April 4, 2010
Focus On: EmbroidMe
Karah-Leigh Hancock
The Valdosta Daily Times
VALDOSTA — For Brian Foskey, family is very important.
Since opening EmbroidMe the week before Christmas, Foskey’s family — including his wife and his father-in-law, who is a primary investor in the shop — has been helping him run the new embroidery and promotional products shop.
According to Foskey, EmbroidMe is the largest embroidery, promotional products and T-shirt printing company in the world.
“It’s a franchise,” Foskey said. “We’re locally owned and operated, like all of the other EmbroidMe shops.”
While the shop specializes in embroidery on a vast variety of items, such as polo shirts, bags and things likes letterman jackets, Foskey is quick to point out that they also offer business promotional products.
Ranging from pens to keychains, businesses can come in and order products with their company name and logo on it.
“We want businesses to come in,” Foskey said.
Q: How did you decide to open up EmbroidMe and get into the embroidery business?
A: I was in the restaurant industry and I was trying to find something different. The job market was so bad (that) we decided we could create our own job. I thought this was something I could enjoy doing. We get the products and are able to bring that all together and deliver the finish product to the customer. That’s good to see.
Q: How has business been since opening up in middle December?
A: Business has been good. The beginning of the year, not so good, but as soon as March 1 hit, they started coming in (more). (We had) a lot of quotes with it being the end of the month and quite a few turned into orders.
Q: Out of all the products you have and services you offer, what do you sell the most of? Which is the easiest to do?
A: The business to business left chest logo is what we sell the most of. Polo shirts are the easiest. The garment printing is pretty easy to do and we are able to turn that around a lot quicker than the embroidery.
Q: What other kinds of services does EmbroidMe have?
A: We do sports apparel. That’s a market we haven’t gotten into in Valdosta and I know there’s a lot of people that do that here. We also do bags, totebags and briefcases.
Q: Do you ever get weird requests for things on T-shirts or other items?
A: Yeah, sometimes I get somebody (who says) ‘Can you put anything on a T-shirt’ and I say, ‘Well, not anything. I have a moral code, but you know, that’ll cost extra.’ (laughs)
EmbroidMe
Address: 1900 Gornto Road, Suite G, Valdosta
Phone: (229) 588-3411
Hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday or by appointment
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