New Catalog Schedule

This past month Stampin' Up! announced some changes to the catalog, both the Idea Book & Catalog & the Mini Catalogs.  Some of these changes may have you thinking Oh, No! What are they doing? But I ask that you hold on to all thoughts and wait to see how this works out. I am listing below some of the changes and my thoughts and opinions on them.

• The Idea Book & Catalog will be renamed to The Annual Catalog
• This raises many questions, by changing the name will they get rid of the samples pictured in the book? According to the information I am receiving as a Demonstrator is that the samples will stay.
• The annual catalog will run from June 1, 2012 (preorder in May) through May 31, 2013
•  This means that your current catalog will be ending a month earlier so be prepares to purchase those things you really want as they may be retired a month sooner than expected.
• The annual catalog will be reduced from over 240 pages in the current Idea Book & Catalog to 208 pages.
• Okay I will admit that this raise more than a few eyebrows, but at the same time as announcing the catalog will have less pages they also made a few other announcements that makes this less scary & less likely to mean a huge difference in the amount of products available. 
• One of the things mentioned was that the Simply Adorned & Decor Elements will be discontinued together this cuts out 8 pages
• Also announced is that most seasonal items will be moved to the Seasonal Catalogs (see more below regarding minis). By removing these items or even just most of them they free up 30 pages
• Total the amount of pages they are reducing the catalog (32 Pages) by and the total of pages that simply adorned, decor elements & seasonal items take up 8+30=38. This is a total of 6 pages more than they say they are reducing the catalog by. This to me means that they won't be removing all the holiday items from the main catalog.
• Stamps will still be featured at full size.
• The annual catalog will be printed on lighter-weight paper.
• Okay I am unsure what this will mean to the quality of the catalog, we are all questioning whether this will cause the catty's to fall apart sooner or become even more dog-eared. I am going to have to wait for the answers to questions I have to this change.
• Celebrando Creatividad will remain unchanged.
• The Occasions, Summer, and Holiday Mini Catalogs will be replaced by two seasonal catalogs called the Holiday Catalog and the Spring Catalog.
• Okay I am excited about this change. As things stand right now, I feel we barely have a chance to show case items in the minis especially the summer mini before it is time to introduce a new mini. I also feel this will give us more opportunity to show off more of the annual catalogs products.
• The first Holiday Catalog will run from August 1, 2012 through the beginning of January, 2013
• The first Spring Catalog will run from the beginning of January, 2013 through May 31, 2013.
• Longer running time= more chance to decide if you like a product and a better chance of being able to afford the items you want.
• The seasonal catalogs will be larger in both size (8 1/2" x 11") and page count (about 40 pages) than the current mini catalogs.
• This is great. I am not sure how much this will change the amount of product these will carry, if they will have more new items or if the size/page amt will just be for the additional seasonal items they choose to bring back each year.

Whew, long post today, but I felt that you need to know what changes will be occurring with Stampin' Up! in the near future. Many of the changes I am excited about, the main change that I am hoping to here more about soon is the new cost of the annual catalog. We know the cost is changing for us but I would like to know what the change of cost to you will be. 

Keep watching for updates on these exciting new changes to Stampin' Up!

I hope you all enjoy!

DanicaA