The main reason we organized the photo shoot was to capture some high quality commercial type pictures of two of our upcoming new products – the myWallaby Joey and a new version of the Agile Bag, which doesn’t have a doll carrier component). Like our last myWallaby photo shoot in Central Park, we decided to use “real girls” who live in the area and own myWallaby bags. We are lucky to have a large pool of wonderful girls in NYC to help represent our products. In addition, it is a great experience for the girls as well, who get to pretend to be little models for the day and soak up all the attention that a professional photo shoot typically generates. For this photo shoot, we used the services of my friend Ann and her two lovely daughters, Madeline and Kaeli. This was great in that we had envisioned setting up a series of shots of two sisters having fun and enjoying some time shopping together.

The photo shoot went off without a hitch. Both girls were naturals and really enjoyed getting into the spirit of the day. It also helped that they were sisters. There was a natural chemistry between them that we feel is evident in the photos. We can’t wait to post the photos on our website (sorry, no sneak peek yet). But for now, here are three behind-the-scenes photos that I think you will enjoy. Special thank you to the girls, their parents (Ann and Yutong), our photographer Lanz, and my sister, Kristen, who was in town and served as our stylist for the day!

See below for a snapshot of our results –

Myriam and I sat down with Giggle Guide‘s Leesa Valentino, for a behind the scenes interview about all things myWallaby. The interview and subsequent article is part of Giggle Guide’s ongoing series, “Behind the Brand.” It was a lot of fun and Leesa asked a lot of interesting questions about business topics and concepts that we haven’t spoken about in public before. We hope you enjoy finding out more about how we came up with the myWallaby concept, some of the challenges we faced with launching the product and how we plan on growing the company in the future. Thanks Leesa for allowing us to share our story with your audience!

“Here’s a sweet success story, inspired by both the fond childhood memories of a friend, and the wallabies who carry their young in a front-facing pouch! Eric says, “The same night we decided on the name myWallaby, we learned that Miriam was pregnant!” Miriam continues, “Given the ever-expanding shape of my belly during the months that myWallaby started to take shape, we can’t help but think that my growing belly was at least in part some inspiration for the myWallaby pouch!” Eric and Myriam share with The Giggle Guide™ how it all began and how their myWallaby Agile Doll Carrier has grown, along with their daughter.”

Click on the following link to read the Giggle Guide article:

http://thegiggleguide.com/behind-brand/2009-11/mywallaby-made-dolls-go

Logo © Giggle Guide

Part 2: The Shoot

We knew from the beginning that we had to make the most of our photo shoot, not only because of the cost, but also because the pictures would serve as the face of our company and product. As such, we decided that we didn’t want to skimp on the photography. We ended up hiring a true New York City photographer — Stavros Panopoulos. If you’re looking for someone who has real artistic talent and is as comfortable on the streets as he is in the studio, Stavros is the right guy for you.

The day of the photo shoot turned out to be just perfect. Even though the local forecast predicted rain, the skies miraculously cleared up and the temperature was ideal (as we learned) — not too cold to make people uncomfortable, but also not too hot or muggy to affect the models’ hair.

While we had some ideas going into the shoot of the kinds of scenes we wanted to capture, we learned the importance of just going with the flow and recognizing opportunities as they presented themselves. For example, the picture of the girls sitting on the steps of a brownstone on the “my” Wallaby page was totally unplanned. What started out as an impromptu respite for the girls as they waited for lunch to arrive, ended up being a great photo opportunity, thanks to Stavros’ eye.

Another nice thing about the photo shoot was the reaction of passersby. We heard a lot of comments about how nice the bags looked and how we had to get them in this or that store. It was just the boost Myriam and I needed as we stared to enter the final stage of development. It made us feel like we had something that would be successful, especially since the feedback wasn’t given by family or friends, but rather by impartial strangers.

The day after the photo shoot we met at Stavros’ studio in the fashion district and shot for almost six hours. We were amazed at the attention to detail that was necessary to get every shot just right. Check out a few more of the behind the scene shots below. We hope it will give you a glimpse into the atmosphere surrounding what was a fun and important moment for myWallaby.

Special thanks goes out to all our friends for their help in making our first photo shoot a huge success. And especially to our models, who epitomized just the kind of girls we envisioned using our product!

Part 1: Preparation

The first thing we had to determine was where the photo shoot would take place. There were really a lot of different possibilities given that we live in NYC. While we were developing the bag, we had envisioned an advertisement of a group of girls dressed up for a tea party, complete with accompanying myWallaby bags and dolls. This would not only show the bags on the girls, but it would also let us show the bag on the ground in the sitting position too. In addition, we thought it would also be nice to show other “about town” type shots, including girls out shopping, walking around town, at a playground, that sort of thing. Based on what we wanted for a backdrop, we decided on shooting in Central Park and the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

From the very beginning, we thought it would be great to get our friend’s daughters involved as “professional” models. While we may be a little biased, we felt that we were lucky in that our friend’s daughters were naturally beautiful and represented just the kind of girls we were looking for. So, we approached four of our friends and they were more than happy to help us out with the shoot.

The moms got into from the very first moment we mentioned the idea. Since we didn’t have the funds for wardrobe considerations, each mom helped out by emailing each other and us various outfit ideas. The moms even had their daughter’s strike poses with the outfits based on what we had described to them. The girls really enjoyed this as well and seemed to have a blast playing the role of models-for-a-day (see pictures to left and right of our models hamming it up for the camera). One mom even had her daughter in staged shots pouring tea and talking to imaginary friends. It was a real delight opening up emails and seeing what they were coming up with.

Besides capturing the images we needed for our website, we really wanted to make the photo shoot an event that the girls would never forget since they were helping us get our company started. We hired a professional photographer and a hair salon on the Upper East Side (see pictures below of the models getting the royal treatment at the hair salon). I think this helped get the girls in the right frame of mind for the shoot in that it really provided the royal treatment.

And so here we find ourselves at the beginning of the next stage in our company’s development cycle, getting ready to show the world what we have been working on. But this excitement also comes with a bit of apprehension. This is a whole new world for both of us. While we have always had our little creative pet projects, this is the first time we have created a product from scratch. We also have atypical job backgrounds for starting a children’s apparel/accessory company, having worked in banking and immigration law, two jobs very far removed from the fashion world we now find ourselves immersed in.

It was our web designer, Timi Carl, who first suggested that we start a blog for our company. While we trusted her judgment, we were a little skeptical about the whole concept. Make no mistake, we have always enjoyed reading other people’s blogs. We just, quite frankly, didn’t know if we could devote the time necessary to keep our own blog interesting. But Timi assured us that this was not the main point of having a blog. In our case, besides sharing the myWallaby story, it would also help us get to know others in our newfound industry and to enable all to share in the creative process.

It is with this goal that we now embark on our own blog – the myWallaby Bloggy. We hope you will find our posts informative and entertaining, that you will learn more about our product and vision, and that you will help us connect and collaborate with others along our journey.