RescindX

Sponsorship and Branding Continued

2011-07-31T12:08:00.000-07:00

It is astonishing how many emails we get a week regarding sponsorship. Through facebook, the website or plain email, I am averaging 150 contacts a week from athletes, events or organizations. It is also ridiculous how little the people sending a large majority of these emails know about myself or the company.

I get statements like, "I love your clothing so much" and " I would love to promote your company as much as promoting myself." Seriously? My usual response is somewhere along the lines of, " That's awesome. What shirts, bag or accessories of RescindX do you own now and which product do you really love showing off.." or "That's great, do you promote our fan pages on your own social media?". The answers I get range from "Oh I have never bought or won any of your stuff" or "I wanted to promote your brand but I didn't have time or feel like it at that time."

Here are my thoughts on that. I am a big, no, a huge believer that there is so much money and business out there, that by working together, everyone can become successful. No question about it. Through RescindX Athletics, we cover Canadian athletes, starting in Ontario and working our way through the other provinces. We give exposure and a chance for athletes to showcase themselves, FREE. Through RescindX Clothing, we sponsor the Ontario Physique Association and athletes. On the other side of the coin, I promote companies that I really believe in, Nutrition Excellence(CYGEN LABS), Advanced Genetics, Inside Fitness etc... I don't do this to get free product, I do this to enjoy a strong working relationship with other Canadian professionals, and mainly because I use their products and believe in their company's integrity. Karma is not an end result, it is a starting point of loyalty, integrity and trust.

So for athletes looking for sponsorship in any industry, for our company or any of the fine companies out there. Look at yourself, look at your life choices. DO these areas make you marketable for a company, are you a go-getter, are you personable, trustworthy. My advice, brand yourself, work with a company to better their brand instead of asking what the company is going to give you. ASK what you can do for them.

I have said it before, and it bears repeating. I don't look at an athletes trophy case. I don't look at their accomplishments and awards. I look at the person, the individual and try to determine whether we can be friends, are they outgoing, personality plus? If I believe that is possible, then I believe the business side will work out. Others have a different philosophy, mine works for us. Don't expect companies to hand over buckets of money or product for free, sponsorship is hard work for both sides, not even close to a free lunch. Be aware and leary of companies that just hand things to you on a silver platter, or offer you the moon. Guaranteed there is an ulterior motive.

Thanks everyone, and all the best in the second half of this 2011 competition season. And show your support for us on our fan pages.

RescindX Clothing Fan Page

RescindX Athletics Fan Page

Bruce Millward
CEO RescindX Clothing & Athletics.

RescindX Updates

2011-07-27T07:16:00.000-07:00

So after an utterly busy first 6 months of the season, I had looked forward to some downtime. I enjoy playing mind games with myself now and then :). Knowing that downtime is not happening, I have been mapping out the next 6 months for RescindX. I believe I am coming to the realization that there is nowhere near enough hours in the day.

Sponsoring the Toronto Pro Super Show was an eye opener for us..in an amazing way of course. This was by far, the largest event we had taken on and as such, was a whole lot more work to get ready. From the 150 gift bags for the 2 model search competitors plus grand prizes to designing and printing our own work, the labour hours certainly piled up. Since I am such a nitpicker when it comes to quality, I print all our own apparel. I have tested and re-tested the print quality, leaving nothing to chance or to someone else's bad day. Our company will rise or fall on the quality we put out. I stand behind our name and therefore I do the work.The Super Show was the first show of its kind in Toronto for a long time and it won't be the last for the OPA, CBBF and IFBB. There was so much work put into this event, and the results demonstrated that. Every large production will have minor bumps, scheduling or otherwise. For a first effort, I stand behind all those who were involved, the sky is the limit for this show and its organizers.

Also something that we are extremely proud of, we have done some printing for Inside Fitness Magazine in the form of their promo shirts. We are looking forward to collaborating on several future endeavours with them. Terry Frendo and Torey Hunt have been amazing to work with. True professionals in every sense of the word and that makes the whole process a joy for us. Check out their fan page and help support Canada's #1 Fitness Magazine. Inside Fitness Fan Page.

While I will be updating our thoughts on sponsorship of athletes. I just wanted to throw a few things out there for athletes to remember. While so many of the athletes would kill to get free supplements, clothing or other products. It is important to remember, that as a sponsored athletes, you are not only representing yourself but the company too. How you act in public, on stage or in leisure time, reflects good or bad on the company sponsoring you. Although we are a fairly new company and having talked to quite a few in the industry, I believe our sponsorship package ranks right up there with the big boys and girls. But there is work involved for our athletes, lots of what we expect is in the Social Media realm. Not tough but can be time-consuming. We have been fortunate that several of our athletes are truly amazing when it comes to this for us. I do know, as we grow, my patience and tolerance for those that don't put in the work or act like professionals does lessen. It is not all free clothing, we offer commissions on sales generated by the athletes as well. I put almost all my time into our company and promoting athletes and I expect and demand the same from those we sponsor.

Also a reminder, there are lots of organizations and individuals out there. If you put your time into these fly-by-night folks, expect that others will see through them. As a sponsor, I don't put a huge emphasis on the number of trophies you win as much as I look at the athlete and how they brand and market themselves and who they associate with. Much more importance is put on personality and marketability than entering 100 shows in a year and winning countless event trophies and having the personality of a flounder. I am sure, if I am receiving 150 sponsorship requests a week, then the big companies are deluged with requests. WHAT MAKES YOU STAND OUT?

Last bnt not least, please check out our fan pages, We do appreciate the support from our fans.

https://www.facebook.com/RescindXClothing

https://www.facebook.com/RescindXAthletics

RescindX " Brand " on the rise?

2011-07-05T09:08:00.000-07:00

Over the last 9 months, I have realized a few things. I suck at keeping up on writing a blog is one that comes to mind. Another is, who you associate yourself with, can be just as important as how you market yourself. I realized that I was completely undervaluing the work and product we put out. Always seemed to be trying to help others, and not realizing that if we put a top notch product on the table for sale, others will understand and see the quality. By pricing under market value, I wasn't helping people so much as I was setting ourselves up to be walked all over.

Now I am not saying any company should gouge a customer at any time. But when people came to me to have custom work done, I bent over backwards to give them the lowest price. In a lot of cases for work I have done over the last year or so, I barely priced that work at my cost. It is fine to help out now and then, but to run ourselves into the ground, financially or workload wise, is pretty insane!

What most don't realize is all the hidden costs, overhead,labour, design time, sourcing highend clothing etc... So at the start of this year, I did a complete evaluation of those hidden costs and had meetings with my suppliers. I knew costs were going to go up, just the cost of cotton on clothing went up over 250 percent. I put everything together, took a look at the market for custom printing at low quantities and realized there is not many out there that still do low quantity orders and those that do are completely over the moon in terms of cost. So we sat down, re-calculated everything and came to pricing that we were comfortable with and still felt was customer friendly.

I have had 15 or 20 orders since then for custom work. Every order was awarded to us, no arguing, no questions and in the end we have 12 customers that constantly come back. They know quality, value and integrity and they have rewarded our company with their trust. And to be honest, at the end of the day, I can live with that and myself, knowing we maintained our company philosophy.

In the end, we want to put out a high quality product at reasonable pricing. For that, we have developed our basic line and for those wanting a bit more, we have our extreme collection. The price point of both are reasonable and fair I believe. We also have a Signature Series line coming soon, similar to walkout shirts from the MMA world, but ours will be fitness/bodybuilding/figure/bikini/heavy iron related. Very excited about this.

Just my rant, next week I will re-visit the sponsorships our company awards to athletes and our thoughts on the Toronto Pro Super Show experience. In the meantime, make sure you hit us up on Facebook and join our fan page at https://www.facebook.com/RescindXClothing

Sponsorships - Part 2 of 2

2010-08-12T09:21:00.000-07:00

What RescindX™ Clothing looks for in a sponsorship relationship?

Positive relationship.

Brand and profile enhanced, strengthened.

Opportunity to showcase their brand & products.

Develop a higher profile through athlete association.

Must have a high level of comfort between athlete and sponsor.

Clear differentiation from other sponsors.

Professional business process and courtesy.

Identifiable and measurable outcome from the sponsorship.

Updates about the athlete, including early warning of any problems, as well as positive outcomes.

Now, some of these can be interpreted in different ways but that brings up one of the most important points in any kind of relationship, communication. The best way to avoid any problems is to discuss issues that may come up. Having both parties on the same page makes for a happy successful relationship. Of course, sometimes situations happen where it is better to sever the sponsorship by either side.

Coming from a military background, I tend to be fairly blunt and to the point which works well for letting people know what I expect. The other side of that, I also tend to have a big heart which can sometimes get in the way of smart business decisions. I like to think the two aspects work well together most times.

Obviously as a sponsor, we are looking to maximize our brand awareness with our athletes wearing our clothing in the gym and to shows. With so many social networking sites these days, there are also another avenue of delivering our brand to the masses, something we like our athletes to utilize, for which we will offer our assistance as well.

Although we have been getting quite a few requests for sponsorships, I don't mind and we reply to each of them. I honestly wish I could sponsor everyone who deserves it and as the company grows, we will take on more athletes. But, to hand out $500 or more of clothing and accessories for each new athlete and along with the new incentive program doesn't always make sense for athlete or our company. Maybe they are just looking for more exposure for themselves or their website or they happen to like our clothing and want to help with our brand awareness without having to take on all the marketing that comes with sponsorship.

In order to accommodate the athlete's and RescindX™'s needs better, we will be developing a tier system of sponsorship from the basic up to "Team" status. I believe this will solve most issues and help us to fully develop the Athlete Incentives Program to assist with competition costs. In the next few days, we will launch the Gold Silver and Bronze tiers. If you have any questions or suggestions, please feel free to email me at athletes@rescindx.ca

Please visit our website at http://www.rescindx.ca for more details and to check our newest designs.

Sponsorships - Part 1 of 2

2010-08-11T10:07:00.001-07:00

It really is funny, people write blogs all the time. Some daily, some weekly or monthly or even less frequently. When i write, I usually do it as a form of self-therapy. Relaxing, thought provoking, whatever it may be, it almost always happens after a long period of printing clothing or designing. Stressed? Naaa, but whatever it is, it eventually relaxes me.

Before I get into some of the processes we use for printing and choosing our clothing, I thought I would discuss something that really seems to get asked a great deal lately.

SPONSORSHIP. For being such a relatively young and smaller company, I seem to get a fairly large number of requests a week asking for us to sponsor individuals, bands, events. I would love to say it is a reflection of our totally awesome lines and though that may be true, it is also a sign of our economy and to a lesser degree, the demographics of the people asking.

The fitness industry is vast and there is a huge number of people making a fairly healthy amount of income. Generally that group making the big money does NOT include the athlete. Of course some athletes, the very elite of the elite make a decent living. But the majority toil in the gym, follow super strict diets and programs and at the same time, work full time and possibly a second job to be able to afford supplements, gym memberships, competition costs and travel expenses.

It is these people we targetted when deciding to sponsor athletes, I knew the lifestyle and people in it. I figured that, in general, this group tended to like clothing and designs of my styles and that I would have a way of giving back. It also allowed me to stay connected to the fitness world. By offering incentives, taking a percentage of sales and putting in a fund under each athlete's name, it would be a way of giving actual cash towards all the expenses amateur athletes incur.

Good theory in point. Of course, this assumes the facts A)The athletes would try and sell the line and B) People would like the designs and clothing. Most athletes get that BUT as in society, there is always going to be those who want everything with the least amount of work and effort. So what to do, we offer a varied amount of clothing and accessories to each new sponsored athlete, we talk with them, get to know them. Even with that, sometimes things just don't work out(pardon the pun) and my least favorite part of all this happens, I have to let someone go. Not fun, not easy, some handle it with class, others not so much.

So what's the answer or solution to getting the perfect match of athlete and sponsor? Don't think there can be just one solution, each situation is different and requires different problem solving. It does happen though, some matches work out better than anything we could have planned.

The next blog, in a few days, will explore some ideas we have come up with to help us with sponsoring athletes or bands. I love the fitness world and the dedication of the athletes and know that we wish to continue sponsoring athletes but in order for it to be viable, both sides have to benefit. Stay tuned for the follow-up article.....

Overload

2010-07-02T22:11:00.000-07:00

Been one of those times, where everything seems to converge all at once. Trying to launch a Fitness Magazine online probably wasn t the smartest thing to do while trying to re-launch the clothing line. Things are coming together though, think I ve finally worked the bugs out of the shopping cart, so it s live now. Just have to finish adding products and re-do the front page. So thats finally looking promising. Can be seen at http://www.rescindx.ca.

I ll be printing new designs this weekend, finally :). After that, it's back to work on the fitness site at http://www.greatwhitefitness.ca. You will be able to find upcoming show info and past results on there shortly. Thankfully we have a tiny window of relative calm between shows. The FCPAQ Provincials this weekend and then a break until August when the Canadian Nationals are held in Saskatchewan and the Fitness, Figure and Bikini Nationals in Toronto. Should be amazing for athletes and fans alike.

Anyways, just wanted to make sure I posted a bit. Will be back soon, to write up some articles on the technical side of printing methods.

The Beginning

2010-06-06T13:09:00.000-07:00

Starting a clothing line last year seemed like a natural fit. I had a web design company, designed logos for others and I did a ton of graphics work for friends and businesses starting out. We attended a local clothing and supplier show and were hooked. The long, expensive tedious process of finding suppliers, getting registered and designing all got underway. We spent the first year making a lot of mistakes, even with all the research I put into it. Trust me, anyone that knows me, knows I am a research fiend. From picking out a new coffeemaker to picking out a car, I am the king of due diligence.

Unfortunately, 9 months into the first year, something sent to us caused my business model to crash and burn. We received our first cease and desist order. Knowing a little of the other company and how little they seemed to be doing with their one brand, I had forged on, ignored what my common sense was telling me, or maybe it was my own ego that told me I was bigger and better than them. Turned out they had a billion dollar company behind them and the nasty lawyers to bring the fight to me. Don' t get me wrong, they were only trademarked in the states at the time I first noticed them. I read and re-read Canadian trademark law figuring my combined law and psychology degree made me invincible. Or possibly, I just ignored it figuring they would not notice us and leave us alone.

Wrong on all counts, we had started sponsoring several athletes at that point, set up a few booths at shows and even sponsored a hip-hop show with one of Canada's up and coming groups, TruPaz. Turns out the big company was a major hip-hop supporter with names as big as 50Cent in the states. One thing led to another and boom they saw our concert flyer. Long story short, our lawyer said that we would probably win under Canadian laws, and could counter-sue. Problem? Would only cost us 32 to 34 thousand to find out.

We moved on and this time, this company is going through the trademark process now, about halfway there and I have put a lot of behind the scenes work into getting things ready for the big launch. RescindX™ has our own line, standard stock statement shirts and we have also printed for other companies to help them out as well. More on our services in an upcoming blog.

So, our first official blog and in future articles, I want to write about the printing processes. Take everyone through the individual steps for each process we use. Once we get that done, I ll be discussing some of our partners and friends and what they offer and how they have contributed in getting RescindX™ to where we are now and where we are going. Stay tuned.....