2019 was rough. The startup I’ve been working at was a major roller coaster ride. We got accepted into an accelerator program last spring, which gave us a boost. That set us on a path to raise money and we spent about 8 months chasing that dream. We had a lead investor but ultimately couldn’t fill the round in time and we ran out of money. We’re unable to keep it going.

The toy project that we’ve been working on for the past two years also met with major roadblocks. The toy manufacturer that we commissioned to get our doll and book created spent all of our money and cannot pay us back or get our product made.

Committed to getting this done, we were forced to start over, double down on the startup costs and do it ourselves. We ultimately did get the dolls manufactured and a smaller version of the book (more of a booklet for now) barely in time to get some Christmas sales, though it was too late to have a big impact. However, we now have our products and a plan to ramp up marketing and sales for Zero the Dream Hero and the Nightmare Protector.

Further, we’ve learned enough along the way and met the right people to have learned just about everything there is to know about getting plush dolls created. We’re starting up a consulting business for this called Dream Custom Plushies. There are some bad things happening that industry from poor service and quality to fraud and we’re going to help fix that by bringing quality and integrity.

Beyond that I’m doing web development and my side projects helping people with genealogy and family tree research, and I’m working on a new project that will get us back on our feet. More on that soon.