What are pocket pals? A question you may be asking if you were not a part of our last campaign!
Pocket pals are a line of soft, mochi minky, weighted plushies! That, as the name implies, can fit in your pocket! They help with the anxiety that some experience, and can also be a great sensory toy thanks to their squishy feel!! Please also note that cards aren't charged until the end of the campaign either, being August 28th!!
What inspired pocket pals?
Salty little salmon started out as a silly 3D model made by Lily. After being inspired by other weighted plush toys. She wanted to create a silly little plush that could be loved by everyone, and could be used to help those with social anxiety, something she suffers with as well. Having often bringing small plush keychains or trinkets with her into crowded places to help calm nerves, she hoped these small weighted friends could do the same for others! Happily able to say so many people have told us how these little friends help them with anxiety, or bring them joy during their work day with them on their desks.
After creating the salmon, and finding success in them at Midwest Furfest in 2024, selling out in just two out of the four days of the con, She decided to continue working with soja to create even more fun critters to bring smiles to so many other people. Especially after seeing the numerous tweets from those who got their own salmon at the con we wanted to be able to give everyone a wider variety of critters!! Since the creation of the salmon, pocket pals went on to have an astounding 21 total designs made for the first campaign! Ranging from the salmon, to catfish, horse shoe crabs and everything in between! Including a few adorable dragons!
After shooting past the initial goal of $5,000 in under 4 hours, this campaign ended up raising over $55,000 towards the creation of so many cute, weighted, silly friends of a variety of species!! Ending up with over 20 different plush designs from this first campaign!! We hope to be able to do this many now, or even more!!!
After this extremely successful campaign, the community of backers and followers voted to bring to life a line of prehistoric pals! Which brings us here, the new series two of pocket pals!! If this campaign goes well, we have even more different series planned, from mythical critters, cryptids, and farm animals to even endangered or reptiles!! There are endless possibilities for these little guys!!
This section will be updated every time a new stretch goal is reached so that it is easy for others to see exactly what designs have been unlocked so far!!
What exactly is a prehistoric pal? Well, they are the second series of Pocket Pals! And feature only prehistoric creatures, ranging from Iconic dinosaurs like the Spinosaurus and T. Rex all the way to outlandish creatures like a Terror bird or Tiktalik!
Why Dinosaurs? A question you may be asking. And its not just because the community voted for it, but in fact it is also due to the love and passion of Lily (me). I have been an avid enjoyer of dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures since i can remember. Even going to college with the hopes of becoming a paleontologist one day, a dream id still love to do one day maybe after getting my masters in the future soon. Actively going out from coast to coast of the US i have scuba dove, sifted, dug and dusted off fossils from dinosaurs to sharks. And worked hard to be able to get every piece in my own collection, even finding a whale tooth in 2016 of a recently discovered species, that my guide informed me of its origins.
In the hopes of spreading the love, and intrigue of fossils Lily will be sending a fossilized shark tooth with every backers order who backs a minimum of one plush! Complete with a protective case, and card detailing its species as well!! These teeth have come from the cooper river in south Carolina after countless scuba dives into its murky waters. (Just note size, and quality will vary)
While the initial funding goal is set to $20,000 this will cover the creation of 5 different Prehistoric Pals! As we hope this campaign will end up as well received and loved as the first series the true goal for this campaign is $100,000 to be able to bring to life a minimum of 20 designs!! With extra stretch goals beyond this to bring to life even more creatures!!
Here is a small group image of the first few designs we hope to make!! As well as a couple different colors for future unlocks!!
While we know this is an extremely large goal to hit, especially for weighted plushies the hope is to be able to atleast unlock the first five designs. The reason the goals are so much larger than the previous campaign, is due to the fact that such a campaign was the first lily had undertaken, and due to miss calculations on my own part we had to pay much more than what was raised to be able to get all the designs fully made, and supplies for shipping bought as well. As well as the impact of these tariffs on the products causing it to cost more to produce the same amount of plushies as in series one.
To avoid this we have acquired the samples before the campaign launch, and also got confirmed pricing for each design and not just an estimate for each. To make sure we are more than capable of creating and bringing to life every design we can!! Each design unlock will be $4,000, with each enlarged design requiring $5,000 per design. We hope to be able to meet these goals as we continue to bring to life this wonderful, fun and unique line of plushies to everyone and continue to bring smiles as well!!
Everyone who backs the campaign, at a single plush level or higher will also receive a small case of genuine fossils!! These are all collected by myself over the past several years.
I have always been fascinated with fossils, and at one point wanted to be a paleontologist, but life had other plans. Though I still actively go out each summer and both dig or scuba dive for fossils! My hope is to be able to share these fossils with everyone, and spread the love and intrigue of paleontology as a whole!! This is a project very near and dear to my heart and I am hoping for the best with it!!
Heres a few examples of these cases!! I hope to be able to label each of them, but no promises!
Unlike the first campaign, there are other pledge levels available! Such as a keychain level, denim jacket and ita bag levels! (Once these items are unlocked of course!!)
We wanted to bring more than just plush toys to everyone during this campaign, and so partnering with a friend and artist mellocove on instagram we created this amazing denim jacket which is currently in sample production! It will feature snaps rather than buttons, super soft fur like material on the inside and the collar. As well as lined sleeves, i personally cant stand the feel of denim on my arms, and i know others cant either! These lined sleeves will help negate that gross feeling!!
On top of the jacket, further into the stretch goals we also have an ita bag!! Based off of our spinosaur plush friend!! There will also be a set of 3 enamel pins available in stretch goals to go with the bags!!
We have samples of the first creatures already made! And as each new stretch goal is unlocked, more samples will be created throughout the campaign! The only limit will be how much we can raise to reach these different goals!!!
We also have fun incentives for new and returning backers as well!!
These little guys all weigh between 1- 1.5 pounds! Some weigh more of they have less detail, like the T rex weighing closer to 1.5 pounds! Once all samples are completed, i will share a list of each of their weights so everyone can pick the most comforting bean for themself!!
While every plush varies in length some, they are all between 10 - 12 inches long at least!
We would love to be able to get as many unique and cool prehistoric animals made, not just dinosaurs but mammals, inverts, avian and aquatic things as well! Please join us in bringing these ideas to life!! Below are listed our goals, as well as the stretch goals for the project!!
After the first Five designs get unlocked we can move onto the Stretch Goals!!!
This includes 5 other pre determined designs, and the remaining ones will be voted on by those in this fun little community!
We sincerely hope that you will consider supporting this campaign and our goals for it, we would love to bring a smile to your face!!
If we are able to surpass the archeopteryx stretch goal, then we will move onto our other goals!! All planned out and we cant wait to see how many we can unlock!!
If we somehow manage to surpass our last planned goal, we will create even more!
So what's the timeline for series two you may be wondering. Well, below is a graphic showing what the estimated timeline is, however please do keep in mind that it could end up being longer, or shorter depending on the actual production time. This is just an estimate based off the previous campaigns ran by us.
At the bottom of the graphic is also a written key, so if you have any questions please just refer to them! Or feel free to ask in the community section if that doesn't help enough.
