From there, Brian began building for a local gallery and designing custom portraits for families and businesses. In 2006, Brickworkz LLC was formed. Brian spent the next two years taking the show on the road to various LEGO-related events, capturing his completed works online. By 2007, online visitors from countries like Israel, Hong Kong, Ireland, Canada and England were requesting Brickworkz art.

In late 2007, Brian received a call from a collector in Ohio who commissioned him to design the World’s Largest LEGO Image, breaking the Guinness World Record.  After months of planning and building, they achieved their goal: a full-scale 18-wheel tractor trailer spanning more than 44 feet and made with over 1.2 million LEGO bricks.

Today, Brian uses Brickworkz not just as a creative outlet, but as a way to reach the community and share his story (and artwork) with children in schools, teaching children about the importance of creativity. LEGO mosaics by Brickworkz can be seen in the offices of Fortune 500 companies as well as private residences in the U.S. and abroad.

Why MailChimp?

“My list started growing beyond what was appropriate (or possible) to BCC, and I wanted an easy way for visitors to subscribe and unsubscribe. I was wasting a lot of time managing my email list, and wanted something easy, yet full of options. MailChimp had everything right from the start, so it was easy for me to build what I wanted and get what I wanted quickly.”

Sign up for Brickworkz’ News From the Studio or view past issues from the archive.

Kudos to Federica Cavallaro Therapeutic Massage and her agency, Rubic Design, for this beautifully designed email.

Check out this really nice, customized newsletter signup form for Brown’s Brain, “Websites can be easy” newsletter.  All you need to do to customize your own signup form is click on the “Lists” tab in the MailChimp dashboard. Then select the list for which you want to edit/customize your forms, and click “design signup forms & response emails”.

Zip

When you place an order online, Zip asks you to set up an account. At the start of this process, when you set up your email address and user password, there is a check box where users can opt-in to receive emails with special promotions and information.

On the right frame of every page, Zip has a “Subscribe to e-newsletter” icon, which serves as a constant reminder to their customers and casual browsers to sign up.

When you click the “Subscribe to e-newsletter” icon, you are taken to Zip Parts’ sign up form which they created using MailChimp.  They are using segmentation in an interesting way as well, by asking subscribers to give the generation of their Corvette (or you can select “all years”). This allows Zip to send out more relevant promotional emails to their newsletter subscribers.

Zip Parts also has a blog that they update multiple times a week.  This constantly updated content stream works beautifully with MailChimp’s RSS-to-Email feature, which Zip is also taking advantage of.  Note to all you business owners and entrepreneurs out there: a blog is one of the easiest and best ways to begin building a repository of content and information that you will be able to draw on down the road! Whether or not you’re looking to start an email newsletter, a blog is an essential element of both personal and professional branding. Don’t overlook it!

Finally, Zip is using MailChimp’s Mini Signup Box in the right-hand column of their blog to help further boost newsletter subscriptions. (The above link will take you to a short video tutorial on how easy it is to create your own Mini Signup Box, for your blog or website, using MailChimp.)

I recently had the opportunity to speak with Adriana De Barros, Founding Editor and Art Director of Scene 360 about her initial idea for starting the publication, the evolution of the project and her thoughts about being nominated for a Pixel Award.  When asked what the best part of her job is, Adriana replied:

The best part is learning something new every day. The reason why I launched this project was to continue reading more, studying and learning, and sharing the things that I liked with others. I’m still doing that today, almost nine years later.

To read more about Scene 360 and how they use MailChimp, check out the interview here.

“We were interested in coffee, so we decided to learn more and try to build the type of coffee place that we weren’t able to find in Atlanta.”

Octane has a reputation for employing some of the most knowledgeable baristas around, and Tony feels fortunate to have attracted so many great people who are willing to learn and teach others.  In February of 2008, Octane barista Ben Helfen won the Millrock Latte Art Competition in Washington DC, scoring $5000 for his perfect pour.  Then in May 2008, Octane baristas Ben and Danielle competed at the United States Barista Championship in Minnesota.

To read more about Octane and how they use MailChimp, check out the interview here.

Last week I had the pleasure of speaking with Thomas Hill, one of the masterminds behind San Francisco’s RooftopComedy.  RooftopComedy is dedicated to giving comedy fans access to the best, most cutting-edge professional comedy from around the globe, and they use MailChimp to help git-r-done.  Not only do they sponsor and host comedy festivals, competitions and events, they also host an array of hand-picked and hilarious videos on their website.

Click here to read Thomas’s thoughts about email marketing, boob jokes and more!

Today, we got some cow squishies, Starbucks gift cards, and an uppity t-shirt from MailChimp customers Truffle Media Networks and Uppityshirts.com. Thanks so much!