Daily Southtown, August 10, 2003 - Want to avoid packed stores?
The Wall Street Journal, August 17, 2001 - Reading, Writing and...Retailing
Yahoo! Internet Life, September 2001 - Buying School Supplies
Chicago Parent, September 2001 - No more missing pencils
Information Week Magazine, October 30, 2000 -
SchoolKidz.com e-business Solution Receives an A+
Sm@rt Partner, September
7, 2000 - Swing Into Action
The Chicago Tribune,
August 14, 2000 - Building Business With Paste, Scissors
The Daily Southtown,
August 13, 2000 - Back-To-School Supply Shopping Goes High Tech
The Doings
Newspapers, August 10, 2000 - Business Profile
Daily
Herald, July 28, 2000 - DuPage Business Column
WANT TO AVOID PACKED STORES? SCHOOLKIDZ.COM COULD HELP
By Kati Phillips,
Daily Southtown
August 10, 2003
Not everyone looks forward to shopping for school supplies. Fortunately, there is relief online.
SchoolKidz.com sells supply kits tailored to mora than 1.400 schools in more than 40 states. Parents
can order the kits at the end of a school year and pick them up at registration in the fall.
"More than 100,000 kids will be going back to school with one of our kits,”
said Tom O'Neill, president and CEO of SchoolKidz.com, Inc.
SchoolKidz.com got its start in 1995 under the name Class Action Student Outfitters Inc. O'Neill operated the
business out of the basement of his Orland Park home. The first year, he had 90 school clients. This summer,
he employed about 100 young adults to assemble kits at an 80,000-square foot warehouse in Bridgeview.
O'Neill credits the growth to a partnership with school fundraising company Market Day and word-of-mouth
recommendations from parents.
"There's one less thing Mom has to worry about at back-to-school time," he said.
Each supply kit contains the basic products such as paper, pencils, glue, and scissors. New, popular items such
as insulated lunch bags, hand sanitizer, and resealable plastic bags are available, as are unique requests like
Velcro, playing cards, and dice. Stretchable book covers are a hot item this year.
The kits come with stickers personalized with a student's name. That cements the "wow factor,"
O'Neill said.
Kit prices range from 10 percent less to 10 percent more than what parents could find at a discount
store, O'Neill said. The average kit costs $26, though private school supply lists sometimes top $100.
Local SchoolKidz.com clients include Kirby School District 140 and St. Michael School in Orland Park, where
O'Neill's daughter Sarah was a student.
The National Retail Federation expects families to spend $14 million on back-to-school merchandise this season,
and only a tiny portion will be online. O'Neill doesn't think Web shopping will make much of a dent in
brick-and-mortar school supply busines. But it could keep parents from dealing with demanding children intent
on faddish buys
"The best negotiators come out of the back-to-school aisles," O'Neill said. "Kids will make a deal with the devil to get something they don't need."
(top)
READING, WRITING AND... RETAILING
By Charles Passy and Sarah Collins,
The Wall Street Journal
August 17, 2001
COYOTE RIDGE Elementary School wants its third-graders to show up with paper and folders.
Actually, make that three wide-rule spiral notebooks and six two-pocket folders-one each in
yellow, red, blue, green, purple, and patterned. Plus washable markers, Ziploc bags (quart size)
and a big box of Kleenex. "I couldn't find the green folder," says Cindy Ayers, who's already
hit two stores trying to round up supplies for her son's first day at the Broomfield, Co., school
this month. "It's a pain."
It's time for America's least-favorite scavenger hunt. Across the country, schools are giving kids
a laundry list of required supplies that seems to grow-and grow more specific-by the year. Forget
No. 2 pencils. Some Houston first graders have to bring 35 items, including seven boxes of
Crayola crayons (six boxes of 24, one 16-pack). In Malden, Mass., parents at Mystic Valley are
hunting not only for certain binders and notebooks, but baby wipes, paper towels and spray cleaner.
Spray cleaner? Blame it on tighter budgets, which are forcing schools to tap parents for everything
from art equipment to cleaning supplies. Some educators say standardizing what kids bring to class also
helps keep them focused on the lessons, not on who has a cooler notebook. Meanwhile, retailers are having
a field day: Despite the lagging economy, school-supply sales are expected to grow 6% this year to a
record $6.3 billion. And this year retailers are promoting their back-to-school stock even harder, with
everything from "education appreciation day" at Staples to bigger-than-usual discounts on basics such
as crayons. "It's like our Christmas," says a spokeswoman for Staples.
But it doesn't feel like Christmas to Angela Pasquarelli. The Florida mother of three has been to
four stores and still hasn't found the school-sanctioned eight ounce bottle of glue. "When you tell
your kids that you're just going to buy two four ounce bottles, the freak out," she says. "It's like
they're going to be the pariah of the art table."
Is there a better way? To find out, we grabbed a willing fifth-grader, Jacob, and headed for the
tool that seems perfectly tailored for the task — the Internet. While the Web accounted for just 3%
of the industry last year, online sales tripled over the previous year, according to the School,
Home & Office Products Association. Jacob, who attends Timber Trace Elementary in Palm Beach Gardens,
Fla., had a typically intimidating list that included glue sticks, a two-inch black binder, a zippered
pencil case and seven book covers. Oh, and a pump bottle of antibacterial soap to share with the class.
We tried two types of site: office superstores OfficeMax and Staples, plus a new crop of
school-supply "boutiques"-School Supplies in a Pak, School-Pak and SchoolKidz.com. We also started
in late July, which should have given us plenty of time to make the first bell. We emphasize
should.
While OfficeMax and Staples offered plenty of cut-price items for the crayon-and-compass set,
their sites just weren't up to the task. First, they often sell in bulk, so we had to buy more
report covers and pens than we needed. Plus, the selection of some items, like binders, was limited.
No style slouch, Jacob wanted a zippered binder, dismissing the other kind as "kind of, a little,
ugly." Unfortunately for us, that's what these sites seemed to specialize in.
So we hit the boutiques. These specialize in pre-packed assortments based on grade level, and
many also let you buy supplies individually. We tried filling our list with a la carte selections
from two sites, School-Pak and School Supplies in a Pak. Not only were we able to find most of our
items, but we saved money because we could order the quantities we needed. School Supplies in a Pak
was easier to navigate than the megastore sites, but a notch below in quality and selection.
School-Pak, meanwhile, came close to filling our list at reasonable prices. The problem: This
company's Web server was glitchy, so we had to e-mail in our list.
We had better luck at SchoolKidz.com. For $54, its 5th Grade Deluxe Kit was full of top-of-the-line
basics, plus goodies like personalized stickers. While the site didn't let us buy by the item, it did
give us enough kits to choose from-up to four for some grade levels-that we got almost everything on
Jacob's list. (SchoolKidz also has a division that works with schools and parent-teacher organizations
to tailor-make kits.)
Of course, when it comes to supplies shopping, nothing's a playground. None of the sites offered
the breezy shopping experience we'd hoped for, or every item we needed. That left us two options:
We could head to the store to fill in the gaps, or start substituting. Mrs. Ayers of Colorado is
considering the latter, and may send her son with another red notebook in place of the missing green
one. "I'm not going to run around until my head falls off," she says. "You know what? 'Sorry.' "
Click for Wall Street Journal comparison table
(top)
BUYING SCHOOL SUPPLIES
OLD WAY vs. NET WAY
Yahoo! Internet Life, September 2001
OLD WAY
1. Back to school means new notebooks, binders, pencils, erasers, and, this year, a protractor! (A letter from
the school included the shopping list.) At a local drugstore, we loaded our bakset. Total $31.65. But no protractors.
The grocery store next door had one - for $2.
TIME ELAPSED 30 minutes
COMMENTS Elementary School is a breeze compared with what's to come, as I know from my college-age offspring.
NET WAY
1. Are the school supplies online? Are they any cheaper? I checked. 4SchoolSupplies.com haas a great feature. If
your child's teacher puts a child's shopping list online, the site will fill it for you. However, my total order
would have been $8 higher, plus a small shipping fee.
2. Another site SchoolKidz.com, has a wonderful idea: "GradeREADY" boxes. If the selections match your
kids' teachers' lost, it's a time and money saver.
TIME ELAPSED 20 minutes
COMMENTS If shopping at the local store weren't so simple, the Net might be a preferable alterantive.
(top)
NO MORE MISSING PENCILS
Program provides school supplies for students
By Mary K. Williams, Chicago Parent, September 2001
This fall, parents of students at Florence Nightingale Elementary School on Chicago's southwest side have been saved
the expense and hassle of buying school supplies, thaks to Kits for Kidz, a giving program started by SchoolKidz,
a Burr Ridge company that sells school supplies over the Internet.
When the 1,400 students at Florence Nightingale arrived at school on July 31st (the first day at this year-round school),
they were given personalized kits of grade-appropriate school supplies. SchoolKidz.com donated about 650 kits, worth a
total of $7,700 and sold the rest to the school at cost.
"Everybody started out on equal footing," says John Arnieri, Nightingale's principal. Each child
received a container labeled with his or her name. Kindergartners got crayons, pemcils, folders, a pencil
box, tissues and more. Older kids got spiral notebooks, highlighters, pens and other essentials. "They
got all the basics," says Arnieri.
Tom O'Neill, a Nightingale alumnus and president of SchoolKidz, launched Kits for Kidz last year. The program pairs
Chicago-Area businesses who want to donate school supplies with local schools that need them, and provides the supplies
at cost.
Individuals can donate one or more school supply kits. (Kits for Kidz lumps the individual donations together;
when they have enough to supply at least one grade level at a school, they deliver the kits.)
For the second year, NBC 5 Chicago will donate kits to Sojourner Truth School in Cabrini Green, providing school
supplies for more than 400 students in kindergarten through 3rd grade.
Businesses and individual who wish to donate school supplies can visit www.kitsforkidz.org
and click on "Getting Involved" to learn more about the program. Those without Internet access can
call 630/887-1500. (top)
SCHOOLKIDZ.COM
e-business SOLUTION RECEIVES AN A+
IBM
PREMIER BUSINESS PARTNERS Aspen Ascends to the Head of the Class
Information Week Magazine, October 30, 2000
Climbing to the heights of customer satisfaction is no easy task,
but IBM Premier Business Partner Aspen Consulting, Inc. can honestly
claim to be at the top of the mountain with its customer SchoolKidz.com,
Inc.
The Chicago-area
high-tech consulting firm began working with SchoolKidz.com only
about 90 days before its unique Web site was launched on June 1,
2000. For the five years prior to launching the new Web site, SchoolKidz.com
had been selling personalized school supply kits to parents of pre-kindergarten
to eighth-grade students only through parent/teacher organizations
at schools.
The collaboration
began when SchoolKidz.com's vice-president, Jeff Pascoe, happened
to attend an IBM and Aspen co-sponsored e-business seminar. He says,
"I talked to the people there and it became apparent that Aspen
and IBM have the right synergy to meet the needs of our e-business
strategy. Eventually, we chose Aspen for its expertise, technical
skill and experience with implementing IBM WebSphere Commerce Suite."
The SchoolKidz.com
Web site (www.schoolkidz.com) was completely architected, integrated
and installed for e-commerce by Aspen. Today it sells basic to deluxe
school supply kits, backpacks and insulated products on-line directly
to the parents of PK-8 students across the U.S., 24/7. IBM SecureWay
safely protects all transactions.
David Ullrich,
director of Web development for SchoolKidz.com explains that "Aspen
has a unique ability to work steadfastly with our internal design
team to ensure that what we want to visually communicate to our
customers is complementary to the site's commercial functionality."
Ullrich adds, "Aspen's forward-thinking technical skills will
guarantee efficient future expansion of the SchoolKidz.com Web site,
including a teachers-only section slated for the coming months."
Kurt Kobylecky,
e-business sales specialist for Aspen Consulting, describes the
process of working with an organization that wishes to take its
business on-line. "We lead with a discovery workshop. The Discovery
Workshop is a round-table discussion with executives and decision-makers.
We always ask what business objectives they want to accomplish with
an e-commerce site." Kobylecky is quick to point out that Aspen
talks primarily about its clients' business, not the technology.
Then Aspen creates a detailed design plan including the system architecture
and technology, as well as recommendations for hardware, software
and services.
After envisioning
SchoolKidz.com's e-business site, there was no question that WebSphere
Commerce Suite, running on two IBM RS/6000 servers, was the right
way to go. Kobylecky is proud to say that, in this case, and many
others, Aspen and IBM join forces to offer a complete solution from
start to finish.
For its part,
SchoolKidz.com is delighted with this savvy solution. In fact, Jeff
Pascoe says that for the upcoming school year, SchoolKidz.com is
planning to take its current off-line business and transform it
into a B2B on-line e-business. That way not only can the parents
of school kids order on-line, but also schools, parent organizations
and teachers will be able to order their school supplies directly
from this savvy school supplier.
(top)
SWING
INTO ACTION
By
Jill Hirsekorn, Sm@rt Partner
September 7, 2000 8:30 AM PT
E-business is no walk in the park. To keep customers smiling, savvy
solutions providers have to keep a firm grip on project goals and
deadlines. Just ask Dave Towner, a project manager at Aspen Consulting.
Towner was one of several key partners who pieced together SchoolKidz.com,
a niche e-commerce site that sells school supplies to parents who
are too busy to shop in brick-and-mortar stores. Other key partners
on the site include IBM, KeyLink Systems and Exodus Communications.
The business plan for SchoolKidz.com dates back to 1995, when company
founder Tom O'Neill was shopping for his daughter's school supplies
and wound up wrestling with other parents for a store's last pack
of crayons. "I knew there had to be a better way," recalls O'Neill,
a parent of three.
O'Neill launched Class Action Student Outfitters Inc., a brick-and-mortar
store that was the precursor to SchoolKidz.com. Working with local
schools, the store tailored supplies to the specs of individual
teachers, who recommended the kits to students and parents.
The convenience store was a hit with parents and teachers, and revenue
was growing 50 percent per year. But O'Neill's class project wasn't
done.
Eager to cash in on the e-business craze, O'Neill earlier this year
renamed his firm SchoolKidz.com and plunged into e-commerce. He
turned to Aspen, Exodus and distributor KeyLink Systems to meet
his IT needs.
Class Act
Aspen Consulting is a Chicago-area IBM Premier Business Partner
that builds AIX-based e-business systems. Founded in 1994, the $19
million integrator has made the INC. 500 list for two consecutive
years.
Jeff Pascoe, SchoolKidz.com's VP of IT, met Aspen folks at an IBM-sponsored
Aspen seminar. "We felt comfortable with them because they're an
IBM partner," says Pascoe. "Aspen basically developed and programmed
the whole e-commerce section of the Web site."
Rather than talking technology, Aspen first considered SchoolKidz.com's
business needs. During Aspen's Discovery Workshop, the customer
and Aspen discussed SchoolKidz.com's mission, vision and principles
as an organization. "The Workshop helped us understand what SchoolKidz.com
wanted to offer online and how they wanted to do it," says Kurt
Kobylecky, an e-business sales specialist at Aspen.
At first glance, selling pencils and glue sticks online may seem
like a no-brainer. But the discovery process revealed mission-critical
criteria, including reliability, flexibility, scalability and security.
"We move most of our money 'revenue and expenses', in and out, between
May and August," explains O'Neill. Any site outage during those
months could bully SchoolKidz.com off the e-commerce playground.
With more than 90 ever-changing supply kits for various school grades
and subjects, plus its TeacherTailored customization program, SchoolKidz.com
needed an e-commerce engine that could mix and match items on the
fly.
Moreover, SchoolKidz.com had to be prepared for enormous traffic
spikes toward the end of August. O'Neill also bet that demand would
skyrocket when SchoolKidz.com made the quantum leap from local store
sales to the Internet.
Finally, parents and teachers need special assurance that any data
concerning their children is kept tightly locked up.
A Site Built To Last
SchoolKidz.com could have started on a very small scale and moved
to larger equipment, but Aspen recommended that the company focus
on scalability from day one.
Specifically, Aspen recommended IBM's WebSphere e-commerce suite,
which includes an IBM Web server, the WebSphere app server and a
DB2 database.
The application server allows SchoolKidz.com to customize its online
product bundles. DB2 tracks SchoolKidz.com's product database, and
tells the front-end system about promotional items and how many
products remain in stock, notes Aspen's Towner.
SchoolKidz.com runs the software on IBM's AIX-based RS/6000 systems.
The AIX-based systems include an H70 database server and a B50 Web
server.
Customer and shopper data is stored securely on the H70 database
server. The B50 Web and application server queries the database
and presents the navigation, product kits, prices and other components
to the user's browser, says Towner.
KeyLink Systems, the IBM distributor division of Pioneer Standard
Electronics, validated the hardware and software configurations
and ensured on-time delivery.
Storming The Data Center
Aspen turned to local partner Exodus Communications for hosting,
backup and firewall services. Exodus owns and operates about 22
Internet data centers worldwide.
"Our hardware is managed and hosted in a remote, high-security location,"
says SchoolKidz.com's Pascoe. "You have to have clearance just to
get through 'Exodus'' front door." Pascoe also likes Exodus' redundant
power and connectivity supplies. "If something were to ever go down,
there are multiple backup systems that kick in."
While some businesses turn to Exodus for numerous hosting services,
customers can start small and add services as they see fit, says
Susan Laughlin, an Exodus account executive.
Ready For Homeroom
SchoolKidz.com's e-commerce site is operational, and the virtual
hallways appear very crowded with customers.
A spokesperson for Emmons Elementary School of Mishawaka, Ind.,
notes that local parents "really enjoyed the ease of ordering and
not having to worry about running around town to get needed supplies."
The school also ordered extras kits for students who are short on
funds.
Looks like Aspen and its partners have built a top-grade e-commerce
site.
(top)
BUILDING
BUSINESS WITH PASTE, SCISSORS
By
LeAnn Spencer, Chicago Tribune
Tom
O'Neill's epiphany, as it were, came about seven years ago as he
and his young daughter stood in the back-to-school aisle at a discount
retailer. Shopping list in hand, the frustrated father found himself
looking at shelves that had been stripped nearly bare of the notebooks,
pens, pencils and other necessities of school life.
It was at that moment that the proverbial light bulb went on in
O'Neill's head.
"It was 10 at night and two days before school, and there was nothing
on the shelves," said O'Neill, who decided then that there had to
be a more efficient way for parents to get their kids ready for
the ringing of the school bell.
Thus was born a company that packages educational necessities for
school age children and ships them in kits to parents and schools.
Headquartered in southwest suburban Burr Ridge, SchoolKidz.com does
not sell individual items. Instead, the supplies are packaged by
age and grade level in fun and practical cardboard kits that look
like briefcases.
They range in price from about $16 for a generic kit for 1st and
2nd graders to more than $70 for a kit for 8th graders that includes
science and math supplies.
Depending on what kind of kit is ordered, the kits can include everything
from pencils and pens, markers and crayons, notebooks and folders
to Kleenex and plastic storage bags, glitter and safety pins, compass,
ruler and calculator.
Customers include parents who buy individual kits and schools that
order customized packages to suit specific programs.
In the beginning, the company was called Class Action Outfitters,
but the name was changed to SchoolKidz.com this year when the company
went online in June in an effort to position itself as a 24-hour,
one-stop shopping outlet for school supplies.
That's not to say that orders aren't taken the old-fashioned way,
over the phone and with pen and paper. They are. But O'Neill wants
to make sure he is connected in all aspects of the market, hence
the addition of the Internet connection.
O'Neill said the firm has grown 50 percent a year since those early
days when he set up shop in a basement corner of his Orland Park
home. Back then; O'Neill kept his day job as a briefcase designer
and sales representative and devoted nights and weekends to his
upstart business. Three years ago he was able to give up his corporate
job.
In 1995, he sold about 8,000 kits. This year he has orders from
500 schools nationwide and expects to ship a total of 100,000 kits.
Next year, he predicts it will be closer to half a million kits.
The growth has meant moving the business three times, and O'Neill
predicts he will have to move again in a year or two.
Future expansion ideas include luring corporate sponsors to pay
for back-to-school kits for children in low-income schools, particularly
in Chicago. Another plan is the creation of starter kits for college-bound
students. He also envisions an online chat room where parents can
get expert advice on all sorts of worries related to schools and
kids.
A tall, ruddy-faced Irishman with a brawny handshake, O'Neill, 39,
is the quintessential entrepreneur, growing up in a working-class
neighborhood near the intersection of 55th Street and Western Avenue
in Chicago.
His immigrant father came to America in 1958 and supported the family
of 11 children by driving a meat truck. His mother ran a restaurant.
After his father died when O'Neill was 19, college was not an option
and, except for a couple of computer courses at a community college,
O'Neill has spent his life working.
His days are long, beginning at 7:30 a.m. and ending around 10 p.m.,
especially in August as the firm works to fill back-to-school orders.
Even so, he readily acknowledges that shedding his business suit
was one of the smartest things he ever did.
And on a recent warm weekday, clad in lemon yellow shorts and a
berry-colored golf shirt embroidered with his company logo, he happily
walked the aisles of his warehouse showing visitors his wares.
The 19,000-square-foot warehouse is stocked with more than 12,000
different items. In addition to 16 full-time employees, he has a
number of part-timers. During the weeks before school starts, the
firm's "crunch time" as O'Neill calls it, up to 40 people work in
the warehouse assembling the kits.
At this moment, O'Neill is just trying to ensure that everything
gets where it is supposed to be in time for school. He often roams
the aisles of his warehouse double checking orders and inventory.
"If you do a bad job, it comes back to bite you," he said.
When asked by a visitor if is he is surprised at his success, O'Neill
said that he knew from the start that he was on to something. "I
just didn't think it would accelerate as quick as it has," he said.
(top)
BACK-TO-SCHOOL
SUPPLY SHOPPING GOES HIGH TECH
By
Mike Nolan, Business Writer. Daily Southtown
Business Section Sunday, August 13, 2000
It's the time of year that parents of school-age children both anticipate
and dread.
With school starting later this month for many students, parents
won't be listening to kids whining that there's nothing to do. However,
the back-to-school season also means venturing out to buy needed
supplies.
That's where Tom O'Neill, president and chief executive officer
of SchoolKidz.com Inc., sees an opportunity.
He's hoping parents will consider staying home and turning to the
Internet to buy pencils and notebooks. O'Neill's company sells grade-specific
school supply kits for kids from pre-kindergarten through eighth
grade.
Based in Burr Ridge, the company was founded in 1995 as Class Action
Student Outfitters Inc. For the first three years the company operated
from the basement of O'Neill's Orland Park home.
The company's name was changed in May, and the SchoolKidz.com Web
site, in development for a year, was launched June 1.
"We felt there was a need to bring a school supplies and services
company into the world of e-commerce," O'Neill said.
Changing the name from Class Action helped "make it easier for our
customers to associate us" with the new Web site, O'Neill said.
"Plus, I was tired of people calling our offices looking for legal
help," he said jokingly.
Visitors to the Web site can pick from 90 different prepackaged
kits. SchoolKidz.com works with more than 500 schools in 30 states
to tailor supply kits to an individual school's requirements. O'Neill
said the company will ship out about 100,000 kits this year.
The Web site enables parents to type in the name and ZIP code of
their child's school to find out supply requirements specific to
that school, he said.
Before the e-tailing initiative, O'Neill's company was selling supplies
primarily to parents who placed their orders through organizations
such as the PTA.
Each kit sent out is personalized and contains the student's name,
school name and grade he or she is in.
"We call that the 'Wow!' factor," O'Neill said.
Along with the staples such as paper, pencils, glue and scissors,
SchoolKidz.com offers calculators (25 different ones), insulated
lunch bags, backpacks and craft supplies. O'Neill said the company
buys from more than 100 suppliers.
"There are over 1,200 different items used to make the kits this
year," he said.
Customers who buy kits online will be e-mailed a reminder around
Dec. 1 that some items in their kit, such as glue and paper, need
to be replenished. The company offers scaled-down kits containing
those products, O'Neill said.
SchoolKidz.com hopes to grab a share of a market that is dominated
by brick-and-mortar retailers, such as discounters, office supply
stores and drugstores.
For the 1999-2000 school year, about $2.3 billion was spent on school
supplies, excluding clothing, for students enrolled throughout the
United States in kindergarten through the eighth grade, according
to the School, Home & Office Products Association, or SHOPA.
The Dayton, Ohio-based association estimates total sales of supplies
will increase by 5 percent to 6 percent this year.
In a survey of 3,000 households taken shortly after the start of
the last school year, respondents cited discount stores, office
supply stores and drugstores as their top three destinations, respectively,
for picking up school supplies. Just 1 percent said they had shopped
for supplies on the Internet.
This year's survey of school supply buying trends will be conducted
early next month.
O'Neill said buying supplies online is an alternative to possibly
having to go to different stores to get everything on a list.
It was that experience a few years ago that prompted him to start
his business.
In late summer of 1994, O'Neill's daughter Sarah was getting ready
to start sixth grade at St. Michael's School in Orland Park.
"Two days before school started she said she needed school supplies,"
O'Neill recalled.
What followed was an extended jaunt to several stores to buy supplies.
The following January, O'Neill, who for 13 years had designed and
sold briefcases, started Class Action Student Outfitters.
The company's first school customer was Kirby School District 140
in Tinley Park.
O'Neill said the company has enjoyed significant growth in both
customers and revenue. Class Action outgrew O'Neill's basement and
the company moved to an 18,000-square-foot warehouse and office
in Burr Ridge.
SchoolKidz.com also has a 6,000 square-foot office and distribution
facility at 966 Lambrecht Road in Frankfort.
O'Neill said that will be consolidated sometime in the fourth quarter
with the Burr Ridge facility.
The company expects revenues of about $2 million this year. SchoolKidz.com
has 40 employees, including 20 seasonal workers, mainly high school
and college students who package the kits. Sarah, now a senior at
Sandburg High School, works with her dad.
SchoolKidz.com recently launched a program called Kits for Kidz
that provides school supplies for economically disadvantaged students.
"The start of the school year is like the beginning of a race,"
O'Neill said. "The kids who can afford it, they are the ones with
the running shoes."
On Aug. 22 the company will be distributing supplies to students
at a school on Chicago's North Side. O'Neill said SchoolKidz.com
is working to line up corporate sponsors to adopt either a school
or a particular class.
"We have not finalized anything but we are in talks with a major
TV station in Chicago," he said. "There are some large corporations
in the Chicago area that are looking to sponsor schools for this
year, but we are really looking just to get the word out this year
so next year we can do this nationally."
(top)
BUSINESS PROFILE
"SchoolKidz.com
Starts Kids Off On The Right Foot"
By Joshua Colman, The Doings Newspapers
Tom O'Neill walked into a department store in August of 1995 to
buy school supplies for his daughter, only to find all the aisles
out of stock of the items he needed.
So in January 1996, he created his own school supplies business,
now called SchoolKidz.com. Today, even the last minute shoppers
can find what they need on the Internet.
The business has taken off, growing by about 50% annually to $2
million in sales this year, or about 100,000 kits of school supplies.
O'Neill, founder, president and chief executive officer, no longer
worries about out-of-stock aisles for his three children in mid-August.
Individuals and schools can order the kits, which come in a cardboard
box, marked with the student's name, grade and school. The kits,
ranging from $11 to $73, come with everything from crayons to assignment
books at a cost less than most department stores, O'Neill said.
"We don't look at a school as a business, we look at it as a partner
made up of parents, teachers and students. So long as we do that,
we'll make all the money we need," O'Neill said.
O'Neill began his business, originally called Class Action Outfitters,
as a mail-order company. Teachers would supply order forms to students
in the spring, who could turn them in if they wanted to order through
the company. The kits would be waiting for kids at the start of
school in the fall.
Now O'Neill no longer needs to rely solely on the teachers to get
the word of his products out. Schoolkidz.com went on the web June
1.
"There was the euphoric state six to eight months ago that if you
had .com at the end of your name, then money would come flying towards
you. But a lot of companies have crashed and burned," O'Neill said.
O'Neill said, Along with selling kits, Schoolkidz.com has launched
a program, "Kits for Kidz" to bring school supplies to students
who can't afford them. At the beginning of this school year, Schoolkidz.com
will donate 463 kits to Stuart Elementary School in Chicago.
"I see the beginning of the school year like a race, and if some
kids don't have running shoes, then they're behind from the start,"
he said. "But if everyone does, then who knows what can happen."
(top)
BUSINESS COLUMN
By Vince Galloro,
Daily Herald
Now known as….: Class Action Student Outfitters Inc.
in Burr Ridge has changed its name to SchoolKidz.com. The school supplies
seller added the Web site earlier this year, and the company, founded
in 1995, says the name reflects its business - one-stop shopping for
school supplies.
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