turning point for the business looms next month. Ms Wallace has booked a stand at a trade fair, Life in Style, at the Royal Exhibition Building.
Over four days, this would be a good investment, she said.
“I thought instead of going out to find people I might invest some money and get the people to find me at a trade show,” she said. “In some ways I think it was a ‘go big or go home’ moment.”
She is expanding her range to take in Sydney in the hope of attracting national interest.
The business is not yet where she wants it to be, but Ms Wallace considered it a long-term project and still takes freelance work that interests her.
John Downes: Mentor medium-sized business Acorro
WELL done Milana! Your fantastic array of beautiful designs shows your ability to blend passion, innate skill and ability to earn from it.
I see two key issues to consider in realising your goal to step back from working for others and enjoy a business that keeps you busy and remunerated in retirement.
Firstly, how you are going to create more demand?
One way is to expand your happy band of supportive wholesalers.
But to do that, you need to show them as much love as you expect them to show you. It is not clear from your website or Facebook how, or who, are you sharing that love with.
Part of your value proposition to them is not only a great product, but sharing the story about their business so that customers can find them and buy in store if necessary.
Oh, and do they want their customers to then shop at Ikea?
The second is personalising the brand, Mopsy. Who are you? Social video is a key to help people get to know you, how you do what you do and your motivations, inspirations, desires and challenges.
A series of short vlogs on your website and social channels might do wonders to build your tribe.
I wish you pleasure, fulfilment and to earn a just financial reward from your passion.
VIVIAN VO: MELBOURNE INNOVATION CENTRE
MOPSY’S unique design and style, combined with the essence of being Melbourne made, instantly becomes the brand’s value proposition.
Online marketplaces and social platforms such as Esty or Pinterest actually place brands in a very competitive playing field.
How can you stand out from the crowd? How do you effectively engage and reach your customers?
You can become very creative when blogging on your website.
Research popular and trending topics when it comes to interior design and home-art decor.
Get creative with your marketing and reach out to influential bloggers and ask them to feature your products on their blogs.
Consider approaching and engaging with mum bloggers to feature art pieces for nurseries or children’s rooms.
This approach seeks different niche markets with the goal of building strategies around each one.
Mopsy’s product images are stunning and well presented. This works to your advantage when establishing your brand online.
Track post engagement, not only through the number of likes but through the number and quality of comments.
Great use of relevant hashtags on Instagram — this definitely aids visibility.
Consider creating a unique, memorable hashtag based around your brand’s message or products and encourage customers to use it when posting pictures of your products.
BRUCE HALL: MENTOR SMALL BUSINESS MENTORING SERVICE
IT is wonderful to see genuine, original high-quality products being created to help capture the essence of Melbourne and Australia. These are real mementos, not mass-produced landfill.
While wholesaling is worth pursuing, I believe a significant opportunity exists to market the higher value items via the web.
The starting point is to optimise pages on the site, and product descriptions for search. Currently, only those who know the domain are likely to find the site.
Optimisation starts with understanding the search phrases potential customers are likely to use. Then including this in the page title, meta heading 1 and copy on the page. Where appropriate, also the image alt description.
To engage the audience, I would like to see more compelling, descriptive language being used. The “backstory” for each work of art would also be helpful.
Adding regular fresh content to the site will also assist ranking. Search engines are hungry beasts when it comes to fresh content. A blog is the best way to add fresh content, but to assist engagement images need to be added to the posts and headings used to break up the copy.
On social media, I suggest using Pinterest, as it drives a lot of traffic to e-commerce sites and would work well for the artwork.
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