ShowBizPizza.com Fan Club Promotional Items


Way back in 2003 I came up with the idea of starting a website "Fan Club" which was meant to help cover the cost of SP.com's operating costs. Believe it or not, our website operating costs were probably five times higher back in 2003 than they are today! Luckily website hosting and storage has become far cheaper, but at the time it was almost suffocating us. Our community was growing rapidly and the old eZboard forum was eating away our budget... we even had to start limiting people's posting ability and page views which was sad. We originally started a "community chest" where people could donate funds (which several fans did) but it didn't feel right taking people's money without giving them something tangible in return - thus the Fan Club was born.

Since all this stuff was being produced and designed by hand, it just made good "branding" sense to slap our name on everything. Everything was labled "ShowBizPizza.com" or "SP.com Fan Club" just to help get the word out and to keep people thinking out our little website. It's probably safe to say that most of the promotional material ever to come out of SP.com was directly through the Fan Club.

In all honesty, we never made that much money through any of the years (and that's not including time & effort) but the little funds we pulled in helped to shoulder the website's costs and kept us alive. Below you will see a quick run-down of the items contained in each of our past offerings. These items haven't been produced in many years and if you were lucky enough to have gotten any of these they may actually be collectable in years to come - it always makes me smile when visiting a fan's house and seeing some of these old items in their collections. Heck most of this stuff I don't even own myself anymore which is kind of weird.

2003 Platinum Club Pack

The 2003 Fan Club came in 3 different membership levels - Silver, Gold, and Platinum. The Platinum level contained everything, Gold & Silver contained a lesser selection of the same items. Since the idea had hit me late in the year, the 2003 club was only available for about 3 months.

For 2003 the promotional items included a SP.com Coloring Book which had assorted black and white images of PTT and RAE character prints, a hand-signed welcome letter, Billy Bob sticker, replica Colander Head membership card (from Rock-a-Palooza 2003), SP.com lucite keychains, Billy Bob replica Pawtograph (with custom Certificate of Pawthenticity), RAE Abbey Road Vinyl CD-R, SP.com Birthday Club card, and 2003 SP.com Fan Club membership card (Platinum members received a special metallic-ink card).

2004 Platinum Club Pack

In 2004 the Fan Club returned with a new batch of similar items (gotta keep things going to increase collectability right?). This years selection contained a new signed welcome letter, two new SP.com lucite keychains, a CEC Gummi Snack, Mitzi Pawtograph w/Certificate of Pawthenticity, VCD of SPP material, RAE '82 New Years Vinyl CD-R, updated SP.com Birthday Club card, and 2004 SP.com Fan Club card (again, Platinum had a different metallic card).

2005 Platinum Club Pack

For 2005 the Fan Club included an even bigger offering than ever before. 2005's selection contained a new signed welcome letter, set of CEC Mini-PVCs with bonus yellow token, a CEC Gummi Snack, Fatz Pawtograph w/Certificate of Pawthenticity, Rock-afire Pizza tickets, vintage PTT ticket, vintage 1982 PTT lapel pin, Rock-afire Pizza token, Billy Bob & CEC plastic clapper, RAE Country Night Vinyl CD-R, and 2005 SP.com Fan Club card (again, Platinum had a different metallic card).

2006 Platinum Club Pack

By 2006, the "hand-made" items were taking their toll on my patience! Although I had the Vinyl CD-R prep down to a science, it was still hard and time consuming to put everything together. So for 2006 the Fan Club included less items, but (a rather expensive) custom Limited Edition CEC plush to make up for it. So this year fans got a new signed welcome letter, set of CEC Mini-PVCs, Beach Bear Pawtograph w/Certificate of Pawthenticity, custom "SP.com Fan Club" Limited Edition CEC plush, RAE Beatles White Vinyl CD-R, and 2006 SP.com Fan Club card (as always, Platinum had a different metallic card).

The Fan Club was discontinued for 2007. Although it was neat to put out these little exclusive website items, it was a major pain in the ass too since nothing was done (professionally) by any outside company. I tried to cut corners wherever possible - for instance I had a special "Mitzi" rubber stamp made for the '04 Pawtographs just to make them professional looking and done with an actual stamp. But it was expensive and when all was said and done, it looked like someone had just printed the name on there... which is what we did from there on out. But as said above, we didn't ever make much money and in 2007 we had solved the problem with the message board costs so it pretty much rendered the Fan Club obsolete. But luckily for a few years fans were able to get some nice little keepsakes which still have a place in their RAE/CEC collections!