What do I do? Well...I make leather shields and keychains for Fire Trader Shields.
How did I land this position? I certainly did not apply for it. I was actually hired as an Administrative Assistant, which I still do when orders are few. Prior to last October, I was always interested how they got from the leather to the finished project. The shield person at the time...Kully...was very excited about showing me how to make the shields. Come mid-October of last year, Kully ended up in the hospital with a stroke. So, because I had learned somewhat how to make the shields, I got nominated for the fill-in position. I told Kully before this that I would help with everything except the sewing! I had to learn very quickly how to get from Point A to Point B because we had some rush orders that needed to go out! Later that week, we got the phone call that Kully passed away due to another series of strokes. Instead of calling one of our old Michigan employees, my supervisor told the owner that I was doing a good job!
Here's a sampling of what I do at work!
These are our most common shields. We customize them to the fire departments needs. They come in a variety of colors.
This is what we call our New York shield. These are a pain in the you know what to make!
Just a sampling of the keychains that we make. Numbers can be sewn on in the center to customize the customer's needs. I just finished an order of 112 keychains. Around Christmas, we tend to get large orders. By January, I don't care to see another keychain for awhile.
These are our gold leaf keychains. The bottom set is our old design. I don't care for them. I hate the lettering. We also do gold leaf shields customized to the customer's needs.
These are another type of keychain that we make...our keyfobs. They come in standard or customized.
This is a customized shield as are the rest of them that I have pictured. This one was made for a little girl for decor. Not very many babies will have their birth annoucement on a leather shield! She's one lucky girl!
This shield was my first custom shield. The customer called and asked if we could do a wedding cake topper. Well, here it is! And yes, the helmet is a cake! This was the groom's cake! Everything was edible except the shield and the eagle!
My first Cowboys shield. Of course I had to give the customer a hard time for ordering this shield from Packers Country. I've since made two Cowboys shields. The other one has silver lettering with a black outline so that the letters would stick out more. If they would've ordered a Packers shield, we wouldn't have had problems with the lettering not showing up decent.
Yes....another rival...I know! This is also our Passport shield. I also gave this customer a hard time!
These are our gold leaf keychains. The bottom set is our old design. I don't care for them. I hate the lettering. We also do gold leaf shields customized to the customer's needs.
These are another type of keychain that we make...our keyfobs. They come in standard or customized.
This is a customized shield as are the rest of them that I have pictured. This one was made for a little girl for decor. Not very many babies will have their birth annoucement on a leather shield! She's one lucky girl!
This shield was my first custom shield. The customer called and asked if we could do a wedding cake topper. Well, here it is! And yes, the helmet is a cake! This was the groom's cake! Everything was edible except the shield and the eagle!
My first Cowboys shield. Of course I had to give the customer a hard time for ordering this shield from Packers Country. I've since made two Cowboys shields. The other one has silver lettering with a black outline so that the letters would stick out more. If they would've ordered a Packers shield, we wouldn't have had problems with the lettering not showing up decent.
Yes....another rival...I know! This is also our Passport shield. I also gave this customer a hard time! And, yes, I have made a Green Bay Packers shield. I just never thought of taking a picture! I've also made a Ryan Newman NASCAR shield.
So far this is my only special customized keychain! The customer wanted it for his new baby as a keepsake! I had to get creative with this one since we didn't have pink leather. It's actually white leather with pink shoe leather paint sprayed on!
And, last, a picture of me! This is what my shield room looks like from what you can see! My coworker took this picture of me after grinding down about 30 shields! Yes, I got very dirty! Why? Because nobody told me that I had to turn on the mini shop vac to suck up the grindings! Oh well....lesson learned!
So far this is my only special customized keychain! The customer wanted it for his new baby as a keepsake! I had to get creative with this one since we didn't have pink leather. It's actually white leather with pink shoe leather paint sprayed on!
And, last, a picture of me! This is what my shield room looks like from what you can see! My coworker took this picture of me after grinding down about 30 shields! Yes, I got very dirty! Why? Because nobody told me that I had to turn on the mini shop vac to suck up the grindings! Oh well....lesson learned!
No comments:
Post a Comment