LEXINGTON, Ky., Aug. 1, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- Theo Edmonds is an unashamed 'hillbilly.' He's an urban renaissance man: lives in a warehouse loft by a railroad, wears overalls while creating art, writes poetry, performs in local musical theatre productions, and holds law and graduate degrees from Tulane University. And, he is on his way to his first million which he intends to use to turn the culture of Appalachia into the hottest, chic, cosmopolitan trend in art and design in the United States with a significant percentage of the net profits from his new company, Hillbilly Chic(tm), to benefit his beloved home: Kentucky!
"I think BIG!" Edmonds begins, "And, BIG IDEAS take BIG MONEY if you want to make them happen. So, I had a BIG PROBLEM! Then one day, as I was doing some research on the internet, I stumbled on a website from the United Kingdom where a guy was raising money for college by selling single pixels on a webpage for $1 per pixel. There are a million pixels on a webpage. Immediately, I knew I had found a way to raise the large amount of start-up capital that was going to be required in order to launch a BIG IDEA in a BIG WAY."
Edmonds, who was already developing a new cooperative marketing website for Lexington businesses and had an interest in promoting Kentucky's art scene (www.CoolLifeKy.com), and his team (Tom Weisenbach and Amanda Bridges) got to work quickly and created the COOL $1,000,000 start-up capital fund page to sell $1 pixels on the CoolLifeKY website.
"I believe that we have a strong commercial product/service, a great marketing/business plan and tremendous potential with Hillbilly Chic(tm) and its companion project Design Garage 21C(tm)," said Edmonds. "Most importantly, we have an intellectually honest mission of redefining for the world the forward thinking, ingenious and extraordinary culture of original and self-sustaining creativity that ordinary folks called 'hillbillies' began building over 200 years ago."
"As for whether or not our approach to raising the necessary start-up funds with the COOL $1,000,000 webpage will be successful or not," said Edmonds with a clever hillbilly grin, "well, this is uncharted territory for us and, to a degree, we're making this up as we go, so let's just wait and see."
On Friday, August 3, 2007 from 6-9 p.m., KY's emerging creative class, entrepreneurial business community and local political leaders will be gathering at The Lorillard Lofts, commercial real estate developer Robert A. McGoodwin's (www.coolspaces.com) latest upscale loft/condo conversion in a 1940's tobacco processing plant in downtown Lexington, KY, to join Edmonds' and his team in the launch Hillbilly Chic(tm) and Design Garage 21C(tm) and formally begin the $1,000,000 start-up fund campaign. The event is free and open to the general public.
To find out more about Edmonds, visit his new blog spot http://mky.marketingky.com/
To see a visual preview of Hillbilly Chic(tm), log onto the new cooperative marketing website Edmonds created www.coollifeky.com