How to Get Publicity For Less Than $1.50

Last fall, I started a new business venture and new life journey as a birth doula.  It is such amazing work, and I love every minute of it, but marketing myself and my services is hard work!

I recently became aware of an opportunity to sponsor The Great Cloth Diaper Change. which is being held locally in conjunction with the anniversary celebration of No Sugar Added (a local natural baby store).  I wore cloth diapers as a baby, and I'm so happy to see that they are making a comeback!  The requirements for being a sponsor include: a donation of cash to cover expenses or a prize for a raffle drawing and "goodies" to go in 100 goody bags that will be distributed to participants.  This sounded like such a great idea, but I have no marketing budget, so I wondered if I could pull it off. 

I decided to donate a gift certificate for the raffle and coupons and breastfeeding cards for the goody bags.  "What is a breastfeeding card?"  Glad you asked.  It is a small card displaying the text of CA civil code section 43.3 which states in part "...a mother may breastfeed her child in any location, public or private..."  Its a wonderful thing to have on hand as a breastfeeding mom.



Breastfeeding Cards

I was then faced with designing and printing all of the these things!  The designing part wasn't difficult, as I have some graphic design experience.  But the potential prohibitive price of paper and printing was posing a problem, given my budget of almost nothing.  I needed a strong cardstock or thick paper for the gift certificate and BF cards, as well as some nice paper (preferably undyed and recyclable) for the coupons.  I decided to print at home, hoping I had enough ink left in my printer.

As I mentioned in my very first post, I am not a big fan of shopping at big chain stores and I purchase secondhand goods as much as possible.  I decided to make the round of local thrift stores to look for paper for this project and asked my mom if she wanted to join me.  She seemed so confused when I told her what I was shopping for, commenting that she didn't think that thrift stores sold paper.  I assured her that one can find almost anything at a second hand store, including paper.

The very first thrift store we visited had a small, ugly, journal type book with the most beautiful papyrus-like paper inside.  There were 52 sheets of  4x6 paper; enough to make 100 small coupons for the goody bags.  And, it only cost 49 cents.  After a little more searching at the same store, I found a never-used 8x8 scrapbook with 20 pages of heavy cardstock, which cost me 99 cents.

So, for only $1.48, I purchased all the paper I will need for this project! 

I designed the BF cards small (2x2) so I could fit 9 on a single page of cardstock.  They came out great, but now I am debating whether or not to laminate them.  It is definitely an added expense, but durability would benefit the pass-it-on nature of the card.  Hmmm. That's a tough one.  Any thoughts? 

Unbinding the little book of paper took patience, but wasn't too difficult.  After creating a custom page size on my printer, and a few trial runs with scrap paper, I successfully printed 100 beautiful little flyers with coupons to go in each of the goody bags!

At the end of the day, I felt so proud of myself.  I spent less than a day and $1.50 to launch the biggest marketing campaign my little business has seen yet!