More great news – you can now find reviews of some of our favorite Grommets at Divine Caroline!

Divine Caroline is creating a compelling site by providing an engaging and lively community for women to share their own thoughts, voices, passions and observations.  We particularly appreciate that the Divine Caroline user submissions are thoughtfully curated and attractively presented, to avoid that free-for-all cacophony of some other sites.  In their own words:

At DivineCaroline, women come together to learn from experts in the fields of health, fashion, and work; to reflect on shared experiences with family and friends; and to express themselves by writing and publishing stories about anything that matters to them. Here, real women publish like real pros. Together, they are discussing all facets of women’s lives from kids and health to politics and style. So come discover, read, learn, laugh, and connect at DivineCaroline.com.

We are delighted to partner with Divine Caroline to provide product reviews that can provide real solutions.  Depending on the review, you might find a Grommet under any number of Divine Caroline’s channels, including Parenting, Play, Home & Food, Body & Soul, Travel or Style. We encourage you to check out Divine Caroline and look around.

There are a few things I especially appreciate about Divine Caroline.

• Anyone can publish at Divine Caroline, so if you have a story you’re just dying to tell – it provides a great forum to share.  Here’s how to get started.
  
• The Divine Caroline team knows that you may not feel like submitting a whole story, but you might want to add your two cents about this or that. So, they have a great feature called chit chat on each of their channels, where they ask a fun question, and you can provide your point of view.  And many chit chats offer incredible giveaways.  We sponsored one earlier this year, when we asked the question “what’s your favorite product find?”
  
• Divine Caroline also offers a daily dose of fashion and product finds called Found It, Loved It, written by its fashion editor, Jacinta O’Halloran.  You can check out an example here. We share Jacinta’s passion for great finds!

Divine Caroline is worth a good look – from its content to its community to its incredible staff (that’s a shout out to Emi Hofmeister, our fun, friendly and totally capable friend there).  Check it out – and let us know what you think about it.

If you saw this article about Daily Grommet last week, or if you’re already a fan, you know we bring you fresh finds and unique gift ideas every day.  Most of the time, you never know what you’re going to get until we launch a new product at noon. We have a lot of great Grommets up our sleeves, but sometimes (like now), we get one that’s just way too hot to keep under wraps.

On July 27, we’re featuring Google Voice.  And we have access to 100 Google Voice beta accounts we want to share with you, our Daily Grommet community.

Haven’t heard about Google Voice yet? It’s “one phone number for life” that consolidates your home, work and mobile phone number into one central phone number that you get to pick. Google Voice gives you one number for all your phones, voicemail as easy as email, free US long distance, low rates on international calls, and many calling features, including the ability to record your own phone conversations. It’s super-hot.

We’ll be featuring Google Voice as our Grommet of the day starting at noon EST on July 27 on the Daily Grommet homepage, and we’ll tell you more about it then.  But because it’s still so new, Google Voice has a limited number of beta accounts that are in hot demand — some estimates place the wait list at tens of thousands.

So here’s how you can enter to win access to your own Google Voice account:

• Retweet any @DailyGrommet tweet that mentions the Google Voice beta account giveaway between now and Noon EST July 28.
  
• Between Noon July 27 and Noon July 28, when we air our feature of the story behind Google Voice, you can leave a comment about Google Voice on our homepage‘s  “Talk about this Grommet” board.  Don’t leave a comment before or after those timeframes (comments are limited to one entry per email address).
• We’ll select 100 winners at random to receive a Google Voice account invite. If you’re a winner, we’ll contact you between July 28 and July 31 and ask you to send us your gmail address so that Google can reach you to send you an invite (NOTE: We won’t contact you at that email address, or add it to our email list). Google tells us they’ll contact you within a week.

General contest rules: To enter, you must be a U. S. resident, and at least 18 years of age. No purchase necessary. All entries are due by Noon EST July 28. By entering this contest, you give Daily Grommet permission to contact you regarding your submission. You are not eligible to win if you have received a prize or giveaway from Daily Grommet in the last six months. Winner will be contacted by email or Twitter. If the winner does not respond within 7 days, a new winner will be selected. Void where prohibited.

Click here to visit the Daily Grommet homepage.

We woke up today to a review of Daily Grommet that makes us very, very happy.   Springwise.com is an intelligent, highly regarded global newsletter on innovation and trends, which “scans the globe for the most promising business ventures, ideas and concepts…” (its own words).  It’s clear that they truly “get” Daily Grommet. Here’s a reprint of the article:

Curated marketplace shares one product story each day

Product life stories can be used to demonstrate sustainability—as in the case of Made-By, which we just recently covered—but they also simply make new products more interesting. Such authenticity-boosting status stories are at the heart of the Daily Grommet, a curated marketplace that highlights one such tale every day.

Currently in beta, Massachusetts-based Daily Grommet releases a profile of one new product each day at noon Eastern US time. Products chosen for inclusion on the site range from household products to kids’ items to simple indulgences; most are from small, independent producers and are selected for their combination of craft, utility, invention and style. Many products are submitted by visitors to the site; others are discovered through team members’ own research. On Tuesday of this week, for example, the product profiled was “Arghand hand-crafted soap pebbles from Afghanistan,” complete with video, social and environmental context, and specific product details. Subscribers to the Daily Grommet can comment online about a particular day’s profile as well as buying products online; widgets are also available for publishers, with revenue opportunities through shared sales or click-throughs.

Combining thoughtful curation, status stories and a pinch of planned scarcity, the Daily Grommet is attempting to go a step beyond Etsy and other online marketplaces with its up-close focus on product origins. Artists, craftsmen and manufacturers around the globe are no doubt lining up for consideration even as we speak; for all others, one to emulate with a niche or regional approach…?

Source:  http://springwise.com/retail/dailygrommet/

If you like to know what’s coming trend-wise, Springwise has a great weekly newsletter to which you may subscribe.  Check it out — it’s definitely a site you should visit…often.

Two people sent me a link to this photo.  (Thanks Carol Cohen, and Heidi Hofer!)   It ran in the NYT, in an article about the Vienna Biennale.  But the reason they shared was, as Carol wrote, “ Did you see today’s NYT? GROMMET ART!!!!!

We’re excited to share some more great news — Jules is a new Intent Voice on Intent.com.

Intent is an inspirational wellness destination that captures and shares people’s life intentions – personal, social, career, spiritual and environmental.  As I  took it for a test drive, I kept finding myself absorbed by so many appealing posts — the writing is impeccable, and the topics are timely and fascinating as they focus on wellness and all kinds of truly healthy life aspirations.

Intent Voice bloggers generously share relevant information or advice in their area of expertise.  Intent tapped Jules for her background in entrepreneurship, building consumer brands,  social media, cultural anthropology and design.  Jules will also be talking about her unique perspective on finding success in your career path and building your career while balancing your family’s needs.  Advice we all need.

Jules is in good company along with other Intent Voices such as Deepak Chopra, Don Miguel Ruiz (Toltec master and author), Larry Dossey (advocate of the role of mind in health) , Ed Begley, Jr. (actor and environmental activist)  and Russell Simmons (founder of the hip hop label Def Jam) among others.   Each Intent Voice announces his or her own primary intent, and Jules’ is as follows:

My intent is to help people find the good stuff — products, experiences, causes.

We invite you to check out Intent, not only because we’re excited that Jules is one of it’s featured Voices, but also because we think it’s a great site filling an important need.  Inspiration on our paths to wellness.  I think we can all use some of that.