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WOW WHAT AN AMAZING FIRST QUARTER

I couldn’t have imagined a better start to my new business than I have had in the first quarter of the year. The one thing that has totally amazed me is that all of the work and contracts I have obtained have been through either reputation or recommendation, which it totally amazing and very humbling.

It’s hard sometimes to believe in yourself, and to believe that you are doing the right thing going it alone and becoming self employed. Especially when there are no colleagues to bounce off or to go to for advice or for a second opinion on work that you are doing. However, with the right clients and contacts that appreciate your skills, advice and guidance those problems no longer matter.

The best thing is getting a small furry companion, who unfortunately is a bit hectic still. Marlo the new office puppy is definitely keeping me on my toes and making sure I don’t stagnate in front of the computer all day!

So thank you to all who have helped me in my first three months of trading, my partner who puts up with me being regardless, Nick Taylor at Boringdon Golf for recommending me to everyone he thinks needs my services, friends on social media who also tag me and do the same. But mainly to the fabulous clients I have worked for this year already: Boringdon Park Golf Club, Wolferstans Solicitors, Chaplins Superstore, Oggy Oggy Pasty (Raleigh Street), Garden Bar Hire, Churchill Environmental, ElizaBea Chairs, RL Properties, Eolas+ and Tavistock Festival. Thank you for your business and I’m looking forward to the future and building Nutty Giraffe.

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KEEPING THE COFFEE HOUSE IN BUSINESS

So two weeks into the year, and only 1 week of seriously working, and I’ve already visited 4 different coffee shops! Good job I’m a massive lover of coffee. I’ve also realised that a lot of people that work for themselves tend to carry out their working day in a coffee shop. Well why not use someone else’s heating, broadband, electricity etc, all the while drinking coffee to a level that most of us will not achieve at home. Although I did overdose one day last week and ended up with such a bad headache after coffee provided my only nutrients of the day. So as you do, I googled health benefits/risks of drinking too much coffee….well if this is going to be what my future days hold I’d just as well be prepared right?

 

 

 

So it looks like to decrease the risk of depression coffee is good for me. That’s a bonus.

As a recommendation, although please don’t all flock there at once, save a table for me occasionally, is the  Hutong Cafe 

If you’ve not been it’s just outside the Royal William Yard, good coffee at a reasonable price too. I could have definitely sat in there all day.

Personally I’m perfectly fine only having myself for company all day working at home, but I can definitely see the attraction of feeling like you are in the buzz of a working environment. A change of scenery is probably a good idea when you are being ‘creative’. Productivity for me however, is better with nothing but the radio for company, but that’s for now, maybe in a few months my opinion might change.

One thing I have done though is invested in the latest ipad pro, all 12.9 inches of it (countdown to February now when it arrives). I work on a mac, but being a ‘creative’ means that a mac book wasn’t really right for me when I started Nutty Giraffe, and if I’m going to get down with the rest of the at home workers occasionally I needed something to work on…didn’t I? Now just to order the accessories, don’t tell the other half!

Happy hump day everyone, get the kettle on or get down to the coffee shop, mines a large latte.

 

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Hello world!

Hi everyone, well it’s January and even though i hadn’t planned starting Nutty Giraffe until now, December got off to a great start.

I had to quickly design a logo so that the Nutty Giraffe brand could start it’s journey. Business cards were printed and social media pages created and/or updated. Facebook was a new business page, but I like the idea of people knowing who the person is behind the company, so as a self employed one man band right now I decided to keep ‘me’ but change the user name to Nutty Giraffe on my other social media pages. This might change in time, but it was a bit of a whirlwind at the start.

It’s really not easy designing something for yourself. Nothing was good enough and you feel like you are going to be judged as it’s what you ‘do’. I didn’t use the colours I thought I wanted as they didn’t work, and ‘favourite’ fonts weren’t right. There’s also nothing wrong with tweaking or refreshing your identity later on in the life of your company. 

So how has time been spent in December starting up the business… the month that where I was going to chill out leading up to Christmas and start in the new year? Well, straight away I was approached to help a new company with start up ideas, so a morning of brainstorming ensued with exciting things to come. Then a local solicitors asked for some new ideas for some print advertising, and it looks like this has shown my skill sets and more work has come in already this year. Then there is the Plymouth Albion programme which I have carried on with after leaving the previous company. Meetings booked in the diary for next week to talk about how I can help another new business fill a gap in their services, and social media assistance for a well established Plymouth building supplies company. And we’re only four days into January…here comes 2019!

 

Terri @NuttyGiraffe