Welcome back to The Official Dog Blog. Aim To Beginn, LLC is documenting the creative concept of the Official Vick Dog Chew toy through the internet. There are many stories about how the concept was created, but there is only one way to know the truth: listen to the actual creator.

Thank You for tuning into The Official Dog Blog! Every blog entry is genuine and truthful. We believe that we are answering the thousands of inquiries as to how this truly unique idea came about and the business opportunity that was created by me in August, 2007.

My last entry documented the website and how it was implemented, but what about the purchases and attention? How many people actually bought a Michael Vick Dog Chew Toy from our website?

Six figures were captured VERY quickly. Can you imagine? A $10 product generating six figures in less than a month? That is an astounding feat! Thousands of people visited my website and wanted to make a difference. We received hate email, love email, media requests, bulk orders, and the one element we didn’t expect: COMPLAINTS!

Those that purchased right away were now expecting the Official Vick Dog Chew Toy we were advertising. Our team was scrambling for manufacturing resources and staying in constant communication with interested buyers, (major activities that will be discussed in more detail later in the blog entries). We were in touch with a China manufacturer and a USA manufacturer.

Many ask: Who in the media was contacting you? This was a major idea and story, so who had interest in our idea?

My simple response to these types of questions was, “Everyone”.

WGN Sports, 100.3 K-Rock, Rush Limbaugh, Jim Rome, MANCOW SHOW, WDCG in Raleigh NC, WTLV Jacksonville FL, First Coast News, St. Petersburg Times, 630 WMAL Radio in Washington DC, WOKV Jacksonville Florida, KDKB Morning Show, SportsRadio 770 ESPN, 99.9 FM Peoria IL, KQRC Kansas City, WRVA Virginia News Network, Clear Channel Radio Richmond VA, Florida Times Union, The Morning Snap!, WPFB, The Rebel 105.9, Paul and Young Ron Radio Show, The Bob Rivers Show, CBS Radio – KZOK FM, RealGM Radio, CNN, MSNBC, Fox Sports, USA Today, AP. Local sports talk shows, ESPN, Sports Illustrated, (both ESPN and SI published stories that I will detail in a later chapter of my blog). Local and National charities, including the Humane Society.

They were contacting me day and night, through phone, email, at my home! At first I was extremely thankful that others found the story of interest. However, the attention and demands quickly became overwhelming.

It turned out that I could not keep up. This effort was a mission to help and to raise awareness. This was not going to be my “job”. This was an effort to try and turn a very negative situation into a positive one; to salvage any good that I could from a very bad and tragic story. The attention, the demand from the public, the requests for my time and my story were simply way too overwhelming. For someone that planned and wanted to make this a full time gig, yes, you could have really spun the attention to a major sales effort. For someone that just had an idea and wanted to try and help, but did not have unlimited or even full time to spend on the effort, it caused me to retract from the media blitz and concentrate on production of the toy ONLY.

In my next entry I will tell you about the media and outlets that I did speak with. Good story and good lesson.

I appreciate your interest in my story.