Daily Inspiration: Meet Andrea Warren

Today we’d like to introduce you to Andrea Warren. 

Hi Andrea, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I have always been a creator from a young age. I also really enjoy knowing how things are made and have worked many years in manufacturing and supply chain. In my occupation, I use a lot of graphic design elements and if something didn’t exist, I created it. Many people have told me that some of my designs are unique and they enjoyed them. This encouraged me to start sharing my designs on Etsy. After successfully selling some of my designs, it motivated me to try to design and create some of my own products using my background in graphic design, manufacturing, and supply chain. 

In March of 2020, my office building closed and I found that I received about 2 1/2 = 3 hours of commute time back into my day. It allowed me to call manufacturers, vendors, and anyone who would speak to me about starting my own business. I found a core group of vendors and supports and moved forward with launching my own website with my designs. In April 2020, I launched the “Plant Lady” 4×6 stamp set and a couple other items. Plant Lady will always be my flagship stamp/design. It was kind of funny because there were only 3-5 products on my website for a few months. Finally, I got organized, got a portfolio of designs together, figured out what I wanted to do and filed for an LLC and officially launched my business in the Fall of 2020. 

I pride myself on offering high-quality products and designs, packaged in an eco-friendly way. In 2021 I had the goal of reducing all of my packaging to be recyclable and met that goal in the Fall of 2021. Approximately 95% of my shipping supplies are fully recyclable. Every design I make, I want to make sure is high quality, the customer is happy, and that it is packaged or able to be stored in an ecofriendly way. A lot of companies overpackage their products. I have worked with manufacturers to provide more sustainable options such as not packaging the stamps in throw-away cellophane, but to have them packaged in a storage pocket. 

The goal of my designs are to offer memory keepers, planners, bullet journalers, art journalers, and travel notebook enthusiasts with an impactful way to tell their stories. In fact, the tagline on my website is: “How you tell your story is not important. What is important, is that you tell it”. Storytelling, journaling, and memory keeping are not new. Humans from the beginning of time have found ways to tell their story, whether through cave drawings, papyrus, and ink, to modern diaries, journals, and scrapbooks. What Journals for Life does is provide thoughtful products, that have a high bar for quality, but also priced right to be a value to our customer. We are also eco-friendly and inclusive. Our Mission: “Providing creatives with a curated kit, with thoughtful designs, to tell their stories and make beautiful and impactful books reflecting their travels and life.” 

In each of our kits, we include everything needed in an eco-friendly, reusable zip pouch that you can carry with you, to document your life. It is created with journalers, travel notebook enthusiasts, and memory keepers in mind. This is not your grandmother’s scrapbook! When using the term scrapbook, large unwieldy books come to mind. Our kits are a much smaller footprint which makes them easier to store and is less intimidating to those who want a fast and impactful way to document their lives. No special tools are needed. You can make your book as decorated or not as you want. If you are more of a journaler, there are ways to tell your story through your pen. If you like stickers and embellishments, you can also load this book up with tons of that as well. There is no right or wrong way to document or use the kit. It is easily customizable to your preferred journaling or documenting style. I have a patent pending for an album that I designed to store these journals in. There is nothing like it on the market presently and I am excited to bring new products that solve a pain point to the market. Currently, for travel notebooks or small softcover journals, there is no good way to store them. My album system resolves that problem and you can store up to 4 completed softcover journals in my albums. 

I also join fans on Facebook at our Journals for Life Facebook Fans page and talk about trends, new products coming out, how I design, and I share a lot of inspiration and design sketches for anyone to follow along – entry-level or veteran. It is an amazing community of people who come together over their love of all things journaling and documenting. 

My greatest joy is our customers, seeing how they use their products and sharing their creations with me. It is amazing to see what people do with something that you designed, created, and had manufactured. Since it takes up to 6 months to produce a kit, by the time it gets to subscribers, I have seen quite a lot of the kit because I design it, artboard it, create all the proofs, work with manufacturers, test and review samples, then receive all the product into kit up. So, you can imagine that I am almost a little tired of looking at it by then. But what is amazing is — what is old is new again when people start posting their photos of what they made. I feel like a kid in a candy store looking at all of the amazing and creative ways people have found to use, display, and interact with my products. There is no other feeling like it. I have truly amazing customers. 

I plan to continue to grow and perhaps visit a trade show in 2022. I recently branched out to attend some paper crafting events in the area to talk about my products. I was amazed at the reception I got. So many people were interested in Journals for Life. I was invited to more events around Florida to come and speak and show my product all throughout 2022. I am now in 4 retail stores in Florida and they are listed on my website. I am thankful to my retailers for believing and supporting me. 

Thank you for the opportunity for an interview. If you have any follow-up questions, feel free to reach out. 

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Absolutely not. I think the first year, I really had no idea what I was doing past designing and producing items. That part was easy. What I had to learn was marketing, social media, and getting my name out there. I am a very straightforward person, so some of my first social media posts were like “Here is a journal. I like it. Buy it now” or something along those lines. I connected with the local business incubator funded by the State of Florida and that team helped me bring some of my products to life, gave me great advice on updating my website. I also reached out to a marketing group to help me solidify my brand, what I sold, who I was, etc. Those were really great eye-opening exercises. Not only did the marketing team help me identify who my main customer was, but also how to reach new customers. It also helped me pare down my offerings. At first, I put a lot of stamps on the website. I sent all of my designs. Not all of them were very popular and there was not a rhyme or reason for creating or releasing them. I learned that timing is important. Also, I learned a lot about tone, brand, keeping to the same colors, using only 2 fonts. It sounds really simple, but it took my website and social media from something that looked random to giving it a more cohesive look. I started out wanting to call my business Journals for Life Stamps. The marketing team helped me realize that it was confusing to have 2 focuses in my name. Was I journal company mainly? Or a stamp company? I decided on journals because that is main item in the kit. Without the journal, I really don’t have a business. So, I dropped “stamps” from my name and website URL. Just making these small changes has really boosted customer business and traffic on my website. I do sell a lot of stamps because I love designing them, but now they are more focused and released with the kits. Each kit has a monthly focus and journal prompts, and the stamps align with that. 

I also received some advice from a colleague that people want to know who is behind the business. He reviewed my website and social media and really couldn’t tell if it was a big box store, or if there was a human behind it. That a lot of what I do is impersonal. I thought that was amazing advice. I didn’t really think people wanted to hear from me. I am quite boring. However, I created a Facebook Fans page for people to share, I started sharing my own work and hosted some class content and Facebook lives and… WOW! What a difference. Not only do I enjoy connecting with my customers personally, they also know the face behind the business and realize there is a human, not a big store, on the other side. 

The last thing that I learned is to always pay the extra for samples. No matter what you produce, or how good your contract or purchase order is. Always pay for a sample. I usually pay anywhere from $30 to $100 for a sample. It has been well worth the money spent. It is better to have a bad sample than to have 500 bad products. I want the quality bar to always be high. I always test my products and use them before ordering and selling them. Paying extra to get a sample has always done me right. You will need to give yourself a longer runway to do this. Always plan way ahead. It takes a long time to produce items. If you need a sample first, that can be up to a month delay. But, always request the sample! 

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Professionally I am a training experience designer. I have a master’s degree in Human Resources Education, with a concentration in Worforce Development and Leadership Development. I basically design learning programs using industrial-organizational psychology and adult learning theory. I have worked for many different companies including Anheuser Busch, Johnson & Johnson, and am now currently working for Amazon. My learners are the associates who program Alexa and Ring doorbell. With this kind of work, visual design is very important and I always challenge myself to a high bar of quality for our learner base. Our new hires are the future of the organization and onboarding should be seamless and well supported. 

My specialty is coming into an organization that needs a revamp or a new training program designed at the curriculum level. I am known for creating blended learning experiences to support new hire onboarding globally. When you work with so many people, in all parts of the world, aligning on a common onboarding experience can be challenging. However, I love every bit of it and have been fortunate to work with the smartest and most amazing people who work very hard to bring life-changing learning experiences to our learner populations. 

I leverage this experience when providing creative content for those who purchase my product. Not only do I want people to experience my product, I also want them to feel comfortable using it. I release lots of tutorials and creative content each month. 

What was your favorite childhood memory?
I am the oldest of five children. I remember being in waiting rooms, doctor offices, church, etc. for long periods of time. When you have 5 kids at the pediatrician, that can take a while. One particular memory about being in church, I was probably about 12-13. I remember my siblings being restless, so I took what I had in my purse and made things. I remember making a complete US flag with paper scraps a pen and highlighter. I gave it to one of my younger siblings to play with as I drew and did other things to entertain the others. Judging by the looks of fascination by my siblings, I remember thinking to myself at that moment “I could create anything with a little bit of imagination.” It sparked something in me that day. It was almost like I had this epiphany: I am creative! People like that! 

Contact Info:

• Email: journalsforlife@outlook.com
• Website: www.journalsforlife.shop
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/journals.for.life/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/journalsforlife
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/JournalsForLife