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Blog Post 1: How I Starting my Souvenir Store
- Anthony McWilliams
- Jul 17
- 7 min read
Updated: Jul 17
7/16/2025
History
Admit it, how many of you have gone out and bought magnets, t-shirts, stickers, local artisan souvenirs, etc. when visiting other cities, states and countries? Guilty 🙌...this is one of the things I like to do. Yes, we can take pictures today with our smartphones and share them instantly but yet we go out and buy "memories." I'm sitting right now at a Starbucks (local coffee shops closed) in Lewisburg, West Virginia, typing this blog, which happens to be my first. Never been to this state, much less this quaint town. This morning my wife and I went to the local downtown to shop. We found a local souvenir shop and of course I had to buy something there 😁. In just about every city, state and/or country you will find a souvenir shop, just like I did today. But why do we bother buying souvenirs? More importantly, before we delve into that question lets first answer the question of where the word souvenir comes from and how long ago does buying memories go?
...the word souvenir in English originally comes from French, where it has a long history. Appearing first in Old French around 1100 CE as suvenir, the word was used as a noun to mean “(something) in one’s memory.” That same century the word began to be used as a verb, meaning “to recall,” “to commit to memory,” and “to remind (someone of something)...The Souvenir Project
...But people have been collecting items far longer than this. The ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans brought home rare artefacts and products from their expeditions in foreign lands...Following the crucifixion of Jesus, it was common for pilgrims to collect dirt and pebbles from Holy Land sites, believing these physical remnants held miracle-giving powers...We’ve been collecting souvenirs for thousands of years. They are valuable cultural artefacts – but what does their future hold?
And there you have it, the origin of the word souvenir and how long we've been buying them. Now lets get to it. As mentioned before, just about every place you go you can find some kind of souvenir shop but not all places, though. Take for example the city I'm from, Brownsville, TX (DISCOVER Brownsville's Historic Places). Where's that?! Yes, you thought it 😂!! Interestingly enough, it happens to be the second city most historical buildings still intact in Texas, San Antonio comes first. When I visited New Orleans a few years back, I've always heard about the French Quarter and it's architecture but turns out that most of their original buildings burnt down and the ones we see today are the "newer" buildings built after the fires. Some of those architects also came to Brownsville and designed and built similar buildings to the ones in New Orleans. But not one souvenir store! That's where I come in
Background
My fascination with souvenirs started with the fact that Brownsville has a lot of history the more I dug into it's history. every place you go has a history and so I take a little bit of memory and history with me when I buy a souvenir. I started a website back around 2000 that focused on the architectural history with before and after images and information for each building. It was ground breaking for the time as our city had nothing like it. I did start an online souvenir store but at the time I would have had to buy merchandize from China because it was cheaper. I didn't have any designs or idea how really to start. Suffice it to say, I gave up on the idea as I started working full time and eventually I stopped updating the website and eventually closed the domain, http://www.brownsvilletexasonline.com.
Fast forward to 2022. After the COVID 19 pandemic, I decided to quit my career and start a new business. I began an engineering academy for kids, I was an engineering high school teacher for 12 years, but decided it's not what I wanted. As an engineering teacher I learned a CAD (Computer Aided Design) software called Autodesk Inventor. It's basically a suped up 3d design software. Other examples are Blender, Tinkercad and SketchUp to name a few. Some are free and others are not. So what's the point of 3d design if I'm supposed to be talking about starting your own souvenir store? I'm getting there, I promise. Then I learned how to use a 3d printer and another software called a Slicer program, in the context of 3D printing, is software that converts a 3D model into instructions (G-code) that a 3D printer can understand, essentially slicing the model into layers and defining toolpaths for the printer to follow.
Starting my Souvenir Store
So this is where my skills in 3d design and printing comes in for starting my own souvenir store. I bought two Bambu Lab X1C color 3d printers, created some designs of local buildings as magnets and key chains and other local designs and took them to local vendor events. Slowly but surely I began to sell more souvenirs over the last two years.
My sister-in-law is a graphics designer and helped me design graphics for t-shirts and mugs as seen below. Since I live right on the US-Mexican border I had the t-shirts printed in Matamoros, which saved a lot of money as it's cheaper labor and costs over there. As for the mugs I bought a Cricut Mug Press on Amazon as a kit, which included a twelve 12 oz blank mugs, see image below. There are lots of Youtube videos (Example: HOW TO USE THE NEW CRICUT MUG PRESS) on how to use the Cricut mug press. It's actually very easy and you can be as creative as you want. You can even do glow in the dark, heat changing mugs (really cool! Look it up.), etc.
As for the stickers, these are water proof stickers from Neato Labels. Excellent sticker sheets that are easy to use (Youtube: MAKE YOUR OWN DIY STICKERS | NEATO Labels | EASY & FUN). I don't recommend the Cricut sticker sheets. It's very difficult to work with. You just need a color inkjet printer and a Cricut cutting machine such as the Explorer 4. It's amazing what you can do with the Cricut cutting machine. If you have never used one I would recommend finding videos on Youtube. There is an upfront cost to buy these machines but you can quickly recover the costs with unique and cool products that can't be purchased in store or online. When I apply at my local vendor events I can say I'm an artisan and craftsman since designing, printing and creating products is a really an art.
Be Unique
I've only just begun to create new an exciting products that can't be found anywhere else. I've been selling more each time I add a new and unique product. And that's the key to this business. Sell something that can't be found in any other store or online that is unique to your local area at a price that is affordable but also makes you a decent profit. The products I produce are just that...unique. Go online and search unique souvenir products for ideas and go from there.
To Lease or to do Vendor Events?
If you're just starting your business then the question is where to begin...doing vendor events or renting a brick and mortar building. This really depends on you and your aspirations and goals. I'm starting with vendor events, which as times can be free such as some of our city events. Any product I sell is instant profit in free vendor events. I look up all the local vendor events and mark them in my calendar. If doing vendor events make sure to have tents, foldable tables, chairs, wagon carts (really recommended!!), payment method such as Cash App, cash box, etc. Again it's an upfront cost but eventually you pay it off.
If going the brick and mortar route, obviously there will be more to do. I will provide my experience with leasing a downtown building and some of the challenges and pitfalls I encountered in another blog post. That was another business I did a few years back but now I'm doing the souvenir business. I plan to return to downtown sometime next year. I have been building up my product offerings, gauging customer feedback at events and getting my company name out there. So when I'm ready to open a downtown business I will be ready and less stressed. Each city has it's own rules on the permitting process so be prepared for that. Cities can be a bureaucratic nightmare. But again I will discuss in another blog post.
What you need for create products
For now, decide what products you want to offer, how are you going to get these products, purchase them or design and create on your own? What equipment will be needed? How many different products do you plan to offer?
My Equipment for producing Products
3d printers
Cricut cutting machine
Cricut Mug Press
Inkjet printer
Sticker sheets
Laminating machine
Screen Printer Starter Press (coming soon! screen print your own designs on t-shirts)
Next Blog...
My Downtown Replica Model...Talk About Unique!
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