TheDailyScrapper:
When did you start with Oscraps.com?
Oscraps:
March of 2005. It started out as a freebie site. Then it moved into a store site.

TheDailyScrapper:
You have given Oscraps a complete makeover which looks really fantastic. What is the reason for it?
Oscraps:
When I first built the site up, I just did the bare minimum that I needed to do to get it online. I thought that I could always change it later to what I wanted it to look like. It took off so fast that I never had the time to go back and do it. As we have grown over the last couple of years, changed servers a couple of times, and we were upgrading again to a new, better and faster server.  I decided it was time to update the site a little bit and

get it closer to what my original idea was for how it would look. I wanted the main focus to be the products. For the products to stand out and the site is just the backdrop for them – not a distraction.

TheDailyScrapper:
Is that the reason why you have this feature where you could enhance a particular area of the product?
Oscraps:
Yes. The main reason for that is because of the way I shop. When I

go shopping for my digi goodies, I want to see the details. I want to see it up close and I want to be able to look at it and see what I would be getting. I don't have a lot of time to shop, I am sure a lot of people are that way too, and I don't want to have to open a new window everytime I want to look at something closeup. I just want to see what I want to see - quickly and easily. I found this mod and customized it to fit the design of the new shop. I just think it makes it a lot easier for me to see the product and see what I am getting and be able to focus on the details.  Plus, I just think it is a very neat feature that I'd never seen in any other digi site.

TheDailyScrapper:
You mentioned changing server several times. What is crucial for a server to have right now for you to run this page?
Oscraps:
Lots of RAM. The reason for that is because a lot of shopping cart software are very heavy in the data base connection. When people are browsing the store, adding things to their cart or checking out, it really puts a huge strain on server resources. The more RAM you have the faster your data base is able to process the requests.

TheDailyScrapper:
How did you obtain this knowledge?
Oscraps:
My husband [laugh] My husband is the computer whiz and I learned by watching him.

TheDailyScrapper:
Who manages Oscraps?
Oscraps:
It's pretty much me with a little bit of [husband's name] help. I have a couple of designers who help me. Genevieve does the newsletter once a week for me, my husband helps me with some technical stuff, but pretty much anything software related is done by me or if it's beyond me, I will hire my web developer to do it.

TheDailyScrapper:
What happened 3 years ago that make you opening a freebies site?
Oscraps:
Before I become a stay-at-home mom, I was a Marketing Director for an industrial holdings company. I often enjoy doing crafting. When I became a stay-at-home mom, I started scrapbooking. A friend of mine that does paper scrapbooking called me up one day and asked if I ever heard of digital scrapbooking? I hadn't and she asked me to check into it as she wasn't very computer literate and I am. I looked into it and I found Shabby Princess. I downloaded a couple of her items and thought, "This is pretty neat". I looked around and found there wasn't a whole lot of stores back then. It was really few and far between and hard to find exactly what I was looking for.  When I couldn't find just what I wanted,  I thought, “I can do this.”  And, I did. I contacted a couple of stores back then and never heard back from the owners. Now that I am a store owner with a large store, I understand because you get so busy and receive so many e-mails everyday from designers wanting to sell in your store......

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