Our second year here at SLC gave us the chance for our first 3 week work placement in the business world.
The Criteria? An assistant to a business (entrepreneur or corporation) permitting they have an office space or desk to work at. Some of us went to Toronto, Brockville or stayed in Kingston and since home for me is 5 hours away (sigh) I found a local start-up business who took me in for January.
It’s hard to explain ‘a day in the life’ because the daily tasks I was assigned hopefully won’t have to be redone two or three months from now after the company is well established. So this is more of a summarized reflection for future IMC’ers of what you will probably do if you get a placement with a start-up entrepreneur.
Sarah Toupin Inc. Outdoor Art & Business Signage is named after its owner, Sarah Toupin a French-Canadian artist, photographer & interior designer. Using unique weather-proof, UV resistant inks to showcase over 20 beautiful shades such as Cold Mauve, Berry smoothie, green Zen, Old Charm pink & Royal red. A state of the art Canadian printing & lamination process creates elegant signage with premium surface protection that is versatile and durable against the unforgiving climates that lead to warping, cracking & rust.
The first task I had was to update her database of business cards that has been accumulating throughout the past three or so years. Sarah goes to every ‘Chamber of Commerce MEGAMIXER’ and also took me on a fieldtrip to a Kingston Connections meeting. I had to organize the business cards into city/region/province and if they spoke English or French, then put them into a database binder and type all the information from each card into her Excel spreadsheet & Windows Outlook contact list.
The second thing we started was an ‘introductory’ direct email campaign explaining the business, owner and why the business' of Kingston should take up doing business with Sarah Toupin Inc. The next ongoing task was to redesign her promotional brochure and Photoshop old & new logos to be used on her website and social media. We created a press release to send out to the media during our ‘introductory blast.” I also created a certificate of authentication to be added to all product packaging and a ‘product fact sheet’ which was applauded for its technical & design accuracy by the head of the marketing department of the product manufacturer.
Sarah has endured many sleepless nights meticulously researching to find metallic photographic aluminum that provides year-round outdoor sustainability. Signage from Sarah Toupin Inc. can be withstand harsh wind & hail, can be rained on in thunderstorms, wont rust or crack during blizzards and keep its shape in scolding heat.
The first thing Sarah ever told me was "I didn't want to sell my clients controversial material that makes poor quality products. There is a great deal of trust needed in business-to-business selling."
We repositioned her Facebook page (the same with her Etsy online store,) and also created a Twitter & Pinterest account. I also edited her website as it was still under construction so there was a three-way of communication between Sarah, the website developer Wil and myself.)
Through those 3 weeks I learned a lot about Sarah and myself. We both share almost the same ‘perfectionist’ personality so every day was relaxed and entertaining but still full of daunting work. That being said I would highly recommend this placement to any ‘Gold personalities’ that love organization & precision. We revised and edited multiple items/assignments over a multitude of times so anyone with a high sense of patience is a strong asset.
Overall, it was a great experience and I’ve gained an invaluable friend who I am SO proud of. I’m so thankful to Sharon Kaye of Research&Writing Inc. for referring her to me. And I’m definitely thankful I took this program in order to have this opportunity. All future students should definitely take advantage of this and I know all of us ‘upper years and alumni’ will be here to help if needed – I know I will be!
For more information about Sarah Toupin please go to her website www.sarahtoupin.com
* To see some examples of the work I did for Sarah please go to my Portfolio fb.com/Creative.Dunning
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