Page 44 - royal-times-11-12

“Twenty Twelve” Mini Company

Craig Stratford, George Marshall and myself, Sara the name of our school and the name of our company,
Whitley decided we would like to start up a mini “Twenty Twelve.” We designed the calendars with a box
company business. We had a few ideas of what around all the dates to write in any appointments you
products we would like to make and sell. In the end we may have. It also has special occasions written in on the
decided on making and selling calendars. We choose dates like St. Patricks Day on the 17th of March. When
to make calendars by asking our friends and family the calendars were printed we had to bind together all
and pupils and staff members of the school to fill out the pages of the calendars with spiral bounding.
approximately eighty questionnaires asking questions We decided to give a donation to our chosen charity
about what kind of calendars should be made. We which came to a final figure of €388. We were very
were determined to make good quality, reasonable satisfied with how much we earned for the very special
priced calendars with high resolution images on them. charity which meant a lot to us, as Craig and I had a
We had to research to find out: where we were going friend in primary school who suffered from the terrible
to get our product printed and how much we would disease. Our friend died when she was only ten years
be able to sell our calendars for. Money and prices old while she was on holidays with her family in Malta.
were one of our biggest concerns.
The money we gave to Cystic Fibrosis went towards
In the end we decided as a group that we would get making four new separate rooms with bathrooms in
the calendars printed in Sara and Craig’s local area. Cavan General Hospital for patients who suffered with
We decided to get them printed with McGinn Printing Cystic Fibrosis.
Ltd. in Castlerahan, Ballyjamesduff. We had to make During the experience we went to a mini company
up the calendars on the computer and bring it into competition in the Slieve Russell Hotel outside Cavan
the McGinn printing on a USB stick. A proof calendar in early March. We were very successful as we got
was made first. We made a couple of changes to the third place in the Cavan/Monaghan junior section. We
calendar and then we got the McGinn printing to print received a trophy and two hundred euro prize money
one hundred of them for us. When they were all sold from it. Over all we had a great day. We learned a lot
we ordered a further 50 calendars.
from the project and we have a lot of knowledge to
Our first place to sell our calendars was at a local car take away from it. We also had lots of highlights and
boot sale in Virginia church grounds. We sold our achievements.
product there on the third Saturday of November and In the future we hope to set up more companies and
December. We got a great response from the public on enter more competitions and hopefully have more
both occasions and we were very happy with our sales. success in them.
In total we sold 39 calendars at the car boot sales. We
also sold at a craft fair with all the other mini company’s Finally we would like to thank everyone who
from the Royal School in Moynehall in Cavan. We were supported us by buying the calendars and especially
also very successful there as we managed to sell 20 to Mr. Robertson who helped us throughout the whole
calendars. We also sold to our family and friends and project, whenever we needed help and for answering
at a school sale in the school room during two lunch all of our questions when we were in doubt.
breaks. We sold 61 calendars to our family and friends,
who were extremely supportive and very happy with
the way our product turned out. We managed to sell 13
calendars at school to pupils and staff members. Our
net profit at the end of the project was €721, which we
were extremely happy with.
At the beginning we had to appoint company positions
to the three of us, so Craig was in charge of production,
I was in charge of finance and George was in charge
of Sales. I was also the manager of the group. The
calendars were A4 in size and the pages had a white
background mainly to keep costs down. They had our
“Twenty Twelve” logo and the school crest on the front
cover. Also on the front cover were all of our names, Craig, Sara & George

44 The Royal Times 2011-2012