The idea came to me when I attended a public event and saw a booth offering small buttons, the buttons really did not promote their business/organization directly, however, it drew many people to their booth.
I thought this was a way to attend public/business events to promote my site www.ShopTBay.ca by offering to press business cards into badges. Then I started thinking about what else I could do with this stuff while I was not at an event, the equipment was not inexpensive and I needed to get more out of the investment. I already have a desktop computer and desktop publishing skills, I can make buttons and badges for the www.ShopTBay.ca website. By offering local businesses a free button/badge with their logo and a QR code leading to their published page on the site (which I still do) and I am still using the equipment to promote the website.
Once I had the equipment and started practicing the art of button/badge making, one thing led to another and I started getting creative with the buttons. Then it came to me, I could make any button or badge with whatever someone wanted on it.
At first, I didn’t even have a name for this venture, it was just supposed to be a promotional thing for the Shop TBay website. Since I was designing and pressing buttons and badges right on the spot, it was a small jump to “On The Spot Buttons” or “On The Spot Badges” or “On The Spot Buttons & Badges” (however, that last one is a long name for a website address). Luckily, both www.OnTheSpotButtons.com and www.OnTheSpotBadges.com were available and took them both and directed them both to my Shop TBay page.
One last hurdle, how am I going to show off all the wonderful button/badge ideas and designs? This quickly outgrew the single-page design the www.ShopTBay.ca site offered. Now we are back to the dilemma of what name to give the site www.OnTheSpotButtons.com or www.OnTheSpotBadges.com? Oddly enough, I went with a third option, which is none of the above. It turned out www.OnTheSpotShop.com was available, and you guessed it, I took that one.
So here we are, building a new website to feature buttons and badges that you can choose, customize, and have produced. Come by once in a while and check out the new button/badge designs or contact us and suggest one of your own.