next steps
 

Hey everyone,

I'm new to this forum (at least, I've never posted) so bear with me while I do my best...

I started a local sorority about a year and a half ago and we are doing excellent! We have all of our ritual written that lies within our newly made ritual manual, we have a bank account, officers for each position, bylaws and rules and procedures written, policies developed and we are constantly getting more new members.

So, we are ready to move on to a few new things. One thing we don't have is Badges or New Member pins designed. We are a little stuck on how we can go about getting these designed for us. Do we go to a local jeweler? If anyone knows, please fill me in! Also, if you know approx. how much it'll cost, that would be great too.

Another thing we've been wanting to do is get our own, graphics....if this is what you call it. I know that all the NPC sororities have stationery with their coat of arms on it and same goes with invitations. How can my sorority go about getting our graphics (symbol, coat of arms, logo, etc) designed and copywrited (sp?)? I'm not sure where to start on this either.

Finally, I was just wondering if anyone knows how we go about getting ourselves a ".org" website created?

Sorry for so many questions at once! I'm determined to finalize things for us. Thanks for any help in advance! :)

-Shelle

Jewlwery - Im pretty sure that you come up with a concept and take it to a jewler, they should know what to do next!

Stationary Etc - You can make a design based on your ritual or whatever and then get things made at Staples or another kind of store. You can also print things on your computer.

Website: If you would want a website - PLEASE go to my boyfriend's site - CMDesign He does websites and logo creation (maybe he can help with that too). He can suggest a really good host (the thing that will give you the .org domain!) He did my chapter's website and is maybe going to do other Phi Sig sites. If you want to contact him, please contact me too and let me know the kinds of things you want. He doesnt fully understand greek life (hes getting there) and he may need me to explain things.

I hope I helped!

Well since I lived in Flagstaff for as long as I did I would suggest Gold Wolff Jewelers over on 4th street... At least they are a good place to start...

If you want the more then the basic looking print job for stationary and thing I would suggest checking out one of the local printing companies in Flagstaff... Or you can just design something on a computer yourself and get it made up at Staples or Kinkos...

For a .org website anyone can register them... There are many sites to do this online... And you can get hosting usually at the same time... I personally use powweb for all my hosting needs... So if you have someone in your sorority who knows website design they can do the entire thing themselves... If you are looking to have someone else design it for you there are many options... You can either be in contact with someone over the phone and internet and they do not have to live in Flagstaff or you can use one of the local companies... The other option is to try to get a hold of a CIS, CS or Graphic Design major at NAU and ask for their help... Most of them can help you design a website as well...

Badges and new member pins: Think about what you'd want them to look like, then talk to a jeweler and see what's feasible. If money is an issue, you may want to think about something simple like ribbons in your colors for your new members for the time being.

Website: Registering a domain name and hosting are two different things, although a lot of companies offer both. There are several companies out there that will let you register a .org domain name for $15-20 per year. (I would recommend registering the .com domain name as well, if possible.) As for hosting, you can probably get space on your university's web servers for free. You'll get a long URL like www.youruniversity.com/~xyz/ but you just forward your .org domain name to that.

Hey Shellarah welcome to GC! I'm also in a local and we get our badges from Masters of Design. They're gold clad and cost about $22.50 each. I know we get a quantity discount if we order a bunch of them at once. We've been getting our badges from them for many years now so I dunno anything about the set up fee or designing it or anything like that, but just contact the Legacy division at MoD and they should be able to help you. As far as new member pins, since the new members don't keep theirs, we would never need more than like 15 of them at a time, so for that reason we can't get a jeweler to make them for us. We just get small fake Morning Glories (our flower) and put them on safety pins for the girls to wear. Good luck with everything! :)

Anyone can register for a .org website. I would suggest doing some research on servers if you do want to host a .com or .org. At least at my school, you can't host your site on their server with a .org address. It has to be the www.youruniversity.edu/org/[insert name here] domain. And our servers here are pretty simple. BUT, it may be a good idea to start at your university, as hosting and buying domains may not fit into your budget yet. (Hell, the school is free, even if you can't do much with it.)

I've seen domains as low as $9 a year and web hosting for as low as $4 a month. It all depends on what you want.

thanks!
 

Thanks everyone for your astounding suggestions!

Badges and pins - I think I'll go to a locally owned jeweler here in Flagstaff and see what is reasonable. We do already have what we want in our minds but the intake of a jeweler would help too. We already have been using ribbons as our pins for the past year, so that is why we wanted to upgrade, so to speak.

Graphics - we can't go to staples or any general store yet because we need our graphics and logos to be designed by someone professionally. The best we have right now is clip art. Once we get that set, then we can make copies and such as staples.

Website - Thanks for all the suggestions. Regarding CMDesign, how much does it cost? We already have a student website through our university, but we want it to look better.


Thanks again to everyone!!!!! If anyone is looking to start a sorority, Gamma Pi Kappa is looking to expand! ;)