{hostess of the week} kerri mich

Hello, everyone! This week's hostess of the week is Kerri, my very oldest friend. Kerri and I met when we were three. Her family moved in across the street from mine, and we were fast friends from the moment she invited me over to play with one of her fabulous Barbie houses. So many of my childhood memories involve Kerri...puppet shows, lemonade stands, walking to school in our matching ponchos crocheted by Kerri's mom. And now we have sons similar ages and our husbands' personalities are so similar it is sometimes spooky!

Kerri's mom is also a killer cook and the original grow your own food lady. Seriously, long before it was chic to have your own backyard vegetable garden, Kerri's mom had one, and after consulting a cookbook from the most ginormous cookbook collection I have ever seen, she'd put something fantastic on the table. Although cooking comes naturally to Kerri, I think her "just do it" spirit is one we all can (and should) embrace!

From Kerri:

Albuquerque, New Mexico is famous for its Balloon Fiesta, the first week of October every year. We like to celebrate by having a balloon breakfast. When else can you have a party at 7 am on a Saturday???

Table: Assorted outdoor patio tables, which no one is sitting at, preferring to stand at the wall to look at the balloons.
Chairs: Assorted outdoor patio chairs.
Lighting: The sunrise!
Favorite table decor: Flowers, candles
Last time you entertained, you served: Breakfast hot dishes, fruit, ham, doughnuts and sweet rolls, lots of coffee and hot chocolate!
How many people were there? About 40 or so, adults and kids. Depends on the weather and which way the wind blows.
Last minute or planned in advance? Advance, via email
Go-to recipe when in a hurry: Pasta Caprese. Basically make Tomato, Mozzarella, and Basil salad and throw it over pasta. Its DELICIOUS when you have home grown tomatoes. We eat it all summer.
Favorite cookbook: My mother is a complete cookbook fanatic (we're talking thousands), and I have received many from her. The last one I used was the Ovens of Brittany cookbook, yum.
Invitations: printed, hand-written or e-mailed? When I plan far enough in advance, printed invitations from hen and barley, of course, but usually I am pulling things together last minute, so phone/email!
Best entertaining tip: Don't stress about having people over, just do it. They'd rather see you and your family than sit home, so don't worry that everything is perfect. And let them bring food too! Usually people like to make a contribution to the event.
When you're not entertaining, what are you doing, professionally and/or personally?
I am a GIS (Geographic Information Systems) Specialist for the Forest Service so basically I make maps and do analysis with spatial data. I have a 2 boys (2 and 3 years old) that keep me busy at home, and a wonderful husband who owns his own company (www.ramblinwood.net) making solid hardwood furniture. Mainly beds, but he can make anything!

{hostess of the week}: haile mccollum

I am really excited to introduce you to Haile McCollum, owner of the brilliant company Fontaine Maury. If you've seen FM products, you will not be surprised by the style Haile brings to her table. Enjoy!

From Haile: The photo is from Parker's birthday party (he's 5) we were going to have the party outside, but it rained. My kitchen table was not big enough, so we did it in the formal dining room. To dress it down some I tossed on 3 vintage table cloths.

The table: A very formal dining room table that my grandmother bought in Aberdeen, Scotland. She told me that if I married the right person I could have her dining room table! So funny. She did not live to see me married, and my aunt got her table, but I did find this table all crated up in her storage shed (that I cleaned out, it was a big task!) My Aunts let me have to table, so I guess she knows I married the right person!

The chairs: 14 in the dining room given to me by my Aunts to go with the table- but I hate the covering! I keep saying I'm going to print my own on Spoonflower, I just can't seem to get it done.

Lighting: A very modern polished silver fixture from Circa lighting
http://circalighting.com/details.aspx?pid=569&cid=4

Favorite table decor: Candles! My husband and I light them almost every night.

Last time I entertained, I served: Pork tenderloin, french rolls a barefoot contessa salad with butternut squash in it. Have to confess, someone else brought the salad!

How many people? 10 grown ups who did not behave like grownups! Stayed until 12:30am!

Last minute or planned in advance? Planned, it was a 41st birthday party for my best friend.

Go-to recipe when in a hurry: White Bean Chicken Chili, so easy! It came off a Progresso can.

Favorite cookbook: I really like the Joy of Cooking for basics, I go to epicurious for more out of the box ideas.

Invitations: printed, hand-written or e-mailed? Usually printed, but sometimes called, and sometimes even texted or facebooked!

Best entertaining tip: If you are at ease, your guests will be too. And don't worry, it's only a party!

When I'm not entertaining, I am: Working on any number of projects for Fontaine Maury and cooking for 2 boys who are the perfect ages, 5 and 2 and my husband. I actually make 2 dinners every night! We have not merged dinner time, but I feel it coming.

We're moving!

Hello, everyone! It's been a while...I hope you are all still out there. The big news here is that we're restructuring our operations and next week will be moving into some new space, all under one roof here in Chicago. We're excited, but all the preparations for this move have obviously resulted in no blog posts for a long time!

Our offices will be closed next week, re-opening on September 16, so we can get everything moved and organized. Any orders placed next week will be filled promptly on or after September 16.

Moving is hassle, but one thing I love about it is that it forces us to really clean house. In honor of this, we're having a little moving sale through October 31 for our dear retailers: 15% off all boxed and bulk imprintable invitations and notecards, and $10 off our Completely Custom display. Now is the time to stock up on some of our darling designs like the one you see above. And, if you live in the Chicago North Shore area, stay tuned because we're going to be hosting an open house/fall clean up sale in October, and there will be some great deals!!

Thanks for your patience and we promise to be back with a new blog schedule by the end of September.

meet hannah!

Good afternoon to you all! It is rainy here in Chicago today, the perfect time for an introduction to our Semi-Custom line's Hannah: Hannah is a natural beauty, your go-to girl. Everything she wears looks instantly new, now and effortlessly chic.

Everyone knows a girl like Hannah. The classic beveled text box on this layout makes it your "go-to" layout, the one you can't go wrong with no matter what swatch you use, and every swatch makes that beveled box look new, now and effortlessly chic. That's Hannah.

Now here's Hannah in other swatches on folded notes, invitations, labels, calling cards and photo cards. Irresistible, right?



Drop us a line to order this fabulous program--either as a new retailer for both Completely Custom and Semi-Custom, or as an add-on to your already fabulous Completely Custom easel.

meet suzy!

Today we're pleased to introduce Suzy from our Semi-Custom line. Suzy is classic with a dash of the exotic. Her house is filled with things that hint of time spent in far-off places. She is the one to have at dinner parties.

Note how the Suzy layout gives everything a clean, contemporary look, but without being too modern. And how cute is Suzy in a different pattern? Can't you just picture matching gift labels for a little boy?

give, invite gather: the girls

We are thrilled to give you a peek at our soon to launch Semi-Custom line. Semi-Custom lets you apply any of 35 of our most popular imprintables swatches to 4 different layouts, called collections. Each collection represents a distinctive layout style that changes the look of any swatch to suit your mood, taste or event. Collections offer the same 6 products: invitations, folded notes, photo cards, calling cards & 2 label styles, all personalized and made to order.

To help translate each collection's signature style, we gave them a name and a personality. They're our "girls", and they'll help you and your customers give, invite and gather with style. So, let's make some introductions!

First, meet Olivia, shown below in swatch #500. Olivia is a big city girl who throws great cocktail parties and loves fresh flowers all over her apartment. She is, above all else, fun. Can't you just imagine her?



And here is the Olivia collection invitation shown in swatch #520. A different swatch changes the look while retaining Olivia's innate sense of style.



After the holiday weekend, we'll introduce you to the rest of "the girls". More info on the Semi-Custom/Completely Custom easel program here.

Hello! Allergies + Asthma + Bronchitis = long time no see

Hello, everyone! I apologize for the LONG delay since our last post, especially since we have some more fabulous NSS round up items to share. My usual spring allergies morphed into an asthma attack, which then turned into bronchitis, all during my kids' last week of school. If you have kids, you know what "last week of school" means: picnics, teacher's gifts, end of year concerts, final sporting events, and the list goes on. Frankly, it exhausts me every year, and I think it does the kids in, too! At any rate, it has taken me much longer than I expected to recover from all this and I am just now feeling somewhat back to normal.

But enough about boring illnesses! There are more exciting things to discuss, namely, the continuation of our gathering of our NSS favorites. All of today's items fit into our favorite category of things that are chic, nice to look at, and useful to boot, and they are especially timely for summer.

First up are custom melamine plates from our friends at Fontaine Maury. Yes, yes, there are plenty of custom plate lines out there, but believe me, Fontaine Maury is the last word in chic custom plates. With more than 250 designs to choose from, there is something for everyone in your family, or to match your decor, or whatever other criteria might float your boat. Visit the Fontaine Maury website to find out where you can get your custom plates before your next summer gathering (and wouldn't a custom plate be a FABULOUS summer hostess gift or birthday gift? I'm just sayin'...).


Next are disposable coasters from Whitney English. When you think of Whitney English, you may think of invitations, or note cards, or note sheet sets, since those are the things that established the company in the stationery industry. But now, the Whitney English team is using their considerable powers of design on useful household items like these coasters. And the designs are chic but timeless, so if you don't run through all that you buy this year, they won't look been there, done that when you pull them out again at a later date. Personally, I want these stacked all over my house, not because I am worried about water rings everywhere (I have three boys, so I got over that one a while ago), but because they look so great, especially with that bold intial in the center. Love 'em!



Finally, from the department of shameless self-promotion we want to share some fantastic Completely Custom items we've done recently. These showcase all that there is to love about our Completely Custom line: for a 4th of July party invitation, our Sparkler icon in navy & red, plus our lattice perimeter border in navy & white, plus a fun font in red makes a smashing July 4th party invitation. Take that same perimeter border in lime & peony, and pair it with grad caps in the same colors, and you have a festive, feminine Grad Party invitation (with darling matching address labels). It is so easy to get exactly the look you want with Completely Custom!

We've gathered some of our NSS favorites

The National Stationery Show is overwhelming. As you walk the aisles, you see fabulous line upon fabulous line, and as a manufacturer, it leaves us wondering: How do retailers ever choose? We love hen and barley press, obviously, but as paper lovers, we appreciate other manufacturers' creativity, too. As the day goes on, we plan to post some of our favorites, including our favorite item from our own line. Many of these are lines whose look we not only love, but whose owners we are fortunate enough to count as friends and close colleagues. Enjoy!

Let's start with Demby + Solomon. They shared a booth with us, so we got to see their products firsthand. Their Clever Correspondence album is DARLING--take a look at some of the product samples below.


Then there is The Paper Menu. The owner Marie is adorable, as are her products. The Paper Menu booth at NSS reflected the line's style, right down to Marie's great husband Julian sporting seersucker pants like only a Southerner can. After seeing Marie and Julian in their booth, both Carolyn and I came away with: 1) how cute are those products; and 2) a reminder that we love seersucker on men. The Paper Menu's latest addition to their line are personalized aprons, gowns and pillowcases. Check out the cute aprons below:


Fin+Roe is another favorite (and boothmate of ours). Owner Lori is, like me, a Wisconsin girl, and as if her Marzipan line weren't enough, she's rolled out the totally innovative Fin+Roe line. Check out these photo magnet digital cards. Talk about clever...and different (GOOD different)...and stylish. We love 'em!


Our favorite from our own hen and barley press this year are our magnets, especially our new Monogram Magnets and You Said It! Magnets. From our Initial Magnets, our Classic Style are runaway bestsellers.



Stay tuned for updates and favorites throughout the day!

topic du jour: customer appreciation

Good afternoon! Today we had a screw up with one of our retailers, someone who had not ordered from us before. As I was reflecting about how we handled the situation, I was reminded about how important it is to show appreciation to customers, both when you're fixing a mistake and in the course of everyday dealings.

Since we are all in an industry that is driven by sales, it is easy to get caught up in who your largest customers are, and limit specials, incentives and perks to them. But, especially this year, when everyone's sales have been hit hard by this economy, sales may not be the best measure of to whom you should extend whatever customer appreciation programs your company might have. One store's (or customer's) $200 might be another store's (or customer's) $2,000. A store who writes a $2,000 is not, therefore, necessarily a more important or "better" customer than the one who writes $200. How many times have you had a store that orders a lot but is difficult to deal with, meaning that your profit margin dwindles by virtue of the amount of time and attention they require? Which is not to say that a big customer isn't important, because of course they are, but I wonder if dollars spent should be the primary factor in formulating customer appreciation programs and incentives.

All of which is a long way of getting to today's topic du jour: How do you handle customer appreciation? Do you have a program within your company for doing so? Retailers, what are your favorite types of customer appreciation incentives?

At hen and barley press, we send updates to our Completely Custom program at no charge to a large portion of our retailers. Sales aside, we can generally glean where the potential is, and let's face it, an album is essentially a catalog of our products, so why wouldn't why want to give as many retailers as possible the tools to sell our products? We send hand addressed, hand signed holiday photo cards to most of our retailers, whether they've ordered from us recently or not.

Recently, hen and barley press donated a bunch of our invitation and note card overstocks to the Chicago branch of a national not-for-profit called AmericaSCORES. It was not a huge donation by any stretch of the imagination. Today, we received a packet with a copy of their most recent publication, as well as a handwritten note from the executive director, thanking us for our donation. Let me tell you, we were impressed! It made us think we should really do the same thing for our customers all the time, not just at the holidays, or after the National Stationery Show. Food for thought!

We'd love to hear from you all on this topic!

Gather: The National Stationery Show Way

The National Stationery Show, described by someone on Twitter as "Fashion Week for paper people" was held from May 17-21 at the Javits Center in New York. Stationery companies from Crane & Co. to hen and barley press to companies you've never or not yet heard of have booths of varying sizes and complexity. It is a very creative atmosphere, a lot of fun, and a great networking, marketing and sales opportunity.

This year, we and a few other companies from A Fresh Bunch got creative and gathered together to have a group presence at the show. Done very last minute, our booth did not have the polish or presentation that it would have normally, but we pooled our resources, got ourselves and our products there, and made a splash at the show. Retailers loved the one stop shopping for 6 lines in one booth, and we each loved having sales help that allowed us to devote time to networking, trend-spotting and socializing with our paper friends. We're going to do it again next year, and are already making plans for improving upon a good thing.

Here are some highlights from the booth:


hen and barley press: our new magnets (shown at left) were a big hit, as was our new combined Completely Custom & Semi-Custom program. With over 14,000 design options, and 15+ stationery & gift products, this program defines one-stop shopping! As one of our retailers said upon seeing the Semi-Custom designs, "Oh, I will sell a ton of this." You can't beat that reaction (or the show special price tag of $150).

marzipan inc./fin+roe: marzipan inc. has launched a new custom album called fin+roe that had retailers all abuzz. Their photo magnet announcement cards drew quite a crowd and we love them, too!

evy jacob: we love evy's tagline of celebrate everything, everyday and her designs reflect that love of celebrations small and large. Her personalized albums were a huge hit and we loved their bar/bat mitzvah designs in particular.

Artful Sentiments: there is something about Molly's handblocked prints, they are simple and yet vibrant at the same time. Her coasters had us drooling with their fabulous prints.

Demby & Solomon: Lysa of Demby & Solomon donates her time & design talent to A Fresh Bunch, designing all of our group's logos and visual communications. Her new line of imprintables is fantastic, and we also loved her clever correspondence album.

Lucky Star Press: Sarah of Lucky Star Press recently had a new baby and still managed to pull together a fabulous collection for the show. Her amazing letterpress designs are subtle and sophisticated with the right dose of good cheer. We loved the mix-n-match initial sets.

None of us had ever done anything like this before, and felt like we were rolling the dice by having "the competition" in the same booth. But gathering together, pooling resources and really exchanging information with each another was such a positive experience, and we think retailers liked it as much as we did. If you visited our booth during the show, THANK YOU! If you weren't there but want more information, please visit each of our sites.

Here's to gathering together!

Giving Back: Creative Pitch

To date, Hen and Barley Press has donated more than $4,000 in products to a wide range of organizations.

One of these groups is Creative Pitch, a not-for-profit corporation in Chicago whose mission is to support art education among underserved elementary students and educators. Founded by Dian Sourelis and her partner through Brainforest, their creative agency in Chicago's Wicker Park, Creative Pitch accepts donations of high quality paper and useful art materials from printers, paper mills, artists, designers, architects and interior designers and makes those materials available, free of charge, to underserved art programs.

"These programs include elementary schools, Head Start programs, after school programs and art therapy programs," Dian says. "For a number of our receiving degreed art teachers, we are their only source of art materials. In the three years we have been running the program, we have served over 70 programs and 35,000 students."

"Hen and Barley's donation of more than 15,000 cards and other stationery items will be used by our talented and creative teachers with the students in our programs," Dian says.

Creative Pitch is always looking for material and cash donations, as well as volunteers to help at special events. For more info, visit www.creativepitch.org

Tomorrow night (that's Thursday, May 29) Creative Pitch will host its spring benefit, Something To Pitch About, at Lumen, 839 West Fulton Market, in Chicago, from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m. View the invitation here or contact Joan@creativepitch.org to volunteer.

Sneak Peek #2

{sneak peek two}

Customers may have less money to spend, but life's events - birthdays, weddings, babies - still go on.

Grab and go gifts like our super-cute Monogram Magnets are an inexpensive and easy way to add a dash of personality to any gift. How cute are these for tacking up memos on the fridge or locker? Using an idea from Country Living Magazine, we use old metal trays to make a quick (and recycled) memo board for keeping track of our kids' homework, party invitations, sports events, etc., and we love how we look oh-so organized!

Displayed on and in a small paint can (shown above), this is the perfect eye-catching display for the check out area. Also check out our fabulous Initial Magnets, available in 3 patterns.

Don't miss all these fabulous displays in our booth at NSS--Booth #2547

Completely Custom

Hey retailers! Looking for a way to turn your store into a custom design studio? We've got a great program that can help you do just that.

Completely Custom is the hot, new must-have program that turns your store into a custom design studio.

It's more than just personalization, it's Completely Custom!

- No inventory to manage
- Small footprint - 8.5" square x 14" tall acrylic easel holds all the pages
- Over 14 products offered, something for every occasion: note cards, labels, invitations, gifts, calendars and more
- Hundreds of designs + different color combinations = 1,000s of design options (our everyday math calculations tell us over 14,000, to be exact)
- Reasonable price points and everything offered in low quantities for gift giving
- Brilliantly simple order form the customer can fill out themselves

Bottom line? Custom design that anyone can do, on products customers love, all at non-custom prices.

Just in time for the National Stationery Show, our newest addition to Completely Custom is ready! Meet Semi-Custom, 36 patterns, including our most popular imprintables patterns, for use on 6 different products with personalization. It's less decision-making than Completely Custom, but still a wee bit custom...it's Semi-Custom! And all of this from one easel!

See it in person in Booth #2547. We'll be there along with members of A Fresh Bunch.

Cool Gifts for Grads

Thursday, May 7

It seems it's Graduation Week on the Hen and Barley blog, so how about some gift ideas for the soon-to-be graduates in your life?

Here are just a few:

Gorgeous flat and folded note cards customized with your grad's name or initial;

Note pad and magnet sets;

Desk sets, including initial note cards and a sturdy holder;

Colorful magnets featuring your grad's initial.

Hosting a graduation party? We offer imprintable invitations in classic and trend-inspired designs that are sure to draw a crowd. We even have photo announcement cards that help you share your grad's milestone with family and friends far and wide.

All of these fun, personalized products come in a range of designs, including spring's must-have Moroccan-inspired motifs and our classic Quatrefoil designs. Our colors run the gamut, too, so you can customize your gift to match your graduate's school colors.

You'll find all of these products at our awesome retailer partners coast to coast (look for a shop in your area here ), and from shopHBP , our partner site for custom orders (where we also donate a percentage of our profits to worthy causes).

A Great Way to Gather

Wednesday, May 6

Yesterday's mail brought a few more high-school graduation announcements, but one in particular struck me as a great way to celebrate graduation with a twist:

This particular graduate is a very talented painter, and she's headed off to art school in August. For her graduation, her parents are hosting an open house to "let us thank you, family, friends and neighbors, who have been a part of [her] life along the way". This isn't just an ordinary open house, though--it's also an art show featuring the new graduate's paintings and other artwork.

What a great idea--to celebrate not just the occasion, but this young woman's accomplishments as well. It shows the parents' pride for their daughter's graduation, but also their pride and respect for who their daughter is becoming.

Gathering in this way--celebrating who the person is, not just the occasion--gives even more meaning to any occasion, be it birthdays, graduations, even Mother's Day on Sunday.

On our desk this week...

Monday, May 4

What's new!

As we count down the days to the National Stationery Show May 20 to May 23, we'll be posting sneak peeks of our newest products on our website. Check back often, and most importantly, be sure to stop by our booth #2547.

{Sneak Peek #1}

Like so many retailers, you probably have a gazillion albums in your store. Well, what if you could buy JUST ONE album, with thousands of design choices for every occasion or event? And what if you could order more than 20 different products from it? And train your staff just once? And have it take up no more than 8.5" square on your shelves? And nothing ever gets discontinued? Sounds dreamy, no?

Introducing...the Completely Custom+Semi-Custom album! This one album has it all, in the form of one compact acrylic easel--Completely Custom designs & products on one side, and our NEW Semi-Custom designs & products on the other.
That's thousands of design choices plus 20 products for every occasion--and in ONE album? That's DREAMY!

Grow your own

Tuesday, April 28

We've heard lots of our friends talking about growing their own vegetables this summer. Here's a fun promotion from Campbell's Soup that will get your garden started with 50 free tomato seeds (the same ones they use for their classic tomato soup). While you're there, be sure to click on the link to donate seeds to the Future Farmer's of America--Campbell's goal is to give away 1 billion (that's billion, with a 'b') tomato seeds this year to promote gardening across America.

We love programs like this that give back to our communities. Do you know about one? Let us know and we'll try to feature it on our blog.

Watering Can icon from hen and barley press Completely Custom line - can be used on stationery, gifts and invitations!