It all began with two moms, two cups of tea, two husbands, three children, two cats, one dog and one dream: let's start a business! After more discussion, much more tea, and many hours consulting with our "expert" children on what kids would use and love, PakNak ® was born. From there, we set out to create ginormous fun, one backpack at a time.
Our Naks are 3D, rubbery, interchangeable and are super easy to attach to surfaces (with no work or hassle for mom and dad). We knew self-adhesive, flexible, weatherproof designs were crucial to making Naks work. In the early days, we experienced what we now know many startups go through – one day we were plotting certain world conquest, the next we wondered what on earth we were thinking.
There were days of elation, like the day the first prototypes arrived, and even our geeky husbands said, "Wow, cool!" (both were especially big fans of the dinosaur Nak). Other days we flirted with disaster as we experimented with adhesives to make sure the Naks were easy to attach and switch out – hair dryers, hot sun and active kids really put them to the test!
As the Naks got closer and closer to our ideal, we became addicted to Skype, gmail, international time zones and color wheels, along with more prototypes and more sessions with our 6-12 year old resident product testers ("Mom, I really think the butterfly should be purpler."). We worked toward building a profitable business, but we knew we wanted much more than just that. We wanted to set a standard for social responsibility, so we contacted the warm and wonderful people of Eastco, where they focus on clients abilities, not disabilities, to help us pack the Naks. From there, it was only fitting that our first large order (10,000 PakNaks®!) should come from Schoolhouse Supplies, a free store for public school teachers in our hometown of Portland, Oregon.
In August 2007, we proudly delivered our first order of 10,000 PakNaks®, launched the website, felt the elation of seeing the first orders roll in and heard the squeals of delight from happy customers. Now, with great appreciation for those who helped us on the first legs of the journey, we look forward to the great adventure that lies ahead for paknak.com!
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