The FreeGreen Blog

FreeGreen Website Wins Design Award

Posted June 25, 2008 09:12 by David

Tags: pr, website design

Hello All,

As you can see from the image above, today, the FreeGreen website won the Outstanding Achievement Award in the area of Building & Construction, from the Interactive Media Council.  We would like to thank our web designers Fresh Tilled Soil and our developers at Extension Engine.  We highly recommend both of these companies and we would not be where we are today with out them.  We are very proud of our site and our team, and we look forward to working with these great companies to keep making the FreeGreen user experience better.

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PR Announcement Residential Architect and EcoHome Magazine

Posted June 18, 2008 02:43 by David

Tags: pr

Hello All,

Two more articles to announce today.  Residential Architect has published a great new article on us which can be seen at:  http://www.residentialarchitect.com/industry-news.asp?sectionID=275&articleID=723417

Also EcoHome Magazine has picked up our article from Builder Magazine.

Keep the traffic coming.  We should have a new PR article out by the end of this week as well which we will announce.

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FreeGreen Builder Magazine PR Announcement

Posted June 17, 2008 02:22 by David

Tags:

Hello All,

As you may be able to tell by the logo above we just had a great article published about us on the online version of Builder Magazine (www.builderonline.com).  Please click here and read this new PR:  http://www.builderonline.com/green-building/theyre-stock-plans-theyre-green-and-theyre-free.aspx

In other good news we will have another article coming out on Residential Architect tomorrow, so we will post another entry when that is live.  We are looking forward to keeping you up to date on our PR success, and will be updating you with images from our upcoming Simple Villa and Builder Product Lines very soon.  

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Quick Update - Keep An Eye Out

Posted June 11, 2008 13:57 by David

Tags: simple villa, printing, pr

Hello All,

Just a quick update tonight:

1) We have now set a date for the release of our next FreeGreen Product Line the Simple Villa.  We are aiming to get this out on July 7th.  We apologize for the slight delay on this but with the July 4th weekend in the way this is what we think is realistic (even FreeGreeners have to take vacations).

2) It looks like we are going to have some big PR announcements coming over the next few days so stay tuned.  We should know more tomorrow or early Friday on this and will certainly let you know as soon as we do.

3) By July 7th we are adding a new feature.  You will now be able to PRINT YOUR PLANS through FreeGreen.  Now we must admit that this will not be a free service.  We did look into it but could not make it work.  For a very competitive $60 per construction document set you will be able to print our plans (in 24" by 36" format) and ship them anywhere in the United States.  For our non-US users we are working on the details for outside the US shipping and will have that up and working soon.  We hope that you will support us through this service and come to use for all of your FreeGreen printing needs.

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FreeGreen Turns 500!

Posted May 6, 2008 15:47 by David

Tags: the 500 club

Hello All,

Just a quick post tonight.  I wanted to share with everyone that (on the same night) FreeGreen has crossed the 500 member, and 500 download threshold.  This means that we have averaged about 14 new users signing up and 14 downloads per day since our launch.  I want to thank everyone for such great support along the way. 

 Just as an update we will be having a number of other PR-bog articles coming out over this week and next so keep an eye out (obviously we will announce them here as well).  Also, the design of the Smart Box product line is going well and we hope to be able to share a number of renderings with you next week.  That's all for now, we will update you as soon as possible on our progress.

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FreeGreen PR Launch Sucess

Posted May 5, 2008 11:14 by David

Tags: pr, smart box

Hello All,

Well our PR Launch was a rousing sucess.  FreeGreen received 1,000's of hits, and 100's of new user sign ups and plan downloads.  We welcome all of you to the FreeGreen Community and look forward to working with you in the future.  We would like to agian thank Inhabitat.com for breaking the story and writting such a great article.  That said we would also like to recgonize the following sites for thier articles as well:

Tree Hugger:  http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/05/free-green-turns-house-design-on-its-head.php

Sustainable Design Update:  http://sustainabledesignupdate.com/?p=762

Ten Bees:  http://www.tenbees.co.uk/1/ecobuildings/news/2008/05/eb20080502133220.php

Modern Eco Home Blog:  http://www.modernecohomes.com/blog/category/eco-news/

Architecture List:  http://www.architecturelist.com/2008/05/04/green-home-designs-for-free/

and of course all the diggers, stumblers, and other bloggers that I have missed.

Although most of the feedback was positive the one thing that people were looking for was a "smaller - cheaper" design.  I am proud to say that our next product line (to be out the end of May) will be the Smart Box.  Our goal for this Product Line is to have a 1,200 - 1,400 sq. ft. home that can be built for less than $100 per sq. ft.  I look forward to keeping you updated on this and many other fronts over the next few days.  As awalys keep the comments and feedback coming.  We will continue to make the site better for you each day.

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Welcome Inhabitat Readers

Posted May 1, 2008 14:18 by David

Tags: pr, inhabitat article, open source, what is freegreen

Hello Inhabitat Readers,

We usually do not write such directed blog articles, but with our PR Launch occurring on Inhabitat.com today we felt the need to address the large amounts of traffic that we are getting.  First we would like to thank Inhabitat for launching the FreeGreen PR campaign.  We are huge fans of your blog and can think of no better avenue to begin getting the word out about FreeGreen.  That said, we know that the readers of Inhabitat are heavily design focused.  Therefore, decided to answer the top three questions we think you will have about FreeGreen.  If you have additional questions please feel free to contact us at info@freegreen.com.

Q: What is FreeGreen?  A: FreeGreen is a site dedicated to giving away expertly designed green house plans.  To do so we have created a unique business model in which we offer free, downloadable, buildable, energy efficient and healthy home plans to everyone.  Our revenue comes from the green product vendors that we specify into the plans (via an advertising and lead generation model).  For each product that we specify we list all of their green and other features (great or just good).  We also rate them according to the LEED-H third party certification method.  On the site, users can browse our plans through the Virtual Tour and learn about the energy features\green materials in each room and for the house as a whole.  In our free downloads we offer a Welcome Packet (to explain our design, show it's LEED-H points, and list the products that make up the home), a location-specific Energy Performance Report for over 200 cities across the United States, and Full Construction Document sets in 24in by 36in format (including all the construction details and a LEED-H checklist for use on the job site).  Please feel free to download any of our plans and take a look for yourself.

Q: How Can I Get Involved?  A: We're glad you asked.  FreeGreen is now just starting its open sourcing of designs.  Not all the details are worked out yet but the general process is:  1) Contact FreeGreen at opensource@freegreen.com.  2) A FreeGreen representative will get back to you and ask you to submit the required design materials for review.  3) FreeGreen will review your design internally and with our vendors.  If you design is chosen, FreeGreen will work with you to produce the proper renderings, details, green features, and energy performance measures for your plans.  4) Once we post your design we will advertise the design as yours, and pay you a significant amount of the reoccurring revenue we receive from our vendors for your design.  Our goal in this is to promote great design, help designers get exposure (and money), and quickly grow our offerings of free house plans.  Please contact us for more information.

Q: Won't FreeGreen Steal All My Business?  A: Obviously, this Q&A is directed toward designers.  The answer is simply no.  Only about 2% - 5% of all homes built today use custom architects.  We will not take any of this business as we all know that people who want custom architecture will settle for nothing less.  Our goal is to revolutionize the house plan market (which accounts for between 100K and 400K homes each year).  In this market we offer designers (through our open source plan) the ability to earn significantly more money than trying to sell their plans on overcrowded for-sale home plan sites.  We see FreeGreen as a way for designers to reap the benefit of the control they have over consumer purchasing decisions.  In the space of house plans (homes costing about $150K to $600K) this is where the real value lies. Well, we hope you enjoy the site and our plans.  For you designers out there we hope to hear from you and look forward to helping you get the exposure and revenue you deserve.

Thanks, Dave Wax, CEO - FreeGreen

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FreeGreen Launches It's PR Campagin - May 2nd

Posted April 24, 2008 13:35 by David

Tags: freegreen pr

We have just received word that Inhabitat.com will be publishing a piece introducing FreeGreen to thier readers.  This article will be released on May 2nd.  The article will focus on both the release of the FreeGreen Suburban Loft House Plan, as well as, the our unique business model.  This will be the first of many PR pieces coming out for FreeGreen in the near future, but we wanted to reserve the "story breaking rights" for our favorite blog, Inhabitat.  Please stay tuned as there will be many PR related, and Suburban Loft related updates coming over the next few days.  We look forward to having you join us in our first  media exposure.

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