First off, I want give credit to the women who inspired me to put this together. I was listening to an episode of The Jenna Rainey show podcast (from January 2020…. I’m a bit behind) and she talked about how she planned out her entire year of content in one day. It reminded me of a similar planning method from Katie Hunt of Proof to Product where she mentions blocking out different timeframes for different projects and life (I can’t find the exact episode, but really you should listen to every single one of them).

Second, at the top(ish) I want to admit that this isn’t for everyone. I mean, you can have it, but it may not work for you. I believe that everyone’s process, business, and success looks different, so if you don’t get Thanksgiving art up in August, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t publish it at all. That’s part of the reason I added the editable excel version (spoiler alert) - if you want to set your timing up differently, then feel free!

Who This Calendar is For

It’s for me! I kid. I would say, you’ll find this calendar most helpful if you’re a surface pattern designer who is mostly doing Print On Demand and is looking to plan further ahead in hopes of pitching PR, possibly working with small licensing clients, or get their art in front of the folks at the POD sites when they’re creating. Speaking of sites, I created this specifically based on what I’ve seen on the platforms that I focus on, which are Spoonflower, Society6, and Deny Designs. I did try to incorporate a bit of licensing timing as well, since that’s something I’d like to expand on in 2023. I also took note of when “big names” started sharing collections of fabrics in some of the "Launch” dates this year.

How to Use This Calendar

I’ve highlighted three different sections of the calendar:

• Design / Licensing Pitch: These are tied less to a specific calendar date as they are tied to the month to do the things. For example if you’re asking “How soon should I pitch my holiday designs for licensing” the answer is now. (Unless you’re reading this after August… then the answer is next year)

• Launch (POD) / PR: This is when you should take the designs you’ve created and pitched (but not licensed) and get them uploaded to POD sites (and proof on Spoonflower). You may be thinking, “But Leah, July is too early for the holidays” First, seasonal creep is real. Two, PR folks I follow are already looking for gift guide pitches, which means POD PR teams are sending pitches. And if you’re looking to grow on Spoonflower, makers are looking for holiday designs so they can sew ahead of time and get their shops ready for PR pitches, hoping for Etsy features, etc…

  Edit: On a recent Spoonflower webinar, their Sr. Merchandising Manager Emerson mentioned that they also work about 4 to 5 months out on featured fabrics and promotions!

• Consumer Dates and Seasons: This is more for your marketing strategy than for creating art, but I put it all in one place… because “One Calendar to Rule Them All” is my motto. I tried to make note of when POD sites were talking about holidays (like “Back to School”) so you can anticipate sales and promotions, or fit with a theme for your content - like gift guides, or “how to decorate a dorm” (if that fits your niche). Maybe 2023 will be the year my Studio Notes gets updated consistently with Pinterest-worthy posts! Shameless plug - more consumer content marketing coming soon!

I’d like to also note that this is by no means comprehensive to every holiday, theme, or piece of content… and that if something doesn’t fit your niche, just leave it alone*.

How Some Things Ended Up in Certain Places

As I mentioned above, a lot of the consumer dates and content are based on what I’ve seen on the front end of POD sites, from established surface pattern designers and based on the fact that I’ve worked in digital marketing for more than 10 years. But I want to spend another minute on the Design and Launch dates.

Edit: On a recent Spoonflower webinar, their Sr. Merchandising Manager Emerson mentioned that they also work about 4 to 5 months out on featured fabrics and promotions!

While I don’t have as much experience on the licensing side, I did a little digging on most important holiday timeframes, and made an assumption that the more important the holiday, the further ahead the planning. Specifically, lets talk about why I put “Design Holiday (ie Christmas)” before Thanksgiving designs. According to the National Retail Federation, in 2020 consumers spent 5.1 BILLION dollars for Thanksgiving. Christmas came in at 777.3 BILLION. So guess which holiday shopping occasion is more important to a retailer, wholesaler, and by extension Surface Pattern Designer’s bottom line… Yeah, it’s Christmas. Companies are going to do styled shoots earlier for more important holidays (Deny Designs shared on their Instagram stories from a holiday photo shoot in MAY) and therefore select featured products earlier as well.

How You Can Get The Calendar

Originally, I was only going to share a PDF version of the calendar, but once I worked through organizing it in excel, I realized that it could be useful as well, so I’ve decided to make both available. The PDF comes with some words of encouragement, as well as some puns, free of charge!

Please note, that this is my work and while I’m allowing you to freely download it, please see the copyright notice at the end of the post (not trying to be a jerk, please don’t profit off of what I’ve worked hard on!) If you’re going to share with fellow surface pattern designers, please direct them to this post.

Have questions? Feel free to comment, DM me on Instagram, or shoot me a note in my contact form! It may inspire another artist support blog post (see also Actionable Ways to Market Your POD Designs)

If this helped you out, please consider sharing with a surface pattern designer friend, or support my surface pattern design journey by sharing something of mine that you love from my Instagram, Society6 Shop, or Spoonflower shop!

(I’m also giving this Ko-Fi thing a try as an artist if you’re so inclined… I love my caffeine over here!)

All material appearing on LeahKeggi.com (“content”) is protected by copyright under U.S. Copyright laws and is the property of Leah Keggi or the party credited as the provider of the content. You may not copy, reproduce, distribute, publish, display, perform, modify, create derivative works, transmit, or in any way exploit any such content, nor may you distribute any part of this content over any network, including a local area network, sell or offer it for sale, or use such content to construct any kind of database. You may not alter or remove any copyright or other notice from copies of the content on Leah Keggi’s website. Copying or storing any content except as provided above is expressly prohibited without prior written permission or the copyright holder identified in the individual content’s copyright notice.