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HoofPrints Newsletter
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October 31, 2012
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ABOUT THE COMPANY AND THIS NEWSLETTERFarriers Greeting Cards was started by Gina Keesling in 1986 (in a very small way) to provide helpful promotional materials for farrier husband Rob. Along the way we became HoofPrints.com, too, adding a selection of fun horse and dog products geared toward women of a certain age. This newsletter is emailed to subscribers a few times a month, depending on how often I have something to share. Watch for special sales, interesting stories, uplifting quotes and more.
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First, thanks to everyone who pre-ordered this year. We processed the credit cards upon receiving the orders, so your money is already helping horses in need via One Horse at a Time. Sarah and I had so much fun with the calendar last year - we had a whole year to think about creative new ideas for this 2013 version. And ideas we had! Above is a little Halloween ad that I made using elements from October - which features bald-faced, blue eyed horses with a little bit of a scary theme. Another thing we added was dozens of fun, horse-related holidays, birthdays, anniversaries and trivia. Do you know when Secretariat's birthday is? The name of the horse Paul Revere chose for his famous ride on April 18, 1775? The date of National Eat A Red Apple Day? You will if you ordered this calendar. Now, for the news. All this creativity took a little longer than we anticipated. We are running a bit behind our projected delivery date of mid-October. The calendars are printed and are in the final stages of bindery now. We hope to have them in hand this week and will begin shipping as soon as they come in. Thanks to everyone for their patience. It'll be worth the wait - we promise!
Almost ready! HORSES AND HOPE Calendar for 2013 First, let's talk about 2012. The debut Horses and Hope Calendar, which became affectionately known as "The Little Calendar that Could" was successful beyond our wildest imaginings. When equine photographer Sarah K. Andrew approached me about helping on the project, she said that folks had been asking her to put something together with her auction and rescue horse images. But she was busy taking pictures, and working her day job at Thoroughbred Daily News - she didn't have the resources in place to orchestrate the layout, printing, payment and order processing, fulfillment, etc. Stuff that HoofPrints already was doing as part of our business. For me, designing the calendar was a fun departure from my regular catalog layout so it didn't really seem like work as I logged many hours choosing photos and fitting them onto the pages with the inspirational quotes and stories that Sarah and I chose together. I have 20+ years experience in mail order marketing to the horse industry. Calling upon that infinite wisdom (ha ha), I told Sarah I thought we could expect to sell a few hundred of the calendars. Boy, was I ever wrong. A few thousand calendars later, we've presented around $40,000. to Sarah's chosen charity One Horse At A Time. I could not be more pleased with her choice, and there's an article I wrote explaining why here. The stats from OHAAT co-founder Penny Austin outlining exactly what they did with the money are here.
If you've not already reserved your calendar(s) you can see thumbnails of all the months, and place your order here.
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Cold weather will be here before we know it... tomorrow is November already!
This snuggly fleece lined Trapper Hat is one that we ordered months ago, and it showed up a little early. Already it's proven to be a popular item with our customers. It's made of brown faux suede, lined in pink and trimmed in super soft fleece. It's by the wildly popular Farm Girl brand, and the swirly embroidery on the side incorporates their signature windmill. To order click here.
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MANURE MOVERS OF AMERICA Now on a Sweatshirt! We have a whole page of products dedicated t horse manure. Why would we put a page full of products dedicated to HORSE MANURE on our website? The fact is, if you've got horses, you've got manure. And lots of it. Most of us accept this as a not-all-that-unpleasant aspect of horse ownership. City folk pay to go to the gym. I can clean stalls for free! It's a great fitness workout routine - 7 days a week. Do kennel owners have an endearing relationship with dog poop? I doubt it. But for horse folk, it's all part of the lifestyle. Enjoy our humorous selection here.
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NEW Horsewoman Sculpture! These are pricier than our other sculptures, but boy are they nice!Artist Kathy Fincher is riding down a new trail and sharing her love for horses through the eyes of her childhood. As a child, Kathy would jump off the school bus and onto her horse, Silver Star, and ride to the house. Her early artwork was expressed on the pages of school books where her sketches of horses would run and leap into motion as the pages were flipped. UnBridled Wonder rounds up theses two loves: children and Horses. Kathy's western paintings and designs portray the relationship and the journey of a child and their horse. These hand cast, heavy resin sculptures look and feel like bronze at a fraction of the price! It's not shown in the photo, but each comes with a brass plaque on the front that's imprinted with the name of the sculpture, and the artist's signature is embossed in gold on the top of the base. They're nice size, too at about 11" tall. We have 3 to choose from here.
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NEW INSPIRATIONAL STRETCH BRACELETS
These comfortable stretchy elastic bands feature a two sided message plaque with horse charm. One size fits most - band is about 7" unstretched.
We love the fun messages that these feature:
"I'm Still Hot - It Just Comes In Flashes Now"
"Life is Tough - But I Am Tougher"
"The Biggest Risk In Life - Is the One You Don't Take"
"Count Your Blessings - Not Your Troubles"
They're inexpensive, lightweight and fun. They come nicely packaged on flat cards, so could be mailed (also inexpensively) as a thoughtful gift along with a card.
These are only $9.95 each and we've even got a special deal going - BUY 3 - GET THE 4TH FREE!
To order click here.
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RECAP from the last newsletter
Here's what we talked about last time:
Horse Calls Books set here Cowgirl Bible Pocket Partners here Healing Shine Book & Audio CDs here Equine Podiatry Book on closeout here Anatomy books on closeout here Oval License Plate on closeout here New girly horse sculptures here Blacksmith Calendar IN STOCK here Books to help riders manage fear here Angel Puppy on CLOSEOUT here
Framed Stamp Prints on sale herePAST NEWSLETTERS - see what you missed! To catch up on the news, click here
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WHAT'S NEW! Christmas Cards
FOUR all new horsey Christmas card designs plus all our old favorites here |
WHAT'S NEW? Don't Sell Your Saddle
See this and all framed inspirational verses here |
WHAT'S NEW! Underwater Dogs
Order your 2013 calendar here |
WHAT'S NEW? Breyer Pink Stablemate
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WHAT'S NEW? Keep Calm & RIDE ON!
Vintage glass dome necklace here |
WHAT'S NEW? ~ for Horsewomen ~
Horsewoman's Long Tall List of Things to Do here
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WHAT'S NEW? A Dog's Journey
Sequel to best-seller A Dog's Purpose here |
WHAT'S NEW? Spiritual Book
Desiderata for Horse Lovers makes a great gift! order here |
Message
We LOVE hearing from our customers. You can contact HoofPrints owner Gina Keesling via email at gina@hoofprints.com |
Find us on facebook
Be sure to LIKE our facebook page - it's where we announce special sales, breaking news and everything else we find interesting. To see it go here |
Our Current Catalog
Request your copy of HoofPrints Spring Catalog by clicking here |
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Share our emails
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Viral marketing... it sounds bad, doesn't it? You can ask my husband - a frequent topic around here is that of forwarded emails - and the psychology behind them - just WHAT prompts people to decide; "I am going to send this to everyone I know!".
We receive a lot of them. Some are pretty good, and others are dumb. Dumb in a myriad of ways... Alarmist email rumors that have been around forever - that folks keep sending "just in case it's true" Pictures of someone's butt (or worse) - don't even get me started about the firecracker butt - but at least that one was timely when it showed up around July 4. Christian messages that are uplifting - until you get to the end and you're threatened "if you're not ashamed that you love Jesus, forward this - if you are, then delete." Pictures of cute puppies and kittens (awww)
I enjoy writing these newsletters - and sharing all this stuff with you all. But the fact is, it's also a way to help us stay connected with customers and sell products during the time between catalog mailings (which is only once a year) So I really, really like it when someone new stumbles upon the newsletter and is excited to "discover" our company and the products we offer.
In all my efforts to make the newsletter interesting and forward-worthy - it never occurred to me to JUST ASK you all to send it! Duh. Sometimes the obvious is elusive, I guess. So here goes - my request to ask you to forward our email newsletter to your horsey friends. All we ask is that you please be judicious and only send to folks who might be interested. Otherwise we are no better than the "firecracker butt". Click to get started. (please note - using this form does NOT subscribe anyone to our list - it is a one-time only forward)
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