Summative Position Statement

To summarise myself as a practitioner; I am an illustrator that is part of the brand BOW DOWN. I will formally be known as ‘Adele at BOW DOWN’ and create work for the website. The website specialises in illustrated commercial products. As the founder, I will be in charge of orders, emails, the creation of the illustrations, and any PR and marketing. As I am not actively looking for freelance work, I am not currently engaging with clients that may require commissions. I intend to expand the website further during the course of the year. It will start off selling greetings cards and prints as they are easiest to produce while getting my head around the business. After the first year, I will explore how the designs can be taken across onto further products; as well as producing new designs.

I will continue to research into becoming self employed, setting up a business and how to market a brand. In order to do this I intend on contacting various marketing agencies and contacting local businesses for advice. I have given myself a deadline of having designs completed for the site by July. I will also need to further research how to enhance the website to make it easier to access and pay, without using my current etsy account. I decided to take on the website full time instead of having a part time job running alongside it as I really want to focus on creating the designs this year. If I had another job running alongside this, I would not be putting 100% into making the business work. In order to do this, I will need a business or graduate loan to support me whilst being out of work, and to buy any relevant equipment needed.

To conclude, my full time job is the founder of buybowdown.com, creating the products for the site, managing the business, shipping out orders, as well as marketing and PR of the brand. If the business fails, I will re-establish myself as a freelance illustrator actively looking for work under the name ‘Adele Pierce illustrations.’ In order to do that I will get an agent, and send out my portfolio to relevant companies and design studios. However, until then, I will focus on establishing the brand and researching how to set myself up as a self employed business. My career goal is to sell funny products that go global, and expand BOW DOWN into a brand that has no ends i.e it could become a clothing line, a stationary brand etc. I would like BOW DOWN to be the new Ohh Deer, Paperchase and Threadless. I would also like it to become a collaboration one day taking in submissions from other artists. 

Written Summative Evaluation

In previous years for me PPP has kind of took the back burner. It was a module that was ticking along throughout the year and never excited me. However, this year it has quite possibly been the most important. I believe I have learnt a lot this year in PPP about who I am as an illustrator, the way I work, what I enjoy doing and where I see myself in the future. PPP has taught me to stop copycatting others around me and focus on my own individual practise, setting myself realistic targets and discovering personal things about the way I work. In comparison to last year, I feel my confidence has grown both in my work, contacting others and presenting myself as a brand.

The main success this year for me is that I have gone from not knowing whether I wanted to be an illustrator at all, to embracing my style of illustration and where it can be placed in the world. I have finally begun to give my work purpose through product. This has been through a constant battle however, both with my practice trying to be something I am not; and with other companies persistently trying to send out my work and not quite fitting in to their criteria. It was then that I discovered how different my work is, and that I should embrace that rather than squeezing myself into their categories. This was the turning point to which I decided to work for myself.

I feel Context of Practice and Extended Practice have beautifully informed PPP this year as they have allowed me to create work that could feature as part of my brand. Most of all they allowed for me to explore and have fun. It was during these modules that I noticed a consistancy in my tone of voice within my work and begun applying that to PPP through product designs.
Outside of university, as a module it has forced me to have a reality check about what I want to do in the future; I will now become self employed with my own studio space and selling products for a living. Looking back at the start of the year I was researching MA's and PGCE's because I was frightened to take such a leap; however my confidence has grown massively throughout the year and it has been an uphill climb to this point in time.

I now feel proud of my brand in comparison to last years promotional material; I feel that representing myself as something that is unknown, that isn't personal, is quite exciting because I don't have to answer to anyone, the work can speak for itself. I also love the idea of making work I enjoy making and people buying into it instead of working for someone else. My brand is fun, current and different to what you can expect to buy in a shop.

In conclusion, I am constantly learning, and my confidence is constantly growing. I believe I am now developing an attitude and not only does my humour come across in the work but is consistent through emails, delivery, marketing and PR. I have a lot of research to do into the industry and audience, which I am very excited to discover. I've gone from not knowing if I want to be on the degree course because my interests were different to those around me, to those people around me admiring what I do. I wish to become an expert at my field and PPP has been the starting point for that.

ISSUU based version of Final presentation

ISSUU based version of Presentation Boards for Creative Presence

ISSUU based version of portfolio of work

I've based this on me as an individual illustrator and not the BOWDOWN brand so this is personal work that may not be featured on the site. I was reluctant to incorporate it at all because I feel I am so far away from this ever being a possibility right now. For me, this portfolio is something I will need if my dream fails, as bad as that sounds, I don't want to be a freelance illustrator. I don't want to have to send out my portfolio. I just want people to buy the work I enjoy making, not make work other people want me to create.

STUDIO BRIEF 2 - Part 3 - Putting promo pack together

My promo pack is based on BOWDOWN because this is what will be my focus when I leave university for the next year at least. I won't be carrying on with Adele Pierce illustrations as of yet, that is on the back burner, as I really want to make this brand work as a business. If it fails I will go back to my personal work and send out my portfolio to possible clients and design studios.

Therefore, my promo pack is not promoting me as an illustrator, but what you can expect to find from the site BOW DOWN. It gives you an idea of the playful tone, the products, and the illustrations. This says much more about my practice than a flat or digital portfolio can. It also enhances what I have learnt so far, despite having a lot more to learn!

I went into paperchase and chose a black bag but looking at it now it's far too big; and everything looks more like a gift rather than a professional promotional pack. I also bought a lot of tissue paper I was planning on wrapping the products but I decided against it it didn't look very professional. I really need to look into some plastic to wrap them properly.

I wanted focus more on the product side of things to advertise the brand because I want to give people an idea of what to expect - which is the keyring, mug and iPhone. The pen, bottle opener stickers and business cards are added extras. I might promote certain products with *FREE* pen when you order.. or something, seen as I have so many spare!!!!

I am not happy with the tissue paper, it takes away the focus of the products but they looked out of place just in the bag on their own.

I added a personal note to my thank you slip. This is what I expect to be doing for each customer. Something to make them smile. I need to look into this more to make it relevant to the products.

I am not that pleased with the promo pack overall because I wish I packaged things properly and put them together in a box or my own BOW DOWN carrier bag if I had time to get one printed. The gift bad just makes it look a little bit silly. The sticker I sealed the bag with is far too small as well. I also wish I had bigger stickers to put onto the centre of the bag it would have brought everything together more.

Creative CV

I have decided not to include a cv into this promotional pack; because the focus is on the brand and I don't feel the brand needs this. 

I don't need a CV to send out to anyone because I am not actively looking for work. 

LAST MINUTE CHANGES

Right before hand in I decided to take the sticker off the seal of the bag because it looked stupid. It was far too small and looked out of place. I took my spare stickers and put them along the bag which I think looks better. I am still not happy I wish I had one big sticker to go central in the middle of the bag but I have made the best of what I have got and I think this looks a lot better. It looks less like a gift bag now.

I also stuck some stickers on the bottom of the mug, and the back of the thank you slip to tie everything together.

STUDIO BRIEF 1 - What I need to do next for the business

WHAT THE BUSINESS WILL BE AT FIRST

• Start off as greetings cards, cards you wouldn't expect, cards based on current trends, based on celebs, based on the news, funny, commercial..
• Also sell prints. 'Prints for ya crib'
• Sold through etsy

EXPANDING & RESEARCHING

• JULY - have all designs ready for greetings cards
• Have little 'coming soon' posts about what people can expect from bowdown next
• Stagger out the advertisement of products, don't put everything out there all at once
• Research into packaging for sending out the products i.e will I use tissue paper, stickers on the bags, plastic bags for the products to go into, what I will be writing on the thank you slips, envelopes etc. 
• Research cheaper companies for the products such as iPhone cases, so that I make the most profit from them but they are still a good quality
• Bank loans - graduate or business? 
• Equipment : card, paper, envelopes, giletine, printer, ink, scanner, pens, new wacom pen, pay for adobe for the year. ---- PRICE ALL OF THIS UP
• Market research - audience, what are they buying into at the minute, what's trending, what is going to make them want to buy from me rather than the bigger brands
• Where I can stock these products outside of my website 
• Make a list of all of the products I want to produce, and how I can produce them. I.e will I do them myself, buy them online (iPhone cases etc), get them done at a local printers (t-shirts etc)
• Define which products I'll be launching at what time.
• Webdesigner ---- price this up for making the website slicker. 
• Photographer - photograph the products to go on the site
• THE BIGGER PICTURE ---- Get people on boarddddd! When I am making enough profit I may need someone to take over the admin side of orders and emails. A graphic designer/web designer to sort out the website photographing the products etc. Social media and PR - have someone in charge of this. Ultimately so I can sit back and create the designs and oversee everything. 

Websites for products

Cushions:

Tshirt studio - £13

Shirtinator - £14.90

Macbook skin :

Caseapp £22

Car airfreshener :

myairfreshener.com £5.99

Notebooks :

vistaprint £3.74 

customizeyournotebook.com 7.99 euros

Car stickers :

vistaprint £3.74

Travel mug 

cafepress stainless steel mug £18

inkgarden $17.99

Need to do this research of prices for each of the possible products I've stated! Find the cheapest site at the best quality. This will be through sending myself the products and having a look at the quality of them, asking whether I would want to buy them and figuring out a reasonable yet profitable price.