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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