Father and son set up 'Face My Case'

Users can design any case they like by uploading their own images via a design tool on the website (www.facemycase.ie).  The Millers produce all the cases in Dublin using a new technology for case customisation.

Greg Miller has 20 years business experience in printing in Dublin — he used to own a colour copy business in town called 'Colour Copy Centre' which is still open today, now owned by his former manager.

“The two of us were looking for an idea to get our teeth into and when we came up with customising phone cases we knew it would be a great fit due to his background in the printing business and my background in interactive media,” Jason explained.

“We were sitting around one day watching TV and Dad asked why people were not advertising on smart phones as everybody seemed to have them and they never seem to leave people’s hands, so what a great place to advertise a business or just your personal style.

“So I set to work for a few months researching all the potential ways it could be done and there were many. But none of them were really what we were looking for as the quality wasn't as good as we wanted. We almost gave up at one stage after contacting multiple companies all over the world with different systems and coming up short.

“In the midst of all this I was at a few tech networking events and the potential of the idea really hit home as people were trying to promote their businesses any way they could and constantly had phones and iPads out taking numbers and writing emails so I thought ‘what an amazing way to advertise your brand, turn your phone into a mini billboard’.”

The duo persevered and eventually found a system that was exactly what they were looking for, producing the highest quality finished products.

Social media working well

As a new startup Face My Case has little to no budget for advertising so it is pushing social media and all forms of free marketing and advertising and Miller said this is working very well.

“We are working on a new phone case blog which will launch very shortly and will help to drive traffic to our main site. We have also sent sample cases out to some of the main advertising agencies and companies in Ireland to bring their attention to this new medium for advertising.

“Word of mouth has been great for us also as we do have an excellent product which we are very proud of and when people see them in person they start to see how good the quality really is and the potential for advertising their own businesses. So far we have had the best response from the SME market and had some fantastic feedback from customers who use our products to advertise their businesses.” 

The Millers say their products are the first of their kind in Ireland and are “rivaled by none for picture quality and phone protection”.

“We hope to expand into other devices like iPad2 in 2012 and we will add new phones and devices to our selection of customisable products as demand requires,” said Jason.