The highlights of our first year!

It’s been a truly amazing, joyful adventure creating our business Ticked Moon and our personalised books. It all started with a spark of an idea over 2 years ago and we’ve recently completed our 1st year of trading. 

Setting up a new business in these challenging and competitive times can be quite daunting and overwhelming. But we absolutely love the new adventures it’s bringing us daily and most of all the feedback that you love what we are creating too!

So here are some of our favourite moments of our first year:-

This Morning TV appearance

“The best personalised presents that are sure to make your loved ones smile this Christmas” – Phillip Schofield

It’s not everyday that you see your hard work come to fruition on a National Television programme! In fact it’s something we hardly dreamed was possible, without a huge PR budget and resources.

But we couldn’t afford a big PR budget or team yet. So I began looking at promoting our fledgling business myself back in the summer. I started approaching and pitching our books and ideas to various publications and by the end of the year Simon & I and Tickled Moon had appearances or mentions in the Metro, BBC Radio Sussex & Surrey, Women’s Own and Yours magazine. We were up and running and delighted with the validation of our business and books! 

However the highlight was in November 2020, when two of our personalised children’s books – “The Christmas BOO!” and “The Christmas Wrapper” – made it onto the very popular and iconic “This Morning with Phillip & Holly” show on ITV. It was part of their Best Personalised Gift’s feature and we couldn’t have asked for a better recommendation of our books before Christmas:-

“That’s the kind of story you can bring out every Christmas, it’s really special and it becomes something that you remember forever.” 

You can watch our books appearance here:-

And you can listen to me talking with Nicky Patrick on her BBC Radio Sussex & Surrey show here:-

The shop floor

In an online business, your website is everything – your shop floor, your salesmen, your company image. So it’s crucial to make it the best it can be with whatever resources you have to hand.

We officially launched our first Tickled Moon website in November 2019. It served us well for the first 6 months, but it became clear over time that it had its limitations if we wanted to grow.

So Simon cracked on with designing a new site and we were incredibly lucky to find Mac – a fantastic web guy – to help with the intricate coding that was necessary to get the personalisation software working.

After months of painstaking work, we finally launched our new Tickled Moon website in September. Aside from the new personalisation software, you can now easily preview your book and listen to it being read before you buy. It allows us to make changes and add new products with ease.

“Brilliant website easy to navigate and complete your purchase hearing the story and seeing your book before you buy it is exceptional. Can’t wait for my second book.” – Helen

Joyful Adventures

I’d been thinking about creating a book for 2 names for a while. I have always been fascinated by the endless eternity of sky above us and being able to fly up into it – and so the first seeds for our 3rd book “The Joyful Adventures of NAME 1 and NAME 2” were sown.

It’s a heartwarming story about the 2 Names going on a wonderful journey together up into the sky, but eventually realising that home and family is where the heart is. It was a complicated book to illustrate too, but our wonderful illustrator Jodie Wonford rose to the challenge beautifully.

We launched it alongside our new website in September 2020 with some trepidation as to how this rather different children’s story would be received.

What we didn’t expect was that it would become an immediate bestseller. Or that over 80% of you would personalise it for a grandparent and child. You have fully embraced it as a unique and wonderful way to celebrate this beautiful relationship!

And you have also fully embraced the opportunity to add all the extra names and we have loved seeing mummies, daddies, aunties, uncles and all the different names for grandparents (so many! – Gangan, Gammy, Gramps, Granda, Oma & Opa) – as well as the occasional Big Pink Ted and Mr. Hedgehog being mentioned!!

Your feedback is often immensely moving:- 

“I am delighted with my book, after I read it I was in tears as to how apt it is for my situation.

The book is for my grandson, I bought it so he could remember his grandad who he doesn’t really know. Thank you for a brilliant book, it will be treasured for many years.” – Margaret

We hope that your children and grandchildren will treasure their extra special book from you and will one day read it to their grandchildren.

“I received my book today. It is a keepsake gift for my Grandson. I can honestly say it is seriously one of the most beautiful books I have ever bought. So personal and so individual. It literally brought a tear to my eye. Absolutely beautiful. Thank you x” – Debbie

Unexpected delights

Finally, there have been many unexpected things that have utterly delighted us whilst taking our joyful Tickled Moon adventure. Here are a couple of them:- 

Finding and working with our illustrator Jodie

Aside from Jodie Wonford’s talent for capturing the heart of our stories in her illustrations, her professional work ethic has been a joy to work with. The word you most use to describe her illustrations is “beautiful” and we couldn’t agree more! You can read more about Jodie’s journey as an illustrator and with Tickled Moon here. 

You!

Yes you! Our lovely customers, who have been so supportive throughout our first year. 

We’ve loved hearing your feedback on our books and even getting to know some of you as we’ve helped you over the phone. It’s been a tough year for everyone and it’s wonderful to know that our books have helped you connect with and bring delight to your children and grandchildren, especially if you’ve had to be apart. Thank you so much!!

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So onwards and upwards! It’s been immensely challenging at times – our learning curve has often been more like a learning mountain! We feel we’re still in the foothills and we have a long way to go, but we will carry on creating new books and gifts for you and we really hope the joyful adventures of Tickled Moon will continue to delight and inspire you! 

Watch this space!!

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Tickled Moon was founded by Alison Reddihough & Simon Roberts in 2019. They create personalised books and gifts with a BIG heart.

They have created 4 books to date, all written by Alison Reddihough and illustrated by Jodie Wonford.

You can check out their books and gifts here.

And you can learn all about the “The 7 Key Benefits of a Personalised Children’s Book” here