Hey there!
Welcome to the first official weekly edition of Dead Parents Digest. Exciting stuff.
We’re going to spend most of our time here in front of the curtain, but I also want to dip behind it and share some of the process that goes into writing a book - my book - and getting it out into the world. I may be the only one who would be really interested in that, but I would be really interested in that if I was in your place. Really, it’s all about me.
The Challenge
The biggest challenge when getting ready to launch a book is getting a group of people together to launch it to. You need to make people care about something that doesn’t yet exist. That effort will take many forms over the next year (like this newsletter, for example).
One way I want to explore, though, is something a little different. Not too many people have used this approach in this way that I have seen, but as soon as I had the idea it seemed to good not to try.
The Next Launch
I’ve opened a store. It’s on Etsy, and it’s called, not surprisingly, Dead Parents Store. The tagline for the store is ‘Dealing with crushing loss through humor and contemplation’. The goal is to create (and sell) things that will very specifically talk to people who are facing exactly what I am writing about, and to do it in a way that isn’t often done.
Right now, the store has been launched with 28 different t-shirt designs, and one guided grief journal called Conversations With My Dead Parents. All of the designs are my own, and there will be many more that come in time. Right now they are almost all available in just one color and one design. That’s intentional, not (just) a lack of visual imagination on my part. The design fits a style of quote t-shirts that are popular. Once the SEO kicks in and people start coming to the store more, I can take the more popular designs and start adding options, or put them on sweatshirts or mugs or whatever else people might want, too. Learning, then expansion.
The sayings on the t-shirts now, and anything that will come after, are guided by a series of feelings that feel pretty important at this point in the Dead Parents creation process:
They need to contain a recognition that things have changed, and that dealing with it is a process, not a destination
There needs to be a bit of a surprise in the presentation - I don’t want straight forward sentiments, or typical grief platitudes. If the saying makes me wanna puke, it’s not on my shirt.
Though they are very self-centered designs for the most part, they can’t be boastful, performative, cheesy or obnoxious. Self-awareness, self-deprecation, and accepted imperfection are more than welcome.
They have to make me laugh. Or at least chuckle. I don’t care about anyone else, but I have to be amused.
Expansion
Besides shirts going forward there are a few things I would like to add if the store grows as I hope it to. For example, I would like to create greeting cards for people who have lost their parents. Both to send to them, and for them to send to other people. For example, one design I imagine to send to someone who recently lost a parent:
“For Someone Who’s Sick of Casseroles and Sympathy” Inside: “This card contains neither. Just acknowledgment that this sucks.”
And for someone who has lost a parent and wants to reach out to those around them:
“Thanks for Not Saying ‘Everything Happens for a Reason’” Inside: “Your presence was perfect. Your platitudes were non-existent. Thank you.”
It’s hard to know what to say in those situations for everyone. I think there is room for us to do better than what’s in the Hallmark aisle.
Why A Store?
The point of this store is threefold:
I just think it’s important. These are things that fit how I think, and I am willing to bet that I’m not alone. And it’s fun, too.
It is a negative-cost way to add people to my mailing list - I don’t have to pay to get their attention. This happens in a number of ways - the domain name that is all over the store points to my mailing list so even curious browsers can see it; buyers will receive a free thank you gift that they will have to give me their email to get; my domain name is printed on the inside collar of the shirt; and each shirt will ship with a card suggesting they check out this newsletter.
It’s a way to fund the entire book process through the sales.
How A Store?
Thanks to technology, the logistics of something like this are pretty easy. I design all the shirts online through a company called Printify. When someone orders one through Etsy, Printify gets the order, creates the shirt or shirts, and ships them off. They have printing partners around the world, so the shirts will be printed as close as possible to the buyers. I pay for the shirt, the printing, and the postage (it’s free to the customers, and a fixed rate for me), and then the extra is profit. I don’t have to touch anything, or pay anything up front. The same thing will be true for any type of item I add later on, too - you can get pretty much anything printed on demand. And Etsy is fully automatic, too. You just set up the site, add in keywords, and visitors to the site find you through search. Once I have had the idea for a shirt and posted it, I never have to be involved in the process again.
Wanna See?
If you have the next great shirt idea, let me know!
Until next week!
Great idea T.O., best of luck as you grow and expand into this beautiful project that the world desperately needs.