Back to School Tip for Teachers: Teach Business and Have Fun with…Buttons!

As you are probably aware, it is now September. This means a number of things: in most areas of the country it means that leaves will start changing colors; it also means that both college and professional football are set to begin new seasons while baseball winds another long one down; it also means that shorts and tank tops are replaced by jeans and wind breakers.

And, most importantly, it means that kids are back to school. (Hence the “B2S” in the title…our attempt to start the next “LOL” or “BTW”. So pass it on…)

Another year of school starting means that teachers across the country are looking for new classroom activities that can not only hold students’ attention but also teach them valuable lessons. For any teachers out there looking for an innovate way to teach math, teamwork, business concepts, and even simple economics, we have the perfect idea.

Yep, you guessed it: buttons! (What were you expecting? Textbooks? Ha!)

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Restaurant Owners: Using Button Machines to Make Custom Buttons and Badges a Recipe For Success

There is no better form of marketing for a restaurant than word of mouth. If a friend of mine tells me about a great experience at a restaurant, I am infinitely more inclined to try out that restaurant than I would be simply by seeing a commercial. When it comes to this type of restaurant marketing, the proof really is “in the pudding” as the old saying goes.

But if you are a restaurant owner, and you think that marketing and promoting ends once a customer – new or old – walks through the door, you are a making a big mistake that is costing you money. Suggestive selling and up-selling are two of the most effective tools that restaurant owners have in their tool belts.

And few devices are better at achieving all of these objectives (and more!) than buttons.

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Busy Beaver Button Co. in Chicago Celebrates the Wonderful World of Pinback Buttons!

Chicago is a wonderful city. It has great food, great shopping, professional sports team year-round, and a rich and compelling history. The Windy City also has museums, lots of them, many of which are very intriguing. And the most intriguing of them all may be one that I just read about for the first time: the Busy Beaver Button Co.

What is it about the Busy Beaver Button Co. that makes it sound so intriguing? It is a museum entirely – entirely – dedicated to pinback buttons. How awesome is that!?

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So Many Options with 6″ Buttons

One of the most commonly asked – and important – questions that we get from potential button makers is: what size button is right for our project? It’s a great question. With so many different button size options available, it can be hard to narrow it down and choose the one that perfectly fits your particular project.

While the 2.25″ button is the most common and versatile button size that we sell, it is just one of many. In today’s post we are going to talk about a button size that doesn’t get enough credit or pub; but hey, even big buttons need love too.

So here are a variety of uses for the 6″ button.

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Creative Fundraising Ideas for Schools: Personalized Buttons and Novelty Items

One of the greatest and most rewarding uses of a button machine is the creation of novelty items that can be an excellent addition to your list of creative fundraising ideas. Many schools, from the elementary level all the way up to high schools and colleges, have made the relatively small investment in a button machine to create personalized promotional buttons for clubs, causes, and classes.

American Button Machines has published an extensive feature article about using a button machine to create pinback buttons for promotional and fundraising purposes. So why is purchasing a button machine and making your own novelty buttons an excellent creative fundraising idea?

Let’s count the ways.

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Button Maker Price Comparison: American All-in-One Kits v Chinese 3-in-1 Button Makers

Welcome back for post #2 in our weeklong series discussing American-made button maker kits and Chinese-made button maker kits. Yesterday we provided an overview and debunked a few myths about Chinese 3-in-1 button machines. Today we are going to do a button maker price comparison, contrasting the costs of Chinese-made button makers to the costs of our American-made button makers.

First, let’s take a look at the hard costs as we dig into this button maker price comparison.

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Button shows that not even the stench of death can deter one happy bride

By the time their wedding day comes around, most women have dreamt about it and visualized it over and over and over again.

The dress, and the ring, and the cake, and the music, and the invitations, and the flower girls, and, oh yeah!, even the groom…for most brides (and certainly for whoever is in charge of planning the wedding) that special day is one for which all the t’s must be crossed, the i’s must be dotted, and even the tiniest curveball can be cause for concern and consternation.

So you might that think that even the most even-keeled bride would turn into a bridezilla if they had to deal with what Jessica Zabala feared she would have to deal with on her wedding day.

And what is that, you ask? Oh nothing…nothing at all…just the smell of death emanating from across the street, nefariously infiltrating the noses of everyone in its vicinity.

Ms. Zabala’s reaction? Wear a button that says “I Love Lois” in honor of the famous “Corpse Flower” from whence the smell was wafting.

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Button University Lesson 4: The Three Different Kinds of Cutters

Sorry for the late posting time on today’s Button University lesson. Sometimes the phone just rings and rings and rings and our duty as gatekeepers to the wonderful world of buttons beckons from sunrise to sundown. After a moment to catch my breath, it is now time for some late afternoon fun here at The Button Blog.

Yesterday, in lesson 4 of our ongoing Button University series, we discussed design standards for button machines and gave you the reasons why ours have the best button machine design available on the market. Today, we are going to dive feet first into cutters. And if you are a graduate of Indiana University, no, this post does not have anything to do with the Cutters race team or the Little 500.

(Raise your hand if you understood that reference? The movie Breaking Away? Anyone? Okay, not many hands up. I hear crickets. Let’s just move along now, shall we?)

So, let’s say that you are getting ready to start a button project. You have your button machine, you have all of your button supplies, and you even have sheets of neatly printed circular graphics ready to go. Are you ready to start making buttons?

Not so fast. Your gorgeous and beautiful graphics must be cut out!

How are you going to accomplish this?

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Button University Lesson 2: Button Sizes – Choosing the Right One

On Friday, we introduced you to our new series of posts that highlight some of the information available at the Button University resource of our main website. The first post in the series provided step-by-step instructions for any button making project. Today, we delve into an important decision that must be made when you are making buttons: with all of the different button sizes available, which one should you use for your project?

Over at our main website, we have a handy-dandy table that you can use for quick reference regarding decisions on button sizes. While we could simply repost that table here, what would be the fun in that? Plus, we know that some people don’t always like looking at tables and charts. So we will use our space here to outline, in a little more detailed fashion, which button sizes and button machine options work best for producing different button types and styles.

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(Button) Badges? Yes, You DO Need Some Stinkin’ Badges!

You may be wondering to yourself…button badges? Do I need any (stinkin’) button badges?

Well we are here to tell you, resoundingly, that yes you do!

Everyone has either seen or heard this famous, iconic movie line before:

The problem is that he’s wrong! You do need some stinkin’ badges! And this is especially true if you are in any type of service industry.
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