[Report] Arroz Merchandising Store January 2022

Actual Total hours carried out in January work Total hours: 34 Hours

Project members :[ @lamour]&[ @laurapnz]

targets : samhill.near, laurapnz.near

Breakdown of work carried out in January 2022 - Arroz Merchandise Store

Photography shoot with Luisa (social media ar Arroz) and various members of the Arroz community. Lifestyle shots were taken of the shop products including not only t-shirts, but vinyl, scarves and prints in order to use for advertisement and primarily used for online mintbase store and edit. Meetings arranged beforehand to prepare and time spent organizing members of Arroz to attend photoshoot in spare time. Generally starting to engage further in our online presence and grow our digital platform.

Began learning the process of minting an item online and will gradually learn this in the coming weeks once the new product photography (above) is processed and edited.

Received quotes and researched a possible t-shirt alternative from our original decision. After discussions with MrShirtGuy in Sintra we have decided to go with 3 to 4 designs for our next range of t-shirts and possible hoodies. Confirmed to also use screen printing options and use a slightly more cost effective t-shirt product for the next designs compared to the one we originally wanted at a higher price bracket.
In terms of t-shirt production a healthy profit margin has not been easy to achieve whilst trying to use and research further sustainable and local brands. The balance of cost of product and print has been quite challenging at times, whilst trying to create a healthy profit margin, so we can reinvest the profits in further production of Arroz merchandise to enable a slow and stable growth in the Arroz Merchandise product. Style has also been a key factor in saleability of the item as we have a target audience with a certain budget and image/subculture to obtain. However MrShirtGuy is turning out to be a good solution. Printing dates to be confirmed shortly this month and designs are almost complete.

Number of hours spent on design work and finalizing of 3 or 4 designs. Also amending designs due to the number of colors we can use on a budget for example and location of design back/front/sleeve all comes into the cost. General trend research/painting/drawing/photoshop

Further merchandise shop items were added to the store from Arroz members such as Mitch Von Arx, Lourenco, Amaury and Diogo. A selection of vinyl and CDs, so we now have more of a range of music to promote our music community at Arroz even further. The shop is filling up!

Arranged an interview for the 3rd February with a possible candidate for part time work in the Arroz physical store. Decided as we are still in our Winter events schedule here at Arroz, that a trial of part time hours of Thursday (17:00-22:00) and possibly Fridays (17:00-22:00) including Saturday and Sunday daytime markets and events are going ahead is an initial start of part time hours until we host more events in a month or so once spring summer kicks in.

Began designing a stand alone promotions board to go outside of the shop. As the weather picks up here in Portugal we can start to put signs outside for promotion of the shop also, especially during events.