It started in 1997 in a small metal warehouse in rural Mississippi. Nobody would rent to Rick London because he
"owned a dog". Indeed he did have a dog, but he also had
what Winston Churchill called "His Black Dog" or severe
depression. A friend of London's owned an old abandoned
warehouse with a phone line and electricity, but no heat
or air, and he lived in it, slept on the concrete floor on
a sleeping bag for a year and launched Londons Times Cartoons.
His only assets were app. $100 cash, a very old IBM 386 computer, a phone line with dial up Internet, and a book
titled "Internet For Dummies".
Ten years later Londons Times Cartoons boasts over 6000
originals that London wrote and his team of artists rendered.
It ranks in the Alexa top 200k and Netcraft top 100k most popular sites. www.londonstimes.us (A subsidiary of Rick London's The London Group)
Last year London launched Londons Times Superstore which features his licensed image items; everything from tee
shirts to mouse pads, to wall clocks to gourmet coffee gift baskets...over 65,000 items in all. www.londonstimessuperstore.com (The London Group)
As if that were not enough, he launched his own private label brand of gourmet coffee gift baskets "Ruth London's Exquisite Coffees" named after his grandmother which include cartoon coasters and mug.
Last week, he launched his own line of cartoon clothing
called Rick Londonwear www.ricklondonwear.com (The London Group)
He also signed with one of the Internet's top digital
content providers www.blish.com. If one does a Londons Times Cartoons on their search engine they can find cartoons for any profession from lawyers to psychiatrists.
London says they work great for journals, websites, ads,
newsletters etc. "Remember, newspaper editors have known for years that cartoons build loyalty. Why else would they devote an entire ad-free non revenue producing page every day? They know why and so should other publishers.
London has also launched his own subscription-based
ecard site "for the high IQ right-brainers" who he says
"simply aren't fascinated with the flash and fast one
liners. Yes, it is a bit erudite but well worth it and
has a 30 day free trial and after that only 8.50 a year,
half of our competitors. http://www.londonstimes.us/ecards/ecards.html
London is a return-to-college adult at 52 living in
the Ouchata mountains of Arkansas and is learning
business. He says most of his focus is on e-business
which fascinates him the most.
He also just created a website with a ticker tape rss
feed which feeds news from major media outlets and
blog feeds from his own site, all worldwide to anyone
who has the ticker tape. It's all free, the membership,
the blog, etc; it even has a chat room and ezine.
In addition Adsense pays bloggers to blog. It can
be found at www.theaffiliatetoolbar.com or
www.seostreetsmarts.com. (The London Group) It also works as a network
solution for affiliate managers and candidates and
to learn SEO from experts often invited in to chat.
"It has been an amazing ride this ten years," says
London. "Everyone told me not to try this because
I would fail. If this is failing, I prefer it to
succeeding...but to be humble, I would be lying to
not admit I had many more failures along the way than
successes. I guess that is how we learn this, and I'm
certain I'll have many more.
Rick London
CEO The London Group
www.londonstimes.us
www.londonstimessuperstore.com
www.ricklondonwear.com
www.seostreetsmarts.com
Sunday, January 28, 2007
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